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Eighteenth-Century English Radicalism before Wilkes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2009

Linda Colley
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Extract

Addressing a Society consecrated to the advance of historical studies is bound to be an awesome experience: it is a particularly sobering one for me because the central argument of this paper would have been familiar to British historians writing in the early nineteenth century. In his Constitutional History of England, published in 1827, Hallam asserted, seemingly without fear of contradiction, that

‘it must be evident to every person who is at all conversant with the publications of George II's reign, with the poems, the novels, the essays, and almost all the literature of the time, that what are called the popular or liberal doctrines of government were decidedly prevalent. The supporters themselves of the Walpole and Pelham administrations … made complaints, both in parliament and in pamphlets, of the democratical spirit, the insubordination to authority, the tendency to republican sentiments, which they alleged to have gained ground among the people.’1

Type
Research Article
Information
Transactions of the Royal Historical Society , Volume 31 , December 1981 , pp. 1 - 19
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1981

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References

1 Hallam, H., The Constitutional History of England, from the Accession of Henry VII to the Death of George II (4 vols., London, 1827), II, p. 653Google Scholar.

2 [Perceval, John], Faction detected by the Evidence of Facts (2nd edn., London, 1743), p. 134Google Scholar; printed in Midgley, G., The Life of Orator Henley (Oxford, 1973), p. 216Google Scholar.

3 Williams, B., The Whig Supremacy 1714–60 (2nd edn., Oxford, 1962), p. 1Google Scholar; Brewer, J., Party Ideology and Popular Politics at the Accession of George III (Cambridge, 1976), pp. 19–20CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 Pocock, J. G. A., ‘Virtue and Commerce in the Eighteenth Century’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, iii (1972), 122–4Google Scholar.

5 Thompson, E. P., ‘Patrician Society, Plebeian Culture’, Journal of Social History, vii (1974), 388Google Scholar; and see his ‘Eighteenth-Century English Society: class struggle without class?’, Social History, iii (1978), 133–65Google Scholar.

6 Maccoby, S., English Radicalism 1762–1785. The Origins (London, 1955)Google Scholar. For a discussion of the often tenuous connection between eighteenth-century Dissent and political independence, see Bradley, J. E., ‘Whigs and Nonconformists: “Slumbering Radicalism” in English politics, 1739–1789’, Eighteenth Century Studies, ix (1975–1976), 1–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Note the implicit assumption that political dissidence was whig-bound.

7 Doddridge, Philip complained of Old Dissent's increasing stress on social respect-ability in Free Thoughts on the Most Probable Means of Reviving the Dissenting Interest (London, 1730), pp. 11–16Google Scholar. The limitations of such nonconformist political protest as existed in the mid-eighteenth century emerge from Hunt, N. C., Two Early Political Associations: the Quakers and the Dissenting Deputies in the Age of Sir Robert Walpole (Oxford, 1961). SeeGoogle ScholarWesley's, John ‘Word to a Freeholder’, printed in The Works of the Rev. John Wesley (14 vols., London, 1872), XI, pp. 196–8Google Scholar.

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11 See Kramnick, I., Bolingbroke and his Circle: the politics of nostalgia in the age of Walpole (London, 1968)Google Scholar. I have discussed the sociology of eighteenth-century toryism and the extent to which tory-plebeian rapport was or was not based on a common economic dispossession in chapters 1 and 6 of In Defiance of Oligarchy: the Tory Party 1714–60, to be published by Cambridge University Press in 1982.

12 Cf. Hume's argument that toryism flourished most within England's middle classes (Forbes, D., Hume's Philosophical Politics (Cambridge, 1975), p. 94Google Scholar; Thompson, , ‘Eighteenth-Century English Society’, 142–3)Google Scholar.

13 For the longstanding tory aversion to excises, see Hughes, E., Studies in Administration and Finance 1558–1825 (Manchester, 1934), pp. 119–91Google Scholar. See also Plumb, J. H., The Growth of Political Stability in England 1675–1725 (London, 1967), pp. 149CrossRefGoogle Scholar and 155; Commons Journals, XX, p. 319; Ilchester, Lord, Henry Fox, First Lord Holland, his Family and Relations (London, 1920), I, p. 309Google Scholar. For tory parliamentary agitation over turnpikes, see Commons Journals, XXI, pp. 823, 836 and 867; ibid., XXII, pp. 39 and 84.

