United Kingdom

There was always a danger, however, that too many concessions to Protestant dissent would alienate the Church of England, which enjoyed wide support in England and Wales. There were 5,000 parishes in these two countries, each containing at least one church served by a vicar (minister) or a curate (his deputy). For much of the 18th century these Anglican churches provided the only large, covered meeting places available outside of towns. They served as sources of spiritual comfort and also as centres for village social life. At religious services vicars would not only preach the word of God but also explain to congregations important national developments: wars, victories, and royal deaths and births. Thus churches often supplied the poor, the illiterate, and particularly women with the only political information available to them. Weakening the Church of England therefore struck Walpole as unwise, for at least two reasons. Its ministers provided a vital service to the state by communicating political instruction to the people. The church, moreover, commanded massive popular loyalty, and assaults on its position would arouse nationwide discontent. Walpole therefore determined to reach an accommodation with the church, and in 1723 he came to an agreement with Edmund Gibson, Bishop of London. Gibson was to ensure that only clergymen sympathetic to the Whig administration were appointed to influential positions in the Church of England. In return, Walpole undertook that no further extensive concessions would be made to Protestant dissenters. This arrangement continued until 1736.

Economic policies

Finally, Walpole’s long tenure of power was assisted by national prosperity. The gross national product rose from £57.5 million in 1720 to £64.1 million in 1740, an increase of 11.5 percent. Walpole encouraged trade by abolishing some customs duties, but his main economic concerns were to reduce interest payments on the national debt and to foster agriculture by switching taxation from land to consumption. He succeeded in reducing interest payments on the debt by 26 percent during his time in office, but his efforts to reduce the land tax in favour of more excises almost led to political disaster. In 1732 he revived a duty on salt, which enabled him to cut the land tax to one shilling in the pound. In 1733 he proposed to levy excise taxes on the sale of wine and tobacco, but the Opposition in Parliament launched a ferocious and successful campaign against these proposals. It claimed that excises weighed unfairly on the poor, whereas the land tax was mainly paid by the prosperous. It claimed, too, that excise collectors, and there were more than 6,000 of them employed by the state by this time, intruded into citizens’ private affairs and were a danger to British liberties. This crisis led to nationwide riots and demonstrations, and Walpole’s House-of-Commons majority seemed in jeopardy. In April 1733 he decided to retreat. He continued, however, until 1740 to keep the land tax at a low rate, thereby winning important support from the nation’s dominant landed class.

The electoral system

The fiasco over the excise might have toppled Walpole, since a general election was scheduled for 1734. In fact, however, his administration retained a comfortable majority in the House of Commons. One reason for this was that Britain’s electoral system at this time did not adequately reflect the state of public opinion. Until the Reform Act of 1832 England returned 489 MPs. Eighty of these were elected by the 40 county constituencies; 196 smaller constituencies called boroughs returned two MPs each, and two other boroughs, including London, the capital city, returned four MPs each. Oxford and Cambridge universities were also allowed four representatives in Parliament. Wales returned only 24 members of Parliament and Scotland 45. Their limited representation indicated the extent to which these countries were subordinated to England in the British political system at this time.

The system was not even remotely democratic. Power in this society was intimately and inextricably connected with the possession of property, particularly landed property. To be eligible for election as an MP, a man had to possess land worth £600 per annum if he was representing a county constituency and worth £300 per annum in the case of a borough constituency. To vote, adult males had to possess some kind of residential property or, in certain borough constituencies, be registered as freemen. Women were not given the vote until 1918.