Part 9

From Norman times the yearly profit of the royal boroughs was as a rule included in the general "farm" rendered for the county by the sheriff; sometimes it was rendered by a royal farmer apart from the county-farm. The king generally accepted a composition for all the various items due from the borough. The burgesses were united in their efforts to keep that composition unchanged in amount, and to secure the provision of the right amount at the right time for fear that it should be increased by way of punishment. The levy of fines on rent arrear, and the distraints for debt due, which were obtained through the borough court, were a matter of interest to the burgesses of the court, and first taught the burgesses co-operative action. Money was raised, possibly by order of the borough court, to buy a charter from the king giving the right to choose officers who should answer directly to the exchequer and not through the sheriff of the county. The sheriff was in many cases also the constable of the castle, set by the Normans to overawe the English boroughs; his powers were great and dangerous enough to make him an officer specially obnoxious to the boroughs. Henry I. about 1131 gave the London citizens the right to choose their own sheriffs and a justiciar answerable for keeping the pleas of the crown. In 1130 the Lincoln citizens paid to hold their city in chief of the king. By the end of the 12th century many towns paid by the hand of their own reeves, and John's charters began to make rules as to the freedom of choice to be allowed in the nomination of borough officers and as to the royal power of dismissal. In Richard I.'s reign London imitated the French communes in styling the chief officer a mayor; in 1208 Winchester also had a mayor, and the title soon became no rarity. The chartered right to choose two or more citizens to keep the pleas of the crown gave to many boroughs the control of their coroners, who occupied the position of the London justiciar of earlier days, subject to those considerable modifications which Henry II.'s systematization of the criminal law had introduced. Burgesses who had gone for criminal and civil justice to their own court in disputes between themselves, or between themselves and strangers who were in their town, secured confirmation of this right by charter, not to exclude the justices in eyre, but to exempt themselves from the necessity of pleading in a distant court. The burgess, whether plaintiff or defendant, was a privileged person, and could claim in this respect a "benefit" somewhat similar to the benefit of clergy. In permitting the boroughs to answer through their own officers for his dues, the king handed over to the boroughs the farming of his rents and a large number of rights which would eventually prove to be sources of great profit.

No records exist showing the nature of municipal proceedings at the time of the first purchase of charters. Certain it is that the communities in the 12th century became alive to the possibilities of their new position, that trade received a new impulse, and the vague constitutional powers of the borough court acquired a new need for definition. At first the selection of officers who were to treat with the exchequer and to keep the royal pleas was almost certainly restricted to a few rich persons who could find the necessary securities. Nominated probably in one of the smaller judicial assemblies, the choice was announced at the great Michaelmas assembly of the whole community, and it is not till the next century that we hear of any attempt of the "vulgus" to make a different selection from that of the magnates. The "vulgus" were able to take effective action by means of the several craft organizations, and first found the necessity to do so when taxation was heavy or when questions of trade legislation were mooted (see GILDS). The taxation of the boroughs in the reign of Henry II. was assessed by the king's justices, who fixed the sums due _per capita_; but if the borough made an offer of a gift, the assessment was made by the burgesses. In the first case the taxation fell on the magnates. In the levy _per communam_ the assessment was made through the wardmoots (in London) and the burden fell on the poorer class. In Henry II.'s reign London was taxed by both methods, the _barones majores_ by head, the _barones minores_ through the wardmoot. The pressure of taxation led in the 13th century to a closer definition of the burghal constitutions; the commons sought to get an audit of accounts, and (in London) not only to hear but to treat of municipal affairs. By the end of the century London had definitely established two councils, that of the mayor and aldermen, representing the old borough court, and a common council, representing the voice of the commonalty, as expressed through the city wards. The choice of councillors in the wards rested probably with the aldermen and the ward jury summoned by them to make the presentments. In some cases juries were summoned not to represent different areas but different classes; thus at Lincoln there were in 1272 juries of the rich, the middling and the poor, chosen presumably by authority from groups divided by means of the tax roll. Elsewhere the several groups of traders and artisans made of their gilds all-powerful agencies for organizing joint action among classes of commons united by a trade interest, and the history of the towns becomes the history of the struggle between the gilds which captured control of the council and the gilds which were excluded therefrom. Many municipal revolutions took place, and a large number of constitutional experiments were tried all over the country from the 13th century onward. Schemes which directed a gradual co-optation, two to choose four, these six to choose more, and so in widening circles from a centre of officialdom, found much favour throughout the middle ages. A plan, like the London plan, of two companies, alderman and council, was widely favoured in the 14th century, perhaps in imitation of the Houses of Lords and Commons. The mayor was sometimes styled the "sovereign" and was given many prerogatives. Great respect was paid to the "ancients," those, namely, who had already held municipal office. Not till the 15th century were orderly arrangements for counting "voices" arrived at in a few of the most highly developed towns, and these were used only in the small assemblies of the governing body, not in the large electoral assemblies of the people.

