INTRODUCTION

According to discoveries made by Titus Oates in the autumn of 1678, England was threatened by a Roman Catholic conspiracy headed by the Pope and the King of France, whose objectives were: 1) to murder the King, 2) to overthrow the government, and 3) to destroy the Protestant religion. Although Oates was subsequently exposed as a charlatan, in 1678-81 a panic held the nation in an iron grip, and belief in the Plot fostered irrational and reprehensible excesses. The Popish Plot was not so much a religious fraud as a political cause célèbre, the significance of which can be assessed only in the context of the republican movement of the seventeenth century to redistribute power within the state. The conflict which developed between Charles II and the Parliament during the 1670's reflects the struggle for ascendance of two opposing theories of government: absolute versus limited monarchy. Charles, supported by the Tories and the Anglican clergy, was determined to maintain all the hereditary privileges and powers of an English monarch, while the Whig coalition in Parliament, led by the Earl of Shaftesbury, was intent upon subordinating the power of the Crown to the will of Parliament. The Opposition realized almost immediately that in the Popish Plot lay means for furthering their schemes of political reform. Under the guise of counteracting the Plot, they hoped to enact legislation to: 1) increase parliamentary power, 2) limit the prerogatives of the King, 3) control the succession, and 4) curtail the influence of the prelacy. Published in 1680 when the Plot crisis was at its peak, Citt and Bumpkin is one of a series of pamphlets by Sir Roger L'Estrange written to support the policies of Charles II and to defend the government from attacks by the Whig Opposition.

Since James, Duke of York, had given the Whigs every reason to believe that he would oppose their policies vehemently after he came to the throne, they decided to take advantage of the public resentment against him as a Roman Catholic to try to pass a bill in Parliament to exclude him from the succession. James had already been accused of conspiring with the French King to overthrow Protestantism in England and institute Roman Catholicism as the state religion. In addition to reiterating this charge, the Whigs enlarged upon the awkwardness and danger bound to arise in a Protestant nation with a Roman Catholic ruler. The question of a Popish successor soon came to be the principal concern of Parliament, and the battle over the Exclusion Bill dominated the political scene in 1679-81. While the Exclusion crisis was at its height, Charles II circumvented this plan to deprive the Duke of York of his hereditary title by repeatedly proroguing and dissolving Parliament so that the bill could not be brought to a final vote. This series of adjournments began when Charles dissolved the Parliament soon after the Exclusion Bill was first introduced in the spring of 1679. After a bitterly fought election contest during the summer of 1679, the newly constituted Parliament assembled in October only to be prorogued once again until 26 January 1680. The Whigs were furious and began to fear that the King had no intention of permitting the Parliament to meet even in January. Powerless to act legally out of Parliament, the Whigs realized that a long series of postponements would lead to the defeat of all their carefully drafted legislative plans. To combat Charles' delaying tactics, the Opposition hit upon the expedient of petitioning him to allow Parliament to sit. By a strong demonstration of popular will, they hoped to force the King to comply with their demands.

Under the leadership of Shaftesbury and his followers in the Green Ribbon Club, the Whigs achieved a degree of party organization and efficiency in the autumn and winter of 1679-80 which remained unrivalled during the seventeenth century.[1] While petitions were being printed in London, the country was divided into districts; then petitions were distributed to party agents everywhere who systematically canvassed for signatures. In London, blank petitions were conveniently placed in coffee houses and taverns; pens and inkstands appeared in the Strand and at the Royal Exchange. Since these petitions were designed as instruments to convey the will of the masses, emphasis was placed on collecting large numbers of signatures with scant concern for the political, economic, or social status of the subscribers. According to the Tory historian Roger North, the people were warned by the promoters of the petitions that, if the King were allowed to govern without a Parliament, despotism would inevitably ensue, followed by a resurgence of Popery.[2] Frightened, and in some cases confused by these formidable predictions and threats, many people (especially in the country) subscribed. After the canvassing had been completed, the petitions were sent to London for presentation to the King.

The petitions themselves were phrased inoffensively enough, stressing the fact that the Popish Plot had created a state of national emergency and requesting that Parliament be called to deal with this danger. The first petition, The Humble Address and Advice of several of the Peeres of this Realm For the Sitting of the Parliament, was presented to the King at Whitehall on 7 December by ten Whig peers. Charles accepted the petition and dismissed them. But he could not dismiss the rumors of countless other petitions in preparation and the unavoidable disturbance such an onslaught would produce. Since the petitions were not promoted through official channels, and since there was evidence that they were designed to create tumult for seditious ends, Charles denounced them as illegal. Moreover, on 11 December the King issued a Royal Proclamation forbidding seditious and tumultuous petitioning. The effects of the Proclamation were twofold. The Tories, who objected to petitioning as a popular movement carried on by men without substance or position, received the Proclamation everywhere as an expression of the King's disapproval, and cited it as an authority to discourage others from promoting and subscribing to petitions. The Whigs, on the other hand, protested that petitioning was the legal right of the subject and resumed their petitioning activities with added vigor.