14 Mathias, P. and O'Brien, P., ‘Taxation in Britain and France, 1715–1810. A comparison of the social and economic incidence of taxes collected by the central government’, Journal of European Economic History, v (1976), 606Google Scholar. For contemporary opinion, see [Shebbeare, John], A Third Letter to the People of England (3rd edn., London, 1756), pp. 46–7Google Scholar; William Kennedy, English Taxation 1640–1799: an essay on policy and opinion (1964 reprint), p. 107n; and Schuyler, R. L., Josiah Tucker: a selection from his economic and political writings (New York, 1931)Google Scholar.

15 de Krey, G. Stuart, ‘Trade, religion and politics in London in the reign of William III’, Princeton University, Ph.D. thesis, 1975, pp. 260–9 and 310Google Scholar. For tory agitation over Norwich and London, see Isaac, D. G. D., ‘A study of popular disturbances in Britain 1714–54’, Edinburgh University, Ph.D. thesis, 1953, pp. 211–13Google Scholar; for Bristol, see ‘A necessary CAUTION’, in The Poll Book … to which is prefix'd the controversy on both sides (Bristol, 1739)Google Scholar.

16 The tory campaign over Manchester's work-house can be traced in ‘The private journal and literary remains of John Byrom’, I, Part II, ed. Parkinson, R., Chetham Society, xxxiv (1855), 440–90Google Scholar.

17 One version of Carte's scheme is printed in Greaves, R. W., ‘A Scheme for the Counties’, Eng. Hist. Rev., xlviii (1933), 630–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

18 For a detailed discussion of these societies see my In Defiance of Oligarchy, chapters 5 and 6. See also Doolittle, I. G., ‘The Half Moon Tavern, Cheapside, and City Politics’, Transactions of the London and Middlesex Archaeological Society, xxviii (1977)Google Scholar; and Brown, A. F. J., Colchester in the Eighteenth Century (Colchester, 1969), pp. 12–20Google Scholar.

19 See chapter 5 of my In Defiance of Oligarchy, and Carte's, Thomas rather inflated assessment of the Steadfast Society in The History of Parliament: The House of Commons 1715–54, ed. Sedgwick, R. (London, 1970), I, p. 245Google Scholar.

20 For the Independent Electors, see Perceval's draft history in B.L., Add. MS. 47159, and Rogers, N., ‘Aristocratic Clientage, Trade and Independency: popular politics in pre-radical Westminster’, Past & Present, 61 (1973), 70–106CrossRefGoogle Scholar. I think Dr. Rogers has understated the society's tory connections, for which see Lord Egmont (the former Perceval) to Frederick, Prince of Wales, 17 November 1749 ‘Leicester House Politics, 1750–60’, ed. Newman, A. N., Camden Miscellany XXIII (R. Hist. Soc, 1969), p. 188Google Scholar.

21 A Key to the Present Session … Certain Important Hints deliver'd to an Assembly of Independents (London, 1742), p. 35Google Scholar; Foord, A. S., His Majesty's Opposition 1714–1830 (Oxford, 1964), pp. 234–5Google Scholar.

22 See Mathias, P., The Transformation of England: essays in the economic and social history of Englandin the eighteenth century (London, 1979), p. 118Google Scholar; Cranfield, G. A., The Development of the Provincial Newspaper 1700–60 (Oxford, 1962), pp. 133–7Google Scholar.

23 See Stephens, F. G., Catalogue of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum (London, 1877)Google Scholar, III, part II, print nos. 3340 and 3508.

24 Ibid., print nos. 805, 2142–4, 2494 and 2856.

25 The Derby revolt and its sponsors were reported in The Worcester Journal, 29 December 1748; see also the poll book for this by-election at the Institute of Historical Research. For Abingdon, , see Jackson's Oxford Journal, 20 04 1754Google Scholar.

26 Tory, advertisement printed in The Worcester Journal, 11 08 1748Google Scholar.

27 Thompson, , ‘Patrician Society’, 397Google Scholar. This and the next paragraph are based on a paper ‘Richmond Park, radical toryism, and republicanism in the mid-eighteenth century’, recently delivered to the Cambridge Historical Society. I hope to publish an extended version in the near future.

