18

Stuart Britain and the Crisis of Monarchy, 1603-1702

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SECTION THREE From republic to restored and limited monarchy, 1649-78

Topic 18 The emergence of Court and Country ‘parties’

Key Question: How and why did MPs divide into Court and Country ‘parties’ by 1678?

The development of the ‘Court party’ and ‘Country party’

The reign of Charles II is commonly seen as the period in which a formal division opened up between members of the Political Nation. Said to have initially evolved from the polarisation of the nobility and gentry class into two distinct groups during the Civil War: Cavaliers (supporters of a relatively unlimited monarchy) and Roundheads (supporters of a monarchy that was restrained by parliament). By the 1660-70s, this basic division had developed into what has been termed a ‘Court party’ and a ‘Country party’.

The growing factionalism of politics and government under Charles II can be exemplified by the way in which each of his leading ministers met their downfall.

The Earl of Clarendon: Despite Clarendon’s seemingly dominant position as the King’s favourite and Chief Minister in the years after 1660, several fundamental weaknesses left him vulnerable:

• his business-like approach and arrogance prevented him from building up a network of supporters at Court, and at times also alienated the King;

• he was resented for the extent of his power over Charles and never gained the full support of other members of the Privy Council;

• Clarendon angered the Political Nation by advising Charles to avoid conflict with the Netherlands at a time when colonial rivalry was at its height – this won him few friends as warfare was seen as the natural pursuit of a monarch, and when he was overruled by the King, his position was weakened;

• he lacked competence in managing opposition in Parliament, which allowed his enemies to develop their position and strike when he was at his weakest point (the failure of the Second Anglo-Dutch War);

• Clarendon’s daughter, Anne Hyde, was married to James, Duke of York, brother to the King and heir to the throne, leading to accusations of nepotism and self-aggrandisement by jealous rivals, especially given that the royal marriage that Clarendon had arranged for Charles (with Catherine of Braganza) was childless.

The combination of these factors meant Charles found it very easy to abandon Clarendon when his alleged mismanagement of the Second Anglo-Dutch War (1664-67) ended with the embarrassing capture of the English flagship, The Royal Charles, from its naval base in Chatham. Accused by rival MPs of treason, Clarendon voluntarily went into exile in France when it became clear that the King would not support him.

The lack of intervention afforded to his most trusted servant led future ministers to conclude that they could not depend on this self-centred King to protect them from Parliament’s wrath when things went wrong. They were therefore now more likely to seek alliances with other like-minded MPs than prioritise the execution of royal policy. Above all, ministers started to put the maintenance of their own positions before matters of state.

The Cabal: Despite the perception of others that the Cabal were a coordinated and secretive faction, they rarely formed a united front, and their internal quarrels often spilled over into the public arena. It has been suggested that the King actually encouraged the personal rivalries between the members of the Cabal, in the belief that this made them easier to control. They, in turn, never trusted him not to orchestrate their downfall in the same way as he had abandoned Clarendon.

The Cabal’s reputation as untrustworthy and self-seeking made them extremely unpopular throughout the Political Nation. Sir William Coventry, Secretary to the Admiralty, resigned from his office following the challenge to a duel from Buckingham, and became the spokesman of a group of marginalised MPs who were all loudly opposed to the Cabal and its policies. In the face of this opposition, Charles accepted the Cabal’s recommendation to keep the Cavalier Parliament out of session for as long as he could, so as to leave the five ministers to run the country without the interference of MPs. In the end, the financial crisis that occurred after the Stop of the Exchequer and the outbreak of the Third Anglo-Dutch War in 1672, forced Charles to eventually re-convene Parliament for a longer session. When MPs reassembled, they were determined to exact revenge on the Cabal.

During an acrimonious parliamentary session in November 1673, Charles dismissed Clifford, on account of his Catholicism, and Ashley-Cooper (now Earl of Shaftesbury) as Lord Chancellor for his support of The Test Act and criticisms of the lack of government reform. With Lauderdale still north of the border, little was now left of the Cabal. Its fate was finally sealed in January 1674. Buckingham came under heavy attack in the Commons for encouraging the King’s pro-French, pro-Catholic foreign policy. In an effort to save himself, he leaked details of the secret terms of The Treaty of Dover and suggested it had been the work of Arlington. Such was the ill-feeling in Parliament that Charles now had no choice but to dismiss both ministers and sign The Treaty of Westminster (1674), bringing the Third Anglo-Dutch War to an end.

The Earl of Danby: Having witnessed first-hand how quickly Clarendon and the Cabal had fallen from power, Danby’s principal aim as Chief Minister was to maintain and increase his own political influence. To achieve this, he was possibly the first minister to deliberately use patronage to develop a group (or ‘party’) of Commons MPs who were entirely subservient to him. By late-1675, 30 MPs were receiving substantial Crown pensions and personalised letters from Danby, with instructions on how to conduct themselves during parliamentary debates. He carefully cultivated friendships with the King’s mistresses to secure direct access to the monarch, and used proxy voting (i.e., the practice of having absent peers nominate another Member vote on their behalf) to manage the passing of legislation. Such was the extent to which he dispensed sinecures (i.e., paid offices, with few or no duties to be performed) that his opponents nicknamed him the ‘Bribe Master General’.

However, in establishing a ‘Court’ party, Danby inadvertently helped the development of a rival ‘Country’ party of MPs within the wider Political Nation who resented his influence. When it became known that Danby had acquiesced to Charles’s continuing communications with Louis XIV, despite professing to Parliament that England was now allied with the Dutch against France, these MPs charged Danby with having assumed royal powers for himself by treating matters of peace and war without the knowledge of the Privy Council. Despite the obvious reality that Danby had only been following the King’s direct instruction, Charles had few qualms about dismissing him, and when the Commons pursued Danby under threat of an Act of Attainder, he was committed to the Tower for the next five years.

The significance of Court and Country ‘parties’

Britain’s first official political parties – the Tories and the Whigs – are thought to have originated from the initial ‘Court’ v. ‘Country’ divide in the 1660s-70s. By c.1680, the distinction had been brought into sharp focus by the Exclusion Crisis – the constitutional debate over whether James, Duke of York (the legitimate successor to Charles II, but an open Catholic) should inherit the throne. However, other important differences can also be identified.