Refugees from France and Ireland.
James attacks the Church establishment.
While Huguenot visitors excited the anger and pity of English Protestants, Irish Roman Catholics kept pouring into London to remind them of dangers nearer home. Tyrconnel’s countrymen gathered round him, and it was soon known that he would return to Ireland as generalissimo, and that great military and judicial changes would follow. Rumours of all this, and even the names of those who were to lose their places and of their successors were known in Dublin long before any intimation was given to the Lord Lieutenant, who found that he had very little power. The archbishopric of Cashel was vacant, and he proposed to fill it by making two translations and a new appointment: ‘though there be but one see vacant, yet, for the enlargement of His Majesty’s first-fruits, and to make them as considerable as I can upon this occasion, I have humbly proposed these removes.’ This was for the King, but in writing to Sancroft the Lord Lieutenant did not think it necessary to mention his plan of supporting the Church by taxing her. The process was too slow for James, who preferred to keep vacant sees in his own hands. By this means the establishment might be made to pay for the clergy of the King’s religion. When Clarendon had been a little more than two months in Ireland, Sunderland informed him that the King had long thought it necessary to make great changes there, and that these could no longer be delayed without much prejudice to his affairs. Catholics were to be admitted to the Council and to be sheriffs, magistrates, and members of corporations. New commissions in the army were already prepared and would soon be sent over.[145]
Protestant judges turned out.
As a preliminary to the general remodelling, Primate Boyle was deprived of the Great Seal, and no bishop has held it since. He was approaching his eightieth year, and accepted dismissal with a good grace, declaring, with imperfect apprehension of an archbishop’s duties, that he had made the whole business of his life to serve the Crown. Roman Catholics had found him impartial, and even Tyrconnel admitted this, but attributed it to craft, ‘and, by God, I will have him out.’ It was thought prudent to appoint a Protestant successor until the King felt strong enough for more extreme measures. The man chosen was Sir Charles Porter, who was needy and extravagant and thought likely to be subservient, but who afterwards showed unexpected independence. The next step was to remove three judges—Sir Richard Reynell from the King’s Bench, Robert Johnson from the Common Pleas, and Sir Standish Hartstonge from the Exchequer. They were all able men and nothing could be said against them, but they were Protestants, and that was enough. Johnson had been sixteen years a judge. Clarendon had pointed out that the Act of Supremacy obliged all officials to take the oath; if the King dispensed with that, he suggested that English Roman Catholics should be sent over. James answered that he did not see how employing some Catholic natives could harm ‘the true English interest there, so long as the Act of Settlement is kept untouched, which it must always be, though many ill and disaffected people are secured in their possessions by it.’ Ten days later Lord Chancellor Porter reached Dublin and publicly announced the King’s resolution not to have the Acts of Settlement shaken.[146]
Roman Catholic judges appointed.
The new Chancellor had heard the common report that there were to be three Roman Catholic judges, but he was told nothing officially, and the appointments were almost ostentatiously made without consulting him or the Lord Lieutenant. The vacancy in the King’s Bench was filled by Thomas Nugent, a son of the late Earl of Westmeath, who boasted about his promotion, and had his robes made in Dublin long before. Clarendon says he was ‘a man of birth indeed, but no lawyer, and so will do no harm upon the account of his learning.’ He and Lyndon, the other puisne judge, squabbled ‘like two women’ about precedence. Viceroy and Chancellor agreed that Nugent was foolish and troublesome. The new judge of the Common Pleas was Denis Daly, ‘one of the best lawyers of that sort,’ says Clarendon, ‘but of old Irish race, and, therefore, ought not to be a judge’; otherwise there was nothing against him except that he was ‘very bigoted and national.’ He had been bred a lawyer’s clerk, and made money, which he invested in land under Settlement titles. The appointment to the Exchequer was in some ways the most important of the three Courts, because it was the only one from which no writ of error lay in England. Charles Ingleby, an English Roman Catholic, having refused to go to Ireland, the place was given to Stephen Rice, whose abilities as a lawyer were not disputed. Clarendon was not even formally consulted, though his patent gave him the appointment of all judges and officers of the Exchequer except the Chief Baron. Nugent, Daly, and Rice were dispensed from taking the oath of supremacy, which had been invariably required ever since the second year of Elizabeth.[147]
A new Privy Council.
Tyrconnel made commander-in-chief.
Clarendon was ready to do anything that the King wished, but he usually gave good advice, which was very seldom taken. Indeed, James said plainly that he had made up his mind to remodel the administration, both civil and military, and would go to work at once quite irrespective of anything the Lord Lieutenant might say, who, having been only a short time in Ireland, could not possibly give His Majesty ‘so good an account as he had already received from persons of undoubted integrity and zeal for his service.’ Having begun with the bench, he went on to name nineteen Roman Catholic Privy Councillors, who were not to take the oath of supremacy. Among them were the three new judges, Richard Hamilton, Lord Galmoy, Justin MacCarthy, and Tyrconnel. Clarendon did not think that the dignity or usefulness of puisne judges would be enhanced by making them politicians, and neither Rice nor Daly were anxious for such promotion, though it flattered the vanity of Nugent, who was much the least able of the trio. Nagle, whose fees exceeded a Chief Justice’s salary, agreed with the Lord Lieutenant that a practising barrister was unfitted for the position. Having a large family, he could not afford to lose briefs, and he declared, and perhaps at this time really fancied, that he was not ambitious. In the meantime it became known that Tyrconnel, in pursuance of the scheme hatched before Charles II.’s death, was about to return as lieutenant-general, with power over the army, independent of the Viceroy, who was informed by Sir Robert Hamilton that he had seen the commission. Clarendon thought the creation of such a potentate absurd, as indeed it was, and he professed to disbelieve the story; but a fortnight later Rochester wrote to confirm Hamilton’s statement. Alarmed by such reports and by what they saw going on, several Protestant families left Ireland every week, carrying with them what they could realise. Industry was paralysed, and large employers of labour prepared to wind up their business and to make haste out of the country. The Government and the judges on circuit tried to settle men’s minds, but it was persistently rumoured that by Christmas Day no Protestant would be left in the army. At last Tyrconnel arrived, and the alarmists were soon seen to be better informed than those who cried peace when there was no peace.[148]