It is to Gillray that we owe the version embodying the glorification of autocratic boroughmongering as “The Pacific Entrance of Earl Wolf into Blackhaven,” January, 1792. Before Lord Grey’s Reform Bill altered the constituencies, in the sordid old days of corrupt influence, when the representative system of electing parliaments was purely theoretical, a certain number of territorial magnates apportioned about half the constituencies between them; of this, the “upper order,” or aristocratic patrons, trafficked in the seats in exchange for “honours” for themselves, or lent their boroughs to support ministerial influence in return for places and pensions, or offices—sinecures for choice—in which to provide for their less opulent relations; thus in the old lists of place-holders, pensioners, and “ministerial patronage” may be traced the younger sons and cousins in several degrees, besides the names of those who have by marriage entered the families of the prime holders of “marketable ware,” otherwise parliamentary interest. When boroughmongering was a profession—a very highly paid one—and boroughs were farmed for sale, it might be expected that a less elevated class of adventurers would treat the question of buying and selling “seats” in parliament like any ordinary item of commerce, as was the fact; the markets fluctuated, thus we find Lord Chesterfield, whose authority is unquestionable, looking round for some venal borough to bring in that young hopeful to whom he addressed the famous “Letters,” thinking it a finishing part of a gentleman’s training to be in the House; the ex-ambassador communicated with an agent, proposing to pay “twenty-four hundred pounds for a seat,” presumably the price in Chesterfield’s younger days; but he found seats had risen to inordinate rates—up to five thousand pounds—owing to imported competition, chiefly rich factors returned home with fortunes from the East and West Indies. Bubb Dodington has set down in his “Diary” how he, the lordly proprietor of this said “marketable ware,” went about bargaining to bring in ministerial nominees for his five or six seats in exchange for places at the disposal of the administration; and instances might be multiplied to a tedious extent from the journals of the House containing the evidence of trafficking in boroughs and buying up voters, en gros et en détail, as disclosed on controverted elections.
This condition of affairs produced a mechanical majority as long as the prime minister in power could command wealth and influence sufficient to secure a larger number of seats than the opposition. It was in this direction that the famous electioneering genius, the Marquis of Wharton, spent a hundred thousand pounds in William III. and Queen Anne’s days; while Walpole manipulated such huge sums, thinly disguised as “Secret Service Money,” that, never wealthy enough to purchase all, and meeting occasional honest members, he was, at intervals, impeached for corruption in a House two-thirds venal, as it is alleged.
Walpole’s successors, who finally drove him from office, bought elections on even a more extended scale; the Pelhams were clever dissemblers and apt negotiators for this commodity; it was written of the Duke of Newcastle, by his antagonist, Lord Hervey, it is believed:—
“And since his estate at Elections he’ll spend,
And beggar himself without making a friend;
So while the extravagant fool has a sous,
As his brains I can’t fear, so his fortune I’ll use.”
Major Cartwright, the advocate of universal suffrage, who had the misfortune to live a trifle before the times were ripe enough for reform to be carried, addressed a petition to parliament in 1820, showing “that 97 Lords usurped 200 seats in the Commons House in violation of our Laws and Liberties;” while 90 wealthy commoners “for 102 vile sinks of corruption (pocket boroughs) brought in the House 137 members;” Ministerial patronage returning another twenty, thus giving, according to the petitioner’s statistics, “a total of 353 members corruptly or tyrannically imposed on the Commons in gross violation of the law, and to the palpable subversion of the constitution.” At that time the Earl of Lonsdale commanded eight seats, as did the Earl of Darlington. William Pitt, as already described, was seated in Parliament, 1781, by Lonsdale, then Sir James Lowther, who had been stigmatized by “Junius” as “The contemptuous tyrant of the North,” and who himself declared that he was in possession of the land, the fire, and the water of Whitehaven. When the youthful Pitt became premier, one of his first acts was to acknowledge his obligations to “the Wolf,” and Lowther was raised to the peerage as Earl Lonsdale. The “pacific entrance” of this plutocrat shows the docile “free and independent voters” of Whitehaven, driven by Lonsdale’s law agent, and lashed with thongs of “sham suits at law,” dragging the earl through the tumble-down streets of his town, every window being illuminated with candles in his honour. He exclaims, “Dear gentlemen, this is too much; now you really distress me!” Mobs of his miners are cheering vociferously, he having brought the townsmen to submission by suspending the working of his coal-mines. Fair canvassers, with complimentary inscriptions on their banners, head the triumphal procession:—
“The Blues are bound in adamantine chains
But freedom round each ‘Yellow’ mansion reigns!”
Before the parliamentary dissolution of 1796, the country was in an agitated state, for distress was prevalent among the poorer classes, the expenses of the continental wars were impoverishing the country, and there was a general outcry for peace; bread riots were common at the time, and the price of provisions in general was exceptionally high; political agitators were taking advantage of these circumstances to fulminate against the king and his ministers; while the various societies, called “seditious” by the Tories in office, received encouragement from the Whig party, whose prospects of succeeding to power were not encouraging. A meeting of an enthusiastic nature, largely attended, had been held in St. George’s Fields, the scene of the former riots, to petition for annual parliaments, and for universal suffrage, theories which at that time were regarded hopefully, and which would, it was anticipated, redress existing grievances. In the autumn of 1795, meetings were held at Copenhagen Fields, where an immense multitude assembled to sign addresses and remonstrances on the state of the nation. The immediate consequences of the inflammatory orations pronounced to the people on this occasion was that, on the opening of the final session of the parliament which had assembled in 1790, the king, on his way to the Peers to open the House in state, was assailed by vociferous cries of “Give us peace and bread!” “No war!” “No king!” “Down with him! down with George!” Before the House of Peers was reached, an attack was made on the royal carriage, stones were thrown, and one passed through the window. The riot on this occasion was made the pretext for the ministry to bring forward new bills for the defence of the king’s person, and to attempt further infringements on the liberty of the subject by interfering with the right of public meetings.
ENTRANCE OF EARL WOLF (LORD LONSDALE) INTO BLACKHAVEN. 1792. BY JAMES GILLRAY.
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