In order to demonstrate his firm resolve not to be intimidated in the exercise of his prerogative to call and dismiss Parliament, and in order to rob the petitioning movement of its impetus by destroying its immediate objective, Charles issued a second Proclamation on 11 December proroguing Parliament from 26 January to 11 November 1680. Spurred on by the realization that so long a recess would utterly ruin their hopes, the Whigs directed considerable effort toward promoting an official petition from the City of London.[3] Because of the power and prestige of the City, the Whigs felt that such a petition would lend encouragement to those being prepared in the country. Accordingly, they arranged to present a petition from the City of London for a vote in the Common Council on 20 January. The King deliberately attempted to frustrate the London petition by purging the City Council of disaffected members through enforcement of the Act for Regulating Corporations. This Act disqualified all Dissenters, who usually held Whig principles. Consequently, by the time the petition was brought to a vote, the Tories had gained enough support to defeat the referendum by a small margin. Although this ballot was won in effect only by the votes of the Court of Aldermen, it was accounted a great victory for the Court Party and left the Whigs sorely disappointed.

The peak of petitioning activity occurred during the month of January, and the atmosphere became increasingly more tense as the day approached upon which Parliament was supposed to meet. The week following the Common Council's rejection of the London petition was the most strained. Petitions continued to appear daily, though the King received them with marked disfavor and sharply rebuked the delegates who delivered them. When Monday, 26 January, finally arrived, the air was charged with excitement; everyone crowded to Westminster to see what would happen. But Charles had no intention of capitulating. As soon as the Lords and Commons were assembled, the King addressed them, reaffirming his determination to prorogue them and implying that the recent petitions had served only to strengthen his resolve. The Whigs complained bitterly but offered no open resistance. Charles had won the day and emerged with his prerogative untarnished but not unchallenged. Shortly after this coup, a counter reaction to petitioning set in, and a wave of loyalty gained momentum and found expression in the form of abhorrence addresses which poured in from all over the kingdom condemning the practice of petitioning and professing loyalty to King and Court.

A fortnight after the prorogation of Parliament, just before the tide of abhorrence addresses began to inundate the capital, on 10 February, Narcissus Luttrell (indefatigable collector of Popish Plot ephemera) recorded possession of the most important pamphlet written about petitioning—Sir Roger L'Estrange's Citt and Bumpkin. Whether the date which Luttrell gives represents the day of publication as well as the day of purchase is a matter of conjecture, but his note does establish the fact that the pamphlet was available to the public and in Luttrell's hands by 10 February. Corroboration that the pamphlet was in circulation before the end of February comes also from L'Estrange's bookseller Henry Brome, who first advertised Citt and Bumpkin for sale as already published in a list of pamphlets dated 27 February. On 5 March in the Popish Courant, a companion sheet to The Weekly Pacquet of Advice from Rome, a violently anti-Papist newspaper in which L'Estrange was frequently traduced, Henry Care condemned Citt and Bumpkin in a list of Catholic libels, "All publisht within little more than this fortnight." Although less precise than Luttrell's note, the references by Brome and Care help confirm the hypothesis that Citt and Bumpkin was published by mid-February. Further evidence which helps to define the date of publication occurs within the text of the pamphlet itself. On page 24, L'Estrange mentions Henry Care's History of the Damnable Popish Plot and says it appeared on 26 January. This date in turn is verified by two advertisements for the work in Care's own journal—one on 23 January announcing its impending release, and another on 30 January commenting on its recent publication. Since Citt and Bumpkin obviously appeared after Care's tract was released and before Luttrell's entry was made, it must have been published during the fortnight between 26 January and 10 February.

Citt and Bumpkin was not only the best written pamphlet on petitioning, it was also the most ambitious in scope. Arranging his material artfully, L'Estrange presented it with the wit and skill that demonstrate unequivocably his mastery of the polemic medium. Unlike most other party writers who confined their efforts to a few folio pages, L'Estrange sustained his performance through 38 quarto leaves of readable, entertaining prose. Moreover, his objectives and arguments were much more comprehensive and sophisticated than those of the other pamphleteers engaged in the controversy over petitioning. Most Tory writers treated petitioning as an isolated issue and directed their attack accordingly, failing to relate any of their arguments to each other or to a larger scheme. Many authors attempted to defeat petitioning by identifying the petitions of 1680 with those of the 1640's leading up to the Civil War. In addition, some insisted that petitioning was illegal and defended the Proclamation against it, while others tried to discredit the organizers and promoters of petitions as disaffected persons motivated by hopes of preferment and profit. At the same time, they launched a collateral attack upon those members of Parliament who actively encouraged petitioning. There was even a general indictment of Parliament as a whole, suggesting that it intended to usurp the King's prerogatives and take sovereignty upon itself. But there was no definite, direct statement that a plot led by the petition managers was actually underway to subvert the government. In Citt and Bumpkin L'Estrange accused the republicans and Dissenters of actively promoting a Protestant Plot more insidious than the Popish Plot but with identical goals: 1) to kill the King, 2) to undermine the government, and 3) to destroy the established Church of England. Throughout the pamphlet, which is an exposé of this alleged conspiracy, L'Estrange supplied a great deal of specific factual detail upholding his claims. His objective was not merely to discredit petitioning, but to lessen belief in the Popish Plot and to launch a counterattack against the enemies of the Court. By indicating that petitioning was not an end in itself but an integral part of a larger plan, L'Estrange managed to censure petitioning per se, to increase its odium by linking it with the greater disaster of rebellion and civil war, and yet to preserve a sense of proportion by directing the brunt of his attack against the Protestant Plot as a whole.