Fletcher of Saltoun

by George W. T. Omond

‘My Lord Chancellor,’ he said, ‘I am not surprised to find an Act for a supply brought into this House at the beginning of a session. I know custom has, for a long time, made it common. But I think experience might teach us that such Acts should be the last of every session; or lie upon the table, till all other great affairs of the nation be finished, and then only granted. It is a strange proposition which is usually made in this House, that if we will give money to the Crown, then the Crown will give us good laws; as if we were to buy good laws of the Crown, and pay money to our princes, that they may do their duty, and comply with their coronation oath. And yet this is not the worst, for we have often had promises of good laws, and when we have given the sums demanded, those promises have been broken, and the nation left to seek a remedy—which is not to be found, unless we obtain the laws we want, before we give a supply. And if this be a sufficient reason at all times to postpone a money Act, can we be blamed for doing so at this time, when the duty we owe to our country indispensably obliges us to provide for the common safety in case of an event, altogether out of our power, and which must necessarily dissolve the Government, unless we continue and secure it by new laws: I mean the death of her Majesty, which God in His mercy long avert.’

There was a long debate; and it was not until two days later, that the Ministers, seeing themselves in a minority, gave in, and allowed what was afterwards known as the Grand Resolve, of 28th May 1703, to pass without a division. By this Resolve it was declared that Acts for the security of religion, liberty, and trade were to have precedence over Supply or any other business whatsoever.

Fletcher, with the whole of the Opposition at his back, supported every proposal the effect of which was to guard against the influence of England, and to emphasise the fact that Scotland was an independent kingdom. But he had also elaborated a great scheme of his own, which he laid before the Estates. ‘Before the Union of the Crowns,’ he said, ‘no monarchy in Europe was more limited, nor any people more jealous of liberty than the Scots.’ But the result of the Union of the Crowns was that the people of Scotland lost their liberties. English influence, the source of every evil, had become supreme. Now was the time to strike a blow for freedom; and he proposed Twelve Limitations, or conditions on which, after the death of Anne, the Crown of Scotland was to go to the same Sovereign as should rule in England. These Limitations were: 1. Annual Parliaments, which should choose their own President, adjourn at their own pleasure, and vote by ballot. 2. That for every new peerage granted by the Crown, another county member should be added to the Parliament. 3. That none should vote in Parliament except peers or elected members. 4. That the king should not have the power of refusing the royal assent to any Act passed by the Estates. 5. That when Parliament was not sitting the executive Government should be in the hands of a Committee chosen by Parliament. 6. That the King should not have the power of making war or peace, or concluding any treaty, except with consent of Parliament. 7. That all offices, civil and military, and all pensions, should be given by Parliament, instead of by the King. 8. That without consent of Parliament there should be no standing army. 9. That a national militia, of all men between the ages of sixteen and sixty, should be at once armed with bayonets, firelocks, and ammunition. 10. That no general pardons should be valid without consent of Parliament. 11. That no judge should sit in Parliament, or hold any other office, and that the office of President of the Court of Session should be in three of the judges, named by the Estates. 12. That if the King should break any of these conditions, the Estates were to declare that he had forfeited the throne, and proceed to choose a successor.

These conditions, for proposing which he would have been sent to the gallows in the days of the Stuarts, and to Botany Bay in the days of Mr. Pitt, Fletcher pressed upon the Estates as essential for the protection of Scotland against England. ‘If,’ he said, ‘our Kings lived among us, it would not be strange to find these limitations rejected. It is not the prerogative of a King of Scotland I would diminish, but the prerogative of English Ministers over this nation. These conditions of Government being either such as our ancestors enjoyed, or principally directed to cut off our dependence on an English Court, and not to take place during the life of the Queen, he who refuses his consent to them, whatever he may be by birth, cannot sure be a Scotsman by affection. This will be a true test to distinguish, not Whig from Tory, Presbyterian from Episcopal, Hanover from Saint Germains, nor yet a courtier from a man out of place, but a proper test to distinguish a friend from an enemy to his country.’

But the Scottish Parliament, in spite of all its high-strung patriotism, was not prepared to accept so republican a scheme as this; and by a majority of twenty-six votes it was decided that the Laird of Saltoun’s Limitations should not form a part of the ‘Act of Security’ which the Estates were now engaged in framing.

The basis of this famous statute was a measure introduced by the Lord Privy Seal, providing that the Estates should meet within twenty days after the death of Anne, and proceed to name a Protestant successor to the throne of Scotland. But to this simple measure a number of clauses were added, until it grew into that elaborate Act which was the pivot on which Scottish history turned until the Union.

Rothes proposed a clause which embodied the principle of one of Fletcher’s Limitations: That war and peace were to be made only by consent of Parliament. Queensberry said that he was ready to consent to anything which was for the good of the country, and which ‘the Queen had under her view when she left London.’ This proposal, he said, she had never heard of.

On this Fletcher declared that it was now evident, as he had often thought, that in Scottish affairs the Crown was under the influence of English councillors. At these words some members were so ill-advised as to interrupt him, and even to suggest that he should be censured. This led to a scene. ‘What!’ exclaimed Hamilton, ‘is this the liberty of Parliament?’ There were shouts of ‘privilege’ from all parts of the House; and several members rose at the same time to demand that the member should be allowed, without interruption, to explain his words.

As soon as silence was obtained Fletcher continued. He had no difficulty, he said, in explaining. He spoke, not as a slave, but as a free man. He had the greatest respect for the Queen and for her Commissioner. But the love and duty which he bore to his country obliged him to speak as he had spoken. What the Commissioner had said that day convinced him that the only way to secure Scotland from English interference was to refuse to settle the Scottish Crown on the English Sovereign. The two countries must have separate Kings.

This statement was received with a tumult of applause; but the matter was allowed to drop. Nor did the Estates embody the clause proposed by Rothes in the Act of Security. The next great fight was over a clause introduced by Roxburghe. It provided that the Succession was not, on the death of Anne, to be the same in Scotland as in England, unless conditions of government were settled which would secure the independence of the Crown of Scotland, the power of the Estates, and the liberty and trade of the country ‘from the English or any foreign influence.’