independent of the Crown and irresponsible to the people. in Parlia The first two kings of the House of Hanover continued to Number of make additions to the peerage, which on the accespeers sitting sion of George III. amounted to one hundred and ment, 1760. seventy-four. Of this number, thirteen minors, and twelve Roman Catholics were incapable of sitting and voting in Parliament.1 reign of George III. Great as had been the additions to the peerage since the Profuse crea- reign of Queen Elizabeth, they were destined to be aons in the far exceeded in this and succeeding reigns. The creation of peers, having become an expedient for increasing the influence of the Crown, and the strength of parties, was freely resorted to by successive ministers. In the first ten years of this reign forty-two peers were created, or raised to a higher order in the peerage.2 Lord North was liberal in the creation of peers, with a Creations by view to strengthen his own position, and carry out Lord North. the policy of the court. In 1776, before the continued arrears of the Civil List were again brought before Parliament, ten new peers were created, one baron was raised to the dignity of a viscount, and three were promoted to earldoms. During his administration, he created or promoted about thirty British peers. In Ireland, he distributed honors still more liberally. In 1777 he created eighteen barons, and raised seven barons and five viscounts to higher dignities in the peerage. Mr. Pitt dispensed honors with greater profusion than any Creations by former minister. During the first five years of his administration, he had created nearly fifty peers. The influence he had himself derived from thus Mr. Pitt. 1 Court and City Register for 1760. 'Beatson's Political Index, i. 133. Lord North's Administration, 257. 4 Beatson's Political Index, i. 137. 5 In the debates upon the Regency, Mr. Fox said forty-two, and Mr. sheridan forty-eight. From Beatson's Political Index (i. 140) the latte tatement appears to be strictly accurate. Parl. Hist. xxvii. 967, &c. on the Re gratifying his supporters, suggested to him the precaution of restricting the regent in the exercise of this prerogative. This restriction he proposed to extend to the en- Restriction tire period of the regency, which, however, he proposed uptrusted would be of short duration. Having cre- gent, in 1789. ated peers to consolidate his own power, he was unwilling to leave the same instrument in the hands of his opponents. Had his proposal taken effect, such a restraint, extending over the whole regency, was open to many of the objections which are admitted to apply to the more extensive lim itation contemplated in 1719. It was said by Mr. Pitt that the exercise of the prerogative was required to reward merit, to recruit the peerage from the great landowners and other opulent classes, and to render the Crown independent of factious combinations amongst the existing peers.1 All these grounds were as applicable to the regency as to any other time; while the fact of a powerful minister having recently made so large an addition to the House of Lords from his own party, was the strongest argument against the proposed restriction. To tie up the hands of the regent, Restriction was to perpetuate the power of the minister. A similar condition was afterwards imposed upon 1811. regent in 1810; but, being limited to one year, was exposed to less objection. the during the regency of In 1792, when Mr. Pitt had been eight years in power, he had created between sixty and seventy peers, the Continued greater part of whom owed their elevation to the creations by parliamentary support which they had themselves given to the minister, or to their interest in returning mem Mr. Pitt. 1 His speech on the 16th Jan., 1789, is so imperfectly reported, that his reasoning can only be gathered from the context of the debate, in which his observations are adverted to. 2 Mr. Sheridan's speech on Parliamentary Reform, April 30th, 1792. Mr. Courtenay, speaking in 1792, said: "It had been a matter of complaint that twenty-eight peers had been made in the reign of George I., which, it was argued, would destroy the balance of power in the other branches of the constitution." But Pitt "had created three times as many." Parl. Hist. xxix. 1494. The number of creations and promotions appears to have been sixty-four. Beatson's Political Index, i. 144. bers to the House of Commons. He created and promoted no less than thirty-five peers, within the space of two years, in 1796 and 1797.1 And, in 1801, he had created or promoted, during the seventeen years of his administration, upwards of one hundred and forty peers, sitting by hereditary right. He also introduced as members of that body, in 1801, the Irish representative peers and bishops. Representa