From all these facts it follows that, if at the commencement of the fourteenth century the Parliament was not yet constituted in an actual and definite form, yet it already rested on a fixed basis: moreover, as to its composition, we may deduce from the facts to which I have already referred, the following results:
I. The Parliament was composed, in the first place, of earls or lay barons convened individually by the king; secondly, of archbishops, bishops, abbots, and priors, also summoned individually; thirdly, of deputies from the knights or freeholders of the counties; fourthly, of deputies from cities, towns, and boroughs.
II. No law or statute, no ancient or recognized right, determined who were the earls, barons, abbots, &c., whom the king was bound to convoke individually. He acted somewhat arbitrarily in this respect, often omitting to summon those whom he had summoned on previous occasions. [Footnote 33] These omissions were sometimes, though rarely, resisted by protests. The importance of a noble and of his family was the only guarantee of his convocation to the Parliament. Disorder, civil wars, and confiscations, prevented this convocation from being an incontestable and hereditary right, except in the case of a permanent feudal tenure.
[Footnote 33: Thus Edward summoned to the Parliament of Shrewsbury (1283) a hundred and eleven earls or barons; to the Parliament of Westminster (1295), he only summoned fifty-three; and out of the hundred and eleven who were present in 1283, sixty were absent in 1295. The latter Parliaments of his reign furnish several instances of similar irregularities. Thus we find at this time ninety-eight lay proceres who were only once summoned to the Parliament, and fifty who were summoned once, twice, or three times. There was a distinction among the barons who were summoned individually: some were summoned by virtue of their feudal tenure, others, only in virtue of the writ of convocation, whether they were or were not immediate vassals of the king. These last exercised in the Parliament the same rights as the former, only it does not appear that the sole fact of a writ of convocation conferred upon them a hereditary right. There are even several examples of ecclesiastical peers who were convened by special writs, and who obtained a discharge from the obligation to attend the Parliament by proving that they held no fief of the king. The practice of creating barons or peers was of later introduction: first, by a statute of the Parliament (under Edward III.); secondly, by letters patent from the king (under Richard II.).]
III. The principal functionaries of the king, such as the judges and members of the privy council, were almost always convened to the Parliament by virtue of their official position; indeed, they were uniformly either earls or barons.
IV. The convocation of county and borough deputies was not a legal or public necessity; but it became an actual necessity by the predominance of the principle that consent in all matters of impost was a right.
V. The convocation of county deputies was more certain and regular than that of borough deputies; more certain, because it originated partly in a right which had not then been questioned, and which it was necessary to respect, the right, namely, of every immediate vassal to a seat in the general assembly; more regular, because the county courts, which were all composed of the same elements and possessed of the same interests, constituted a uniform and identical whole throughout England, so that some could not be admitted to the privilege of representation without all the rest being admitted also. As the towns and boroughs, on the other hand, only owed their admission into Parliament to varying causes without unity or connexion with each other, and were only called to assist in matters which concerned themselves individually; so the admission of a representative from one town did not at all involve the admission of representatives from other towns, nor even the continuance of this privilege in any one case.
VI. The number of town and borough deputies was not fixed. The king determined this arbitrarily. Nevertheless the convocation of two deputies for each county, and as many for each borough, passed into a rule.
VII. However irregular the convocation of borough deputies might be, there is no reason to think that the number of boroughs which were then represented in the assembly was as limited as has been assumed; there is no reason to think, as has been maintained by Tory historians, that only towns in the domains of the king originally sent deputies to Parliament. The assumption is, on the contrary, contradicted by facts which prove that, besides the towns belonging to the royal domain, those which had received a charter of incorporation, either from the king or from some great baron, were represented; as were also those which, without having received any such charter, were rich enough to pay the expenses of their deputies. However, the importance of particular towns, and the necessity that was felt for their concurrence in public business, was in this respect the only rule; and most frequently, the choice of the towns which should be represented was left to the arbitrary decision of the sheriffs.
Lecture XIV.
Mode of election of the deputies of counties and boroughs.
Who were the electors?
No uniform principle to regulate elections in boroughs and towns.
Voting in public.