The incapacities of imperial administration were keenly discussed within and without the doors of Parliament. There was hardly a session of the legislature in which the miscarriages of the navy and the losses of the merchants were not the subjects of loud complaint.[1] The House of Commons, smarting under the severe injuries to the economic and maritime interests of the nation and incited to action by the influence of the merchants, closely examined into the whole matter, and, as Bishop Burnet records, "when all the errors, with relation to the protection of our trade, were set out and much aggravated, a motion was made to create by act of parliament, a council of trade".[2] On December 12, 1695, the very day on which this decision was reached, the king countered it by announcing his purpose to establish by royal authority a council composed of "some of the Greatest Quality, and others of Lesser Rank, and acquainted with trade".[3] Thus was the constitutional issue joined. The attempt of the Commons to erect a council,, not only drawn from the legislature but clothed by it with powers of administration, raised the significant question, "how far the government should continue on its ancient bottom of monarchy, as to the executive part, or how far it should turn to a commonwealth".[4] Embraced in the movement were the efforts of the unprivileged merchants, persisting through many years, to break down the political and commercial dominance of the monopolistic London companies in favor of a more open trade and free ports. Bristol and the outports, unconcerned by what authority a council was established, royal or parliamentary, worked to secure one so modelled that it should be representative and non-partizan as well as expert.[5]
- ↑ House of Lords MSS., n. s. (1693–1695), I. i–xix.
- ↑ House of Commons Journal, XI. 359, 376, 398; House of Lords Journal, XV. 606, 608–609, 611–612; Luttrell, Brief Historical Relation, III. 560–561; Burnet, Hist. Own Time, p. 621.
- ↑ "Heads of his Majesty's commission for a Council of Trade". 1696, Br. Mus., Add. MSS. 9764, f. 101; Fox Bourne, Life of John Locke, II. 348; Luttrell, Brief Historical Relation, III. 562; Bristol representatives to merchants, December 19, 1695, Add. MSS. 5540; Cat. St. P., Col., 1693–1696, § 2207.
- ↑ Cobbett, Parl. Hist., V. 977; Commons Journ., XI. 423–424, 440, 454; Luttrell, Brief Hist. Rel., III. 568; IV. 7, 19; Burnet, Hist. Own Time, p. 621.
- ↑ The Bristol merchants declared that if the proposed council of trade "be made up of Courtiers unexperienced in Trade, twill become only a matter of charge to the Nation; if of Londoners, They will endeavour to overrule things so as they shall best conduce to bringing all Trade to that great City, without
Diary (ed. Bray), III. 355–356; Davenant, Discourses on the Publick Revenues and on the Trade of England (London, 1698), II. 126–135; "Memoriall concerning a Council of Trade", Br. Mus., Harleian MSS. 1223, no. 9, ff. 184–188; Letters of the merchants of Bristol to the city's representatives in the Commons, Br. Mus., Add. MSS. 5540, ff. 83–96.