28 [Lewis, John], The Sequel of Advice to Posterity, concerning a Point of Last Importance (London, 1756), p. 69Google Scholar. And see his comments on the Law and England's lower orders in his Advice to Posterity (London, 1755), pp. 8–9Google Scholar.

29 For pledges in the 1722 election see The Freeholder's Journal, 21 March 1722, and John Barlow to Sir John Pakington, 22 February 1721 (Worcestershire R.O., Ace. 4657, vol. 3). For the distinction between electoral pledges and Instructions, see Kemp, Betty, ‘Patriotism, Pledges and the People’, Century of Conflict, ed. e (London, 1966), pp. 40–3Google Scholar, and Sutherland, Lucy S., ‘Edmund Burke and the Relations between Members of Parliament and their Constituents’, Studies in Burke and his Time, x (1968)Google Scholar.

30 SeeEdmund Burke on Government, Politics and Society, ed. Hill, B. W. (London, 1975), pp. 156–8Google Scholar; cf. Brewer, , Party Ideology and Popular Politics, pp. 236–7Google Scholar.

31 ‘Lord Perceval's answer to a deputation of the Independent Inhabitants of Westminster’ (West Sussex Record Office, Goodwood MS. 109, fo. 890), quoted by courtesy of the Trustees of the Goodwood Estate Company Ltd.

32 The Gentleman's Magazine, xxvii (1757), 344Google Scholar.

33 Great Britain's Memorial (London, 1741)Google Scholar and The Second Part of Great Britain's Memorial (London, 1742)Google Scholar; The Voice of the People (London, 1756)Google ScholarPubMed. For the manipulation of Instructions see Langford, P., The Excise Crisis (Oxford, 1975), pp. 47–61Google Scholar. This was the only mid-century petitioning campaign in which dissident whigs were well represented, though still easily outnumbered by their tory counterparts.

34 , H.M.C, Report on the Records of the City of Exeter, pp. 245–6Google Scholar.

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38 See Peters, Marie, ‘The “Monitor” on the Constitution, 1755–65: new light on the ideological origins of English radicalism’, Eng. Hist. Rev., lxxxvi (1971), 706–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Jopson's Coventry Mercury, 26 March and 23 April 1759.

39 Brockett, A. A., ‘The Political and Social Influence of the Exeter Dissenters and Some Notable Families’, Report and Transactions of the Devonshire Association, xciii (1961), 184–5Google Scholar. For estimates of English nonconformist voters in 1715, see Bebb, E. D., Nonconformity and Social and Economic Life 1660–1800 (London, 1935), pp. 182–3Google Scholar.

40 For tory-Wilkite links in terms of personnel, symbolism and constituencies, see chapter 6 of my In Defiance of Oligarchy. The Welsh Wilkite-tory nexus is noted in Jenkins, J. P., ‘Jacobites and Freemasons in Eighteenth-century Wales’, Welsh History Review, ix (1979), 399–401Google Scholar.

41 Rogers, N., ‘London politics from Walpole to Pitt: Patriotism and independency in an era of commercial imperialism, 1738–63’, Toronto University, D.Phil, thesis, 1974, pp. 480–2Google Scholar.

42 Brewer, J., ‘Political argument and propaganda in England, 1760–70’, Cambridge University, Ph.D. thesis, 1973, pp. 21Google Scholar and 156.

43 Brewer, , Party Ideology and Popular Politics, pp. 17–22Google Scholar.

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45 McCahill, M. W., ‘Peers, Patronage, and the Industrial Revolution, 1760–1800’, Journal of British Studies, xvi (1976), 84–107CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Money, J., Experience and Identity: Birmingham and the West Midlands 1760–1800 (Manchester, 1977), passimGoogle Scholar.

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47 Printed in the appendix of Isaac, , ‘A study of popular disturbances’, pp. 27–8Google Scholar.

48 McClatchey, D., Oxfordshire Clergy, 1777–1869: a study of the Established Church and the role of the clergy in local society (Oxford, 1960), pp. 178–201Google Scholar. Evans, E. J., ‘Some Reasons for the Growth of English Rural Anti-Clericalism c. 1750–c. 1830’, Past & Present, 66 (1975), 101CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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50 Ravitch, N., ‘The Social Origins of French and English Bishops in the Eighteenth Century’, Historical Journal, viii (1965), 319Google Scholar.