From customary to constitutional right: the right to petition in Scotland before the 1707 Act of Union

ABSTRACT

The confirmation of a constitutional, rather than customary, right to petition the monarch in Scotland and England in 1689 has been recognized as an important precedent for modern constitutions, but the underlying forces impelling this historical transition have been less well recognized. The assertion of a constitutional right to petition the Scottish crown appeared after of decades of conflict over increasingly bold forms of collective political petitioning to crown and parliament. These innovations involved ordinary people in organized political protest, stimulating Scotland’s monarchs to block what they considered seditious and tumultuous activity. Standing laws against lese-majesté and unauthorized meetings were deployed to restrict petitioning, despite claims by Scottish dissidents for a customary liberty and natural right to petition. Within the composite British monarchy formed in 1603, England experienced similar but not identical conflicts over participative petitioning, leading revolutionary assemblies in both realms to demand in 1689 a right to supplicate the crown without fear of prosecution. Though Scotland’s monarchs still sought to discourage and evade unwelcome petitions, this new right allowed assertive political petitioning to crown and parliament to re-emerge in Scotland, contributing to the prominence of petitioning in British political culture after the Union of 1707.     

Petitioning in early seventeenth-century Scotland, 1625–51

ABSTRACT

In contrast to recent work on England and other parts of Europe, research on petitioning in early modern Scotland is still in its early stages, notably in respect of its political significance in a comparative context. This article investigates supplicatory activity in Scotland during a crucial period in which the petition came under intense scrutiny. The 1630s saw a determined attempt by King Charles I’s Scottish government to clamp down on the use of supplications to express criticism of royal policy; assertive, but carefully controlled, petitioning was one part of a resistance strategy that resulted in the downfall of the king’s regime. When a new government came to power in 1638 headed by the Covenanters, petitioning activity came to be seen as a potential challenge to their authority. Petitioning does not appear to have invoked ‘opinion’ in 1640s Scotland as has been claimed for England; the printed petition remained a rarity in Scotland. Nevertheless constitutional reform, combined with the wartime conditions of the 1640s, generated more recourse to petitioning, and the government recognized opportunities to enhance its claims to legitimate rule. A preliminary investigation of everyday petitions to the government during the 1640s shows how the narratives constructed by supplicants often sought to endorse its values and ideals, but that this type of petitioning was also used by supplicants to critique the government’s policies and hold it to its own rhetoric.     

Petitioning in the Scottish church courts, 1638–1707

ABSTRACT

This article explores the use of petitions in, and by, the courts of the Church of Scotland. It distinguishes between routine petitions and addresses concerning matters of national significance. The former were submitted to the church courts by individuals or groups, and requested that the courts take decisions or perform particular actions. These petitions reveal much about the exercise of discipline, poor relief and ecclesiastical administration, and provide rich evidence of the engagement of ordinary people with the church courts. The second type of petition was usually addressed to parliament or another secular body by one of the higher church courts. In studying petitions on national affairs, we can identify how the formulae of humble supplication were adapted for the purpose of protest, and thus comment on the tensions between the ecclesiastical and civil authorities of early modern Scotland.     

Petitions and ‘legitimate’ engagement with power in absolutist Denmark 1660–1800

ABSTRACT

Petitioning was universal across early modern Europe, but worked differently within distinct polities. Denmark-Norway became, after 1660, an absolute hereditary dual monarchy, with no further meetings of the Estates, and no other formal representative structures. The crown, however, did fully acknowledge the right to petition, confirming the mechanism and the legal basis for doing so in the full law code of 1683, Danske Lov. Petitions from all levels of society were processed in the central bureaucracy, and those processed through the Chancellery (Danske Kancelli) can be analysed systematically. However, a number of petitions were handled separately in the Exchequer (Rentekammer) or through the legal system. This article discusses the different types of petitions to the Danish crown, and analyses some examples that illustrate not merely the complicated negotiation of power within an absolute monarchy, but also the kind of language and cultural conventions necessary for the system to work.     

‘The devil or the Dutch’: Holland's impact on the financial revolution in England, 1643–1694

SUMMARY

In this article Beat Kümin and Andreas Würgler make a comparative study of how the peoples in early modern England and Hesse used their acknowledged rights to present petitions and grievances to exercise a real influence on the process of legislation, and even over administration in general. They could on occasion, virtually initiate legislation from below. The article illustrates the unusually wide scope and usage of the petition in England, helped by the early recognition of the subjects' right to petition both houses of Parliament as well as the monarch. It is suggested that this could result in a broad popular participation in the work of government. But even in Hesse, where the rulers asserted their sovereign rights as sole legislators and where, from the seventeenth century, they were attempting to develop an effective bureaucratic administration to sustain their aspirations, the method of petitioning the ruler, either through the Estates, Gravamina or directly, enabled ordinary people to have a part in promoting legislation and to participate in, and even effectively restrain, the princely administration.     

Parliament,printed petitions and the political imaginary in seventeenth-century England

ABSTRACT

Building on recent scholarship relating to the emergence of printed petitions in Britain in the seventeenth century, this article concentrates on those printed petitions that were designed for more or less discreet or limited circulation in order to lobby parliament. It draws on two collections of such material gathered by the MPs Bulstrode Whitelocke (in the 1650s) and Sir Michael Wentworth (in the 1680s and 1690s). Because print facilitated novel ways of engaging with parliament – not least as problems went unresolved and cases dragged on – printed petitions provide a useful window into the aspirations and frustrations of supplicants, and indeed into their political thinking, however rudimentary this may have been. In tracing what might be called the ‘political imaginary’ of contemporary petitioners, this study recovers evidence of radicalization, but also suggests that the art of petitioning could involve the deliberate avoidance of ideological issues that nevertheless underpinned specific interventions.     

The petition in the Court of Session in early modern Scotland

ABSTRACT

Petitions to Scotland’s central civil court, the Court of Session, contained common features of style despite being presented for a wide range of purposes. As well as being employed in the course of procedure in a number of litigated cases, the petition was used to obtain entry to an office, or in seeking an equitable remedy which might relieve imminent suffering. In many cases they offer detailed narratives about everyday life, commerce, politics and religion which preserve a great deal that may be of value to the legal and social historian. Some petitioners, such as the poor and vulnerable, enjoyed a privileged status entitling them to have their claims heard summarily. A number of petitions, written by lawyers in order to persuade, contain ideas about liberty, justice and reason reflecting the fact that they were addressed to a court of both law and equity. This contribution identifies the features of such petitions, attempts to classify them, and considers their wider historical significance.     

Apparence et réalité du pouvoir de représentation des provinces à Paris L'exemple des Etats provinciaux du Nord au XVIIIème siècle

SUMMARY

In this article, Marie-Laure Legay has examined the relations of the Provincial Estates on the north-eastern border of France—Flanders, Artois and le Cambrésis—with the central government. It shows that they did not waste energy disputing the tax demands of the crown, their right to assent to taxation had been reduced to a formality and they voted them without debate. But they then used direct representations through the delegations they sent to Paris, which usually resulted in some concessions being made by the crown. Similarly the Estates did not engage in formal assertions of their autonomy, but the full-time agents they hired in the capital processed a flow of remonstrances and petitions to the agencies of the central government. Thus instead of resisting the movement towards increased centralization of authority, they used it to pursue local advantages. In this way, the Estates were able to purchase the right to make appointments to local offices, while they repeatedly bypassed the Intendant, lobbying successfully for the transfer of many of his areas of competence to the Estates. This pragmatic strategy of working with the system, rather than opposing it was pursued consistencly down to 1789.     

Speaking the Unspeakable,Naming the Unnameable: The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

ABSTRACT

The establishment of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse followed years of lobbying by survivor groups, damning findings from previous inquiries, and increasing societal recognition of the often lifelong and intergenerational damage caused by child sexual abuse. Through extensive media coverage, the Royal Commission brought into public view the reality that the sexual abuse of children was widespread, and its recommendations are prompting organisational, policy, and legislative reform. This article explores the background to the Royal Commission, situating it within the history of previous inquiries and growing community outrage at the failure of institutions to adequately protect children and respond appropriately when abuse occurs. The article explores the ways in which the Royal Commission, more so than previous inquiries, brought child sexual abuse into public discourse. It also serves as an introduction to this special issue of the Journal of Australian Studies, which illustrates how the Royal Commission has fostered new scholarship across a range of disciplines as researchers engage with complex issues related to institutional child sexual abuse, its history, causes, impacts, and the important role of inquiries in confronting it.     

“Children in a Terrible State”: Understandings of Trauma and Child Sexual Assault in 1970s and 1980s Australia*

ABSTRACT

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has shown us the multitude of ways that children were vulnerable to sexual violence. This article explores child sexual abuse outside of institutions, and the development of concepts of trauma in Australia in the 1970s and 1980s. From the mid-1970s, there was increased social, medical and legal focus on child abuse. Driven originally by feminists, there was a new interest in the psychological impacts of abuse, including analysis of the grief, despair, fear and anger experienced by survivors. The explosion of interest in child sexual abuse was mainstreamed in the Royal Commission into Human Relationships (1974–1978) and in discussion leading up to the United Nations Convention of the Rights of the Child (1989). Across the 1980s, public recognition grew concerning the dangers of sexual violence against children, and, in particular, the increased knowledge and interest in intra-familial assaults. This article will chart the dramatic shifts in public consciousness around sexual abuse, particularly around ideas of harm and trauma. It will also suggest that despite a substantial change in cultural views on sexual assault, improvements for child victims were slow to filter through to the criminal justice system.     

Representation in the English House of Commons: The New Boroughs, 1485–1640

SUMMARY

In this paper Norman Ball re-examines the well recognised process of enlarging the House of Commons in the Tudor and early Stuart periods by the creation of new, or the revival of old parliamentary boroughs. The usual explanation of the phenomenon has been that it met pressures from local gentry for wider access to parliamentary seats. The paper questions this interpretation, noting the new seats often appeared in areas that were already well provided with borough places. On the basis of a geographical analysis of the new boroughs it is shown that there was a preponderance of creations in the lands of the two royal duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster. It goes on to suggest that the main motive behind the creations was the need of the crown and its advisers to find places for reliable members who could assist the royal business managers in carrying through an expanding volume of parliamentary business.     

How to avoid a coup d'état: The Federalist on the American constitution

SUMMARY

In this article Jack Pole considers whether the Constitution of the United States, as drafted in the Philadelphia Convention of 1787 could be regarded as the result of a coup d'état, since the original remit of the Convention had been to modify the existing Confederation of independent states, while the outcome was a constitution for a new sovereign, federal state. The article is based on the use of the collection of essays that were later published collectively as The Federalist to illustrate the thinking of the Convention leaders. It is important that The Federalist was not a work of political theory, but a collection of the ideas of Hamilton, Madison and Jay, which were written in response to developments with the aim of persuading the public to vote for ratification. The central problem for the authors was to balance their wish for a strong central government against the widespread contemporary belief, rooted in Whig thinking, that a strong central government was the most dangerous of all threats to individual liberties. The authors, collectively ‘Publicus’, begin with an orthodox view of sovereignty as ‘indivisible’: but this view was modified in face of strong Anti-Federalist attacks on ‘consolidation’. Key issues were open to later judicial interpretations. The article suggests that, quite apart from the complete absence of armed coercion on the Convention of 1787, the results of its deliberation cannot be seen as the result of any kind of coup.     

Communicating with their voters: The use of direct mailing by the SPD and the CDU

One of the key functions of political parties in modern democracies consists of mobilising the voters and thereby integrating them into the political system. Opinion formation and interest representation by political parties are central to linking people and government. This article concentrates on the way in which political parties perform these tasks. Presenting the main findings of an empirical study into the use of direct mailing by the two major parties in Germany, the SPD and the CDU, the paper discusses its effectiveness as a new means of communication between political parties and their voters. More specifically, it shows how direct mailing is put to use and to what extent its themes reflect the themes of relevant election programmes. The paper concludes that direct mailing has been more widely used only since the change in legislation on party finance but has the potential of developing into an important means of communicating party policies to members and potential supporters.     

The Debate on Annual Parliaments in the Early Seventeenth Century

SUMMARY

In this article Pauline Croft examines the change in English feelings about the survival of their parliaments on the accession of the Stuarts. In the last parliament of Elizabeth, confidence was expressed in the vitality and usefulness of the institution. From the first parliament of James VI and I in 1604 there was a collapse of confidence. The future of Parliaments was seen as being at risk in the changed political atmosphere in England and against the background of the observed decline of representative assemblies on the Continent. The article traces the development of references to the statutes of Edward III which prescribed annual sessions of parliament. These are referred to in the House of Commons in 1610, and this was the beginning of a continuing campaign for a statutory assurance of regular parliamentary sessions. This reached its climax in the Short Parliament of 1640, where there was a petitioning campaign calling for guarantees, probably encouraged by developments in the Scots' parliament after 1638. The campaign came to a succesful conclusion in the passing of the Triennial Act of 1641, the first major legislative achievement of the Long Parliament.     

Representative institutions among contemporary American Indian tribal societies

SUMMARY

In this article Rebecca Starr examines how a broad political consensus was maintained in the politics of South Carolina during the difficult transitional period that followed the gaining of independence. The colony's legislature had been firmly controlled by an oligarchy of planter and merchant families from the coastal plain, and centred in Charleston. Even before the revolution there had been tensions emerging between the oligarchy and the inhabitants of the developing up-country settlements, who had reason to feel that they were being neglected and excluded from representation. The article explains how the oligarchy succeeded in sustaining consensus, while preserving its own ultimate hegemony over the politics of the new state. This was done mainly by a skilful use of committee and petitioning procedures to neutralize and conciliate the potentially divisive political challenges from the up-country. These tactics enabled the oligarchy to maintain its grip on power until the economic development of the decades after independence generated a renewed planter oligarchy which transcended the old geographical divisions and provided a solid foundation for a new consensus in South Carolina politics that held good until the Civil War.     

Transitions from dirty to clean energy in low-income countries: insights from Kyrgyzstan

ABSTRACT

Air pollution from the burning of fossil fuels in developing counties is a global challenge due its climate change and health effects. Dirty fuel and air pollution have become a serious issue in many Central Asian countries. This article studies the factors that affect household decisions to transition from dirty energy to clean modern fuels using panel data from Kyrgyzstan. The article argues that the choice of fuel depends on a number of endogenous and exogenous factors. Contrary to the conventional wisdom of the ‘energy ladder’ hypothesis, high income does not lead to a full switch to modern fuel, but rather facilitates the transition to consumption of energy from multiple fuel sources. Factors that increase the chances of full fuel transition are education and access to gas. By contrast, the number of elderly family members and size of the house negatively affect the transition to clean energy use.     

Misleading the German public: The new bundestag law on parliamentarians

This article outlines the history of several attempts to increase salaries and pensions of members of the German Bundestag in the early 1990s. It shows the unethical tactics used by parliamentarians and the way in which public information was in part consciously designed to mislead. It is argued that Bundestag members tend to form a political cartel when decisions concerning their salaries and pensions are made. Similiar tendencies can be observed in all parliamentary decisions involving party finance, providing support for Katz and Mair's thesis that ‘catch‐all’ parties are generally being replaced by ‘cartel parties’. Having analysed the issues involved, the article calls for greater accountability and responsibility on the part of German politicians when their own personal advantage is at issue.     

Le parlement belge de fonctionnaires 1830–1848

ABSTRACT

The recent publication of two volumes of the acts of the Sardinian Parliament, edited by Laura Galoppini, offers an opportunity to pay attention to this extraordinary rich documentation now covering a continuous period of 175 years. In 1355 King Pedro IV of Aragon convened a first assembly, modelled on the Aragonese corts. The second meeting, in 1421, aimed at the completion of the island’s conquest and the financing of that conquest. It was only since the 1480s that regular meetings took place, albeit it that their convening was determined by the royal need for subsidies. The remarkably long negotiations on the estates’ petitions and complaints reveal new insights into the island’s social tensions and economic problems, and its role in the struggle for domination in the Western Mediterranean.     

The French invasion of the Spanish Netherlands and the Provincial Assemblies in the Dutch Republic 1667–1668

Summary

This article examines the role defence provision played in the relations between a prince and his estates in early modern Europe. Using the Duchy of Wurttemberg as an example, it illustrates why the question of defence proved so significant in shaping prince‐estate relations, and how the attitudes that it forced each to adopt reveal much about their differing aims and general outlook. The dominant group within the Wurttemberg estates rejected the duke's preferred solution to the defence question, a standing army, out of fear that its adoption would alter the duchy's traditional political structure. Maintenance of this traditional structure was essential to the defence of the dominant group's vested social and economic interests. The dukes considered a standing army an essential prerequisite to the achievement of their dynastic and political goals. The estates’ rejection of it made conflict unavoidable. Though the estates were successful in opposing ducal policies, their lack of an alternative solution illustrates the general point that estates were unable to develop their own concept to rival their ruler's ‘modernizing’ pretensions. Instead, they remained entrenched in their traditional values and were not able to develop into modern parliaments. In contrast to the princes, however, their outlook was essentially peaceful, because war meant change and change was to be avoided.     

Structuring parliamentary politics: Party organization in eighteenth‐century Sweden

SUMMARY

The English universities were enfranchised as parliamentary constituencies in letters patent issued by James I in 1604. The various approaches made to the Tudor regime by some of the senior members of Oxford and Cambridge to have ‘burgesses in parliament’ to protect and promote the rights of the respective universities and their colleges were largely responses to the problems caused by the persistent contentions and conflict of interests between ‘town and gown’ in both places. These abortive attempts to add new constituencies to the expanding parliamentary system in the sixteenth century are seen against the background of medieval precedents for the summoning by the Crown of university lawyers to parliament. On three separate occasions after the Reformation, the petitions for the privilege of representation addressed to the monarch and privy councillors were associated with requests that the lower clergy in the Church of England be represented in the House of Commons as well as in the Convocations of the Church. Parliament itself does not seem to have played a part in initiating these overtures or in sanctioning the final grant of representation, which, like the enfranchisement of incorporated boroughs, was an exercise of the royal prerogative. Both universities responded positively to the advice tendered in 1604 by the attorney-general, Sir Edward Coke, that they return as their representatives civil lawyers rather than clerical members of their governing bodies. The possible constitutional significance of this recommendation and its implementation is considered in the context of some contemporary ideas of representation and the failure at this time of the ‘inferior clergy’ generally to gain a presence in the House of Commons to complement that of the spiritual lords in the upper chamber. In the later modern period the separate university franchise was extended in turn to all modern academic institutions on attaining full university status, but was abolished by the post-war Labour Government in 1948.