The early Plantagenets

by William Stubbs

Decision of
Edward in
favor of
Balliol.

These facts will explain the position taken by Edward in 1290. He believed that upon him, as overlord, devolved the right of determining which of the many heirs was entitled to the succession. With great pomp and circumstance he undertook the task; obtained from the competitors a recognition of his character as arbitrator, and, after careful examination, decided the cause in favor of John Balliol, a powerful North Country baron of his own, in whom according to recognized legal right the inheritance vested. He was careful to obtain, on Balliol’s accession, a distinct homage for himself and his heirs for the whole kingdom of Scotland. This was the work of 1291 and 1292; early in 1293 symptoms began to show themselves that the result would not be lasting. The rising troubles in the North were followed by an alarm on the side of France. The opportunity given by these troubles, and the means taken by Edward to meet them, combined to produce the complication of difficulties which brought about the great constitutional crisis of the reign in 1297. The several points must be taken in order: the relations with France first.

Relations of
Edward
with the
French
king.

In France Edward still possessed Gascony and some small adjoining provinces, which, after all the vicissitudes of the preceding century, had, mainly by the honesty and friendly feeling of Lewis IX. and Philip III., been preserved to the French descendants of Henry II. In 1279 Eleanor of Castile, his wife, had claimed as her inheritance the little province of Ponthieu, lying on the coast between Flanders and Normandy, and her claim had been recognized by Philip III. But Philip died in 1285, and his son, Philip IV., generally known as Philip the Fair, was a true inheritor of the guile and ability of Philip Augustus. Edward’s long visit to France, from 1286 to 1289, had been spent partly in arranging for a continuance of friendship with the king, and partly in securing and reforming the administration of Gascony; but he must have been aware that the jealousy with which Philip viewed him would sooner or later take the form of downright hostility. Until 1293, however, they continued to be friends. In that year a series of petty quarrels, between the Norman coast towns and the English sailors, and an outbreak between the Gascons and their neighbors, gave Philip his opportunity. He summoned Edward to Paris to render an account for the misdeeds of the offenders, and on his non-appearance condemned him to forfeiture. This was done with considerable craft. Edward, who had lost his faithful wife in 1290, was engaged in a negotiation for marriage with Margaret, the sister of Philip; in preparation for that marriage a new enfeoffment or settlement of Gascony on the King of England and his heirs was agreed on. As a step towards that settlement the fortresses of Guienne were for form’s sake placed in Philip’s hands, and as soon as he had hold of them he declared Edward a contumacious vassal, for not having obeyed his summons to Paris. This was done in May, 1294.

Consequences
of the
quarrel with
Philip the
Fair.

The news of this outrageous proceeding was received in England with great indignation, and for a moment it appeared that the nation was unanimously determined to uphold the rights of the king. Even John Balliol, the King of Scots, who had got himself into trouble owing to his divided duties to his subjects and his overlord, and who was present in the Parliament which Edward called in June, offered to devote the whole produce of his English estates to maintain the righteous cause. A great scheme was set on foot for foreign alliances: the Spaniards were asked for substantial assistance; the princes of the Low Countries, the King of the Romans too, were taken into pay. A thorough scheme for the defence of the coast and organization of the navy was devised. Edward’s urgent needs or consistent policy led him to assemble, as we saw, the estates of the kingdom, in a way in which they had never been brought together before, and the parliaments of 1294 and 1295 completed the formation of the constitutional system. But a rising on the Welsh border prevented any general expedition in 1294; and the dread of a common enemy threw the Scots in 1295 into correspondence with France. Edward, provoked at the delay, pressed by the deficiency and waste of his resources, had recourse to very exceptional measures for raising money, and so produced a reaction against the foreign war, and a combination of political forces most dangerous to his own authority, and most trying to the new machinery of government at the very moment of its completion. The model parliament of 1295 was followed by the crisis of 1296, and the confirmation of charters of 1297.

Relations of
Edward
with the
clergy.

So strong a king, so determinate a policy, was sure to provoke complaints; the very enforcement of order wears the appearance of oppression. Both clergy and laity had their grievances, and Edward’s extremity gave them their opportunity. The clergy with a certain number of bishops at their head, had throughout the struggles of the century ranged themselves on the side of liberty. The inferior clergy had always had much in common with the people, and John’s conduct during the Interdict had broken the alliance which ever since the Norman Conquest had subsisted between the great prelates and the court. Stephen Langton had set an example which was bravely followed. Henry III., by his love of foreigners, his obsequious behaviour to the popes, and his unscrupulous dealings in money matters alienated the national Church almost as widely as John had done; while Simon de Montfort had conciliated all that was good and holy. But when Henry III. with the abuses which he had maintained, had passed away, and when Church and nation alike saw that Edward was laboring for the benefit of his people with all his heart, matters might have been changed. There was doubtless need for watchfulness on the part of the clergy, for the ministers of the court were always on the lookout for means to limit the spiritual power; but defensive watchfulness is a different thing from aggression. Three successive archbishops had ruled since Edward’s accession, all of them anxious to promote the independence of the Church and to diminish the power of the crown, even if it were to be done by throwing the Church more entirely into the hands of the Pope. Hence it was that Archbishop Peckham in 1279 had declared himself the champion of the Great Charter, although the Great Charter was not assailed, and had in a council at Reading passed several canons which were intended to limit the king’s action in ecclesiastical causes. Edward in return had taken his opportunity of repressing what seemed to him to be ecclesiastical innovation; he had interfered to prevent the publication of the canons, and had made the archbishop apologize and withdraw them. Not content with this, he took advantage of the occasion to pass the statute “De Religiosis,” by which he prevented the clergy from acquiring more land than they held at the time, without express permission. The taxation of the clergy too was heavy; the popes were as willing to minister to Edward’s needs as they had been to supply his father with money from the revenues of the English Church. More than once they had empowered him to collect a three years tenth of all the revenue of the clergy for the purpose of a crusade which was never carried out, and in 1288 Pope Nicolas IV. ordered a new and very exact valuation of all church property. This valuation included both temporal property, that is land, and spiritual, that is tithes and offerings. Such a permanent record laid them open at any moment to exaction. But Edward was not satisfied to have to ask the Pope’s leave to tax his own subjects, whether clerical or lay; he had begun to assemble the clergy in councils of their own, for the purpose of obtaining money grants, and, a little later, gave them a representative constitution as an estate of parliament. They were, on the other hand, unwilling to obey the summons to attend a secular court, and to spend their money on secular purposes, much more so when it was demanded out of all proportion and without reasonable consultation. Robert Winchelsey, who became archbishop in 1294, was fitted to be the leader of a strong ecclesiastical opposition. He was a pious, learned and far-seeing man, but he was fully possessed with the idea that the king was determined to subject the Church to the State; and he knew that in the Pope, Boniface VIII., he had a friend and supporter who would not desert him. He was ready to fight the battle the prospect of which was very near.

Quarrel between
Edward and the
clergy.

Edward regarded the situation of affairs in 1294 as entitling him to assume the office of dictator; to take all advantage of the law offered him for raising men and money; but, if he saw means which the law did not warrant, to use them also as justified by the necessity of the case. So he not only assembled the barons, clergy, and commons, to obtain money grants from them, but seized the wool of the merchants and took account of the treasures of the churches. It is true that by negotiating with the merchants in assemblies of their own he obtained their consent to pay a large increase of custom on the wool, and that he did not actually confiscate the church treasure, still the measures were oppressive and alarming; and when in the autumn council of 1294 he demanded one-half of the revenue of the Church the alarm became a panic. The clergy yielded, only to find another heavy demand made on them the next year; but the king was becoming irritated by delay and the clergy emboldened by papal support. Boniface VIII., in February 1296, issued a famous Bull called, from its opening words, the Bull Clericis Laicos, in which he forbade the king to take or the clergy to pay taxes on their ecclesiastical revenue. Armed with this Archbishop Winchelsey in 1297 declined to agree to a money grant, and the king replied by placing all the clergy, who would not submit, out of the protection of the law.