In London in the 13th century there was a regular system for the admission of new members to the borough "franchise," which was at first regarded not as conferring any form of suffrage but as a means to secure a privileged position in the borough court and in the trade of the borough. Admission could be obtained by inheritance, by purchase or gift, in some places by marriage, and in London, at least from 1275, by a municipal register of apprenticeship. The new freeman in return for his privileges was bound to share with the other burgesses all the burdens of taxation, control, &c., which fell upon burgesses. Personal service was not always necessary, and in some towns there were many non-resident burgesses. When in later times admission to this freedom came to be used as means to secure the parliamentary franchise, the freedom of the borough was freely sold and given. The elections in which the commons of the boroughs first took interest were those of the borough magistrates. Where the commons succeeded for a time in asserting their right to take part in borough elections they were rarely able to keep it, not in all cases perhaps because their power was feared, but sometimes because of the riotous proceedings which ensued. These led to government interference, which no party in the borough desired. The possibility of a forfeiture of their enfranchised position made the burgesses on the whole fairly submissive. In the 13th century London repeatedly was "taken into the king's hand," subjected to heavy fines and put under the constable of the Tower. In the 15th century disturbances in the boroughs led to the issue of new constitutions, some of which were the outcome of royal charters, others the result of parliamentary legislation. The development of the law of corporations also at this time compelled the boroughs to seek new charters which should satisfy the now exacting demands of the law. The charters of incorporation were issued at a time when the state was looking more and more to the borough authorities as part of its executive and judicial staff, and thus the government was closely interested in the manner of their selection. The new charters were drafted in such a way as to narrow the popular control. The corporations were placed under a council and in a number of cases popular control was excluded altogether, the whole system being made one of co-optation. The absence of popular protest may be ascribed in part to the fact that the old popular control had been more nominal than real, and the new charter gave as a rule two councils of considerable size. These councils bore a heavy burden of taxation in meeting royal loans and benevolences, paying _per capita_ like the magnates of the 12th century, and for a time there is on the whole little evidence of friction between the governors and the governed. Throughout, popular opinion in the closest of corporations had a means of expression, though none of execution, in the presentments of the leet juries and sessions juries. By means of their "verdicts" they could use threats against the governing body, express their resentment against acts of the council which benefited the governing body rather than the town, and call in the aid of the justices of assize where the members of the governing body were suspected of fraud. Elizabeth repeatedly declared her dislike of incorporations "because of the abuses committed by their head rulers," but in her reign they were fairly easily controlled by the privy council, which directed their choice of members of parliament and secured supporters of the government policy to fill vacancies on the borough bench. The practice in Tudor and Stuart charters of specifying by name the members of the governing body and holders of special offices opened the way to a "purging" of the hostile spirits when new charters were required. There were also rather vaguely worded clauses authorizing the dismissal of officers for misconduct, though as a rule the appointments were for life. When under the Stuarts and under the Commonwealth political and religious feeling ran high in the boroughs, use was made of these clauses both by the majority on the council and by the central government to mould the character of the council by a drastic "purging." Another means of control first used under the Commonwealth was afforded by the various acts of parliament, which subjected all holders of municipal office to the test of an oath. Under the Commonwealth there was no improvement in the methods used by the central government to control the boroughs. All opponents of the ruling policy were disfranchised and disqualified for office by act of parliament in 1652. Cases arising out of the act were to be tried by commissioners, and the commissions of the major-generals gave them opportunity to control the borough policy. Few Commonwealth charters have been preserved, though several were issued in response to the requests of the corporations.

In some cases the charters used words which appeared to point to an opportunity for popular elections in boroughs where a usage of election by the town council had been established. In 1598 the judges gave an opinion that the town councils could by by-law determine laws for the government of the town regardless of the terms of the charter. In the 18th century the judges decided to the contrary. But even where a usage of popular election was established, there were means of controlling the result of a parliamentary election. The close corporations, though their right to choose a member of parliament might be doubtful, had the sole right to admit new burgesses, and in order to determine parliamentary elections they enfranchised non-residents. Where conflicts arose over the choice of a member, and two selections were made, the matter came before the House of Commons. On various occasions the House decided in favour of the popularly elected candidate against the nominee of the town council, on the general principle that neither the royal charter nor a by-law could curtail this particular franchise. But as each case was separately determined by a body swayed by the dominant political party, no one principle was steadily adhered to in the trial of election petitions. The royal right to create boroughs was freely used by Elizabeth and James I. as a means of securing a submissive parliament. The later Stuarts abandoned this method, and the few new boroughs made by the Georges were not made for political reasons. The object of the later Stuarts was to control the corporations already in existence, not to make new ones. Charles II. from the time of his restoration decided to exercise a strict control of the close corporations in order to secure not only submissive parliaments, but also a pliant executive among the borough justices, and pliant juries, which were impanelled at the selection of the borough officers. In 1660 it was made a rule that all future charters should reserve expressly to the crown the first nomination of the aldermen, recorder and town-clerk, and a proviso should be entered placing with the common council the return of the member of parliament. The Corporation Act of 1661 gave power to royal commissioners to settle the composition of the town councils, and to remove all who refused the sacraments of the Church of England or were suspected of disaffection, even though they offered to take the necessary oaths. Even so the difficulty of securing submissive juries was again so great in 1682 that a general attack on the borough franchises was begun by the crown. A London jury having returned a verdict hostile to the crown, after various attempts to bend the city to his will, Charles II. issued a _quo warranto_ against the mayor and commonalty in order to charge the citizens with illegal encroachments upon their chartered rights. The want of a sound philosophical principle in the laws which were intended to regulate the actions of organized groups of men made it easy for the crown judges to find flaws in the legality of the actions of the boroughs, and also made it possible for the Londoners to argue that no execution could be taken against the mayor, commonalty and citizens, a "body politic invisible"; that the indictment lay only against every particular member of the governing body; and that the corporation as a corporation was incapable of suffering a forfeiture or of making a surrender. The judges gave a judgment for the king, the charters were forfeited and the government placed with a court of aldermen of the king's own choosing. Until James II. yielded, there was no common council in London. The novelty of the proceedings of Charles II. and James II. lay in using the weapon of the _quo warranto_ systematically to ensure a general revocation of charters. The new charters which were then granted required the king's consent for the more important appointments, and gave him power to remove officers without reason given. Under James II. in 1687 six commissioners were appointed to "regulate" the corporations and remove from them all persons who were opposed to the abolition of the penal laws against Catholics. The new appointments were made under a writ which ran, "We will and require you to elect" (a named person). When James II. sought to withdraw from his disastrous policy, he issued a proclamation (October 17, 1688) restoring to the boroughs their ancient charters. The governing charter thenceforth in many boroughs, though not in all, was the charter which had established a close corporation, and from this time on to 1835 the boroughs made no progress in constitutional growth. The tendency for the close corporation to treat the members of the governing body as the only corporators, and to repudiate the idea that the corporation was answerable to the inhabitants of the borough if the corporate property was squandered, became more and more manifest as the history of the past slipped into oblivion. The corporators came to regard themselves as members of a club, legally warranted in dividing the lands and goods of the same among themselves whensoever such a division should seem profitable. Even where the constitution of the corporation was not close by charter, the franchise tended to become restricted to an ever-dwindling electorate, as the old methods for the extension of the municipal franchise by other means than inheritance died out of use. At Ipswich in 1833 the "freemen" numbered only one fifty-fifth of the population. If the electorate was increased, it was increased by the wholesale admission to the freedom of voters willing to vote as directed by the corporation at parliamentary elections. The growth of corruption in the boroughs continued unchecked until the era of the Reform Bill. Several boroughs had by that time become insolvent, and some had recourse to their member of parliament to eke out their revenues. In Buckingham the mayor received the whole town revenue without rendering account; sometimes, however, heavy charges fell upon the officers. Before the Reform era dissatisfaction with the corporations was mainly shown by the number of local acts of parliament which placed under the authority of special commissioners a variety of administrative details, which if the corporation had not been suspected would certainly have been assigned to its care. The trust offered another convenient means of escape from difficulty, and in some towns out of the trust was developed a system of municipal administration where there was no recognized corporation. Thus at Peterborough the feoffees who had succeeded to the control of certain ancient charities constituted a form of town council with very restricted powers. In the 17th century Sheffield was brought under the act "to redress the misemployment of lands given to charitable uses," and the municipal administration of what had been a borough passed into the hands of the trustees of the Burgery or town trust.

The many special authorities created under act of parliament led to much confusion, conflict and overlapping, and increased the need for a general reform. The reform of the boroughs was treated as part of the question of parliamentary reform. In 1832 the exclusive privileges of the corporations in parliamentary elections having been abolished and male occupiers enfranchised, the question of the municipal franchise was next dealt with. In 1833 a commission inquired into the administration of the municipal corporations. The result of the inquiry was the Municipal Corporations Act 1835, which gave the municipal franchise to the ratepayers. In all the municipal corporations dealt with by the act, the town council was to consist of a mayor, aldermen and councillors, and the councils were given like powers, being divided into those with and those without a commission of the peace. The minutes were to be open to the inspection of any burgess, and an audit of accounts was required. The exclusive rights of retail trading, which in some towns were restricted to freemen of the borough, were abolished. The system of police, which in some places was still medieval in character, was placed under the control of the council. The various privileged areas within the bounds of a borough were with few exceptions made part of the borough. The powers of the council to alienate corporate property were closely restricted. The operations of the act were extended by later legislation, and the divers amendments and enactments which followed were consolidated in the Municipal Corporations Act 1882. (M. Bat.)

_Irish Boroughs._--In Ireland the earliest traces of burghal life are connected with the maritime settlements on the southern and eastern coast. The invasion of Henry II. colonized these Ostman ports with Anglo-Norman communities, who brought with them, or afterwards obtained, municipal charters of a favourable kind. The English settlement obviously depended on the advantages which the burgesses possessed over the native population outside. Quite different from these were the new close boroughs which during the plantation of Ulster James I. introduced from England. The conquest was by this time completed, and by a rigorous enforcement of the Supremacy and Uniformity Acts the existing liberties of the older boroughs were almost entirely withdrawn. By the new rules published (in terms of the Act of Settlement and Explanation) in 1672 resident traders were permitted to become freemen, but neither this regulation nor the ordinary admissions through birth, marriage and apprenticeship succeeded in giving to Ireland free and vigorous municipalities. The corrupt admission of non-resident freemen, in order to outvote the ancient freeholders in parliamentary elections, and the systematic exclusion of Roman Catholics, soon divorced the "commonalty" from true local interests, and made the corporations, which elected themselves or selected the constituency, dangerously unpopular.