Any owner, master, or mariner who cast away, burned, or otherwise destroyed a ship to the prejudice of underwriters of policies of insurance or of any merchants whose goods have been loaded on the ship was to suffer death.
The owners of ships were not liable for losses by reason of theft without their knowledge by the master or mariners of goods beyond the value of the ship. This was to prevent the discouragement of owning ships.
The insurance of merchant ships must give salvage rights [rights to take what may be left of the ships insured after paying the insurance on them] to the insurer. A lender on bottomry had benefit of salvage. No insurance could be for a greater amount than the value of one's interest in the ship or in the goods on board.
No waterman carrying passengers or goods for hire e.g. by wherryboat, tiltboat, or rowbarge, on the Thames River could take an apprentice unless he was a housekeeper or had some known place of abode where he could keep such apprentice or else forfeit ten pounds, and if he couldn't pay, do hard labor at the House of Correction for 14-30 days. Also he could not keep the apprentice bound to him. No apprentice could be entrusted with a vessel until he was 16 if a waterman's son and 17 if was he the son of a landman, and he had at least two years' experience. None but freemen, i.e. one having served an apprenticeship of seven years, could row or work any vessel for hire or be subject to the same punishment. This was to avoid the mischiefs which happen by entrusting apprentices too weak, unable, and unskillful in the work, with the care of goods and lives of passengers. Later amendment required that apprentices be age 14 to 20 and that there be no more than 40 passengers, with the penalty of transportation if there were over 40 and one drowned.
No boat on the Thames River could be used for selling liquors, tobacco, fruit, or gingerbread to seamen and laborers because such had led to theft of ropes, cables, goods, and stores from the ships. Excepted were boats registered at the guilds of Trinity and of St. Clement, but they had to show their owner's name and could only operate in daylight hours. The penalty was forfeiture of the boat.
All ships coming from places infected with the plague had to be quarantined and any person leaving a quarantined ship had to return and later forfeit 20 pounds, of which 1/3 could go to the informer, the rest to the poor. This was later raised to 200 pounds and six months in prison, and if the person escaped, he was to suffer death. Also later, a master of a ship coming from infected places or having infected people on board was guilty of felony and forfeited 200 pounds. If he did not take his vessel to the quarantine area on notice, he forfeited a further 200 pounds (later 500 pounds) and the ship, which could then be burned. The king was authorized to prohibit commerce for one year with any country infected by the plague and to forbid any persons of the realm from going to an infected place.
By 1714, there was a clear distinction between a king's private income and the Crown's public revenue. From 1714, the king's Treasurer as a matter of routine submitted annual budgets to Parliament. He was usually also the leader of the House of Commons and the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Proclamations by the Crown were more restricted to colonial and foreign affairs, to executive orders, and to instructions to officials. The high offices included the Chancellor, Keeper, President of the Council, Privy Seal, Treasurer, and two Secretaries of State, who were in charge of all foreign and domestic matters other than taxation, one for the north and one for the south. With Thomas More, the Chancellor had become more of a judge and less of a statesman. Other offices were: Paymaster General, Secretary of War, and Treasurer of the Navy. Starting with the monarch, government positions were given by patronage to friends and relatives, or if none, to the highest bidder. These offices were usually milked for fees and employed deputies, clerks, and scribes who worked for long hours at very modest wages. Most people believed that the offices of power and influence in the realm belonged to the nobility and gentry as indubitably as the throne belonged to the king. Assaulting, wounding, striking, or trying to kill a member of the Privy Council engaged in his duties was punishable by death without benefit of clergy. Civil and military commissions, patents, grants of any office or employment, including Justice of Assize, Justice of the Peace, court writs, court proceedings continued in force for six months after a king's death, unless superceded in the meantime.
The king's ministers were those members of his Privy Council who carried out the work of government. By distributing patronage, the ministers acquired the influence to become leading members of the House of Commons or the House of Lords. They made policy, secured the king's consent, and then put through the necessary legislation. The king was to act only through his ministers and all public business was to be formally done in Privy Council with all its decisions signed by its members. The king gradually lost power. The last royal veto of a Parliamentary bill was in 1708. By 1714, the Privy Council ceased making decisions of policy. Instead a cabinet not identified with any particular party was chosen by the Queen, who presided over their meetings, which were held every Sunday. It dealt with Parliament. In 1720, the number of peers in the House of Lords was fixed, so that the Crown could create no more. About 1720, Robert Walpole, son of a country squire, who came to be first minister of the Crown and the leader of the Whigs, organized the cabinet so that it was of one view. He led it for twenty years and thus became the first prime minister. He was brilliant at finance and lessened taxation. He restored trust in the government after the South Sea bubble scandal. He was successful in preserving the peace with other nations and providing stability in England that led to prosperity. The Whigs opposed a standing army and over-reaching influence of the Crown. They espoused the liberty of individual subjects. Their slogan was "liberty and property". They generally favored foreign wars.
Members of the Parliament felt responsible for the good of the whole country instead of accounting to their electors, but self- interest also played a part. Leading commercial magnates of the realm sought to be members of Parliament or governors of the Bank of England so they could take up government loans at advantageous rates, snap up contracts to supply government departments at exorbitant prices, and play an important part in deciding what duties should be charged on what goods. About 5% of the population could vote. Voting was open, rather than by secret ballot. Seats in Parliament could normally be bought either by coming to an arrangement with some landowner who had the right to nominate to a closed seat or by buying enough votes in constituencies where the electorate was larger and the contest more open. Factory owners and leading landowners sat together on committees drawing up plans for public works such as canal building, obtained the necessary permits from public authorities and organized the whole enterprise. In 1714, Parliament was allowed to last for seven years unless sooner dissolved by the king because of the expense and tumult of elections, which frequently occasioned riots, and sometimes battles in which men were killed and prisoners taken on both sides. Politics had become a career. Members of Parliament could not be arrested while Parliament was in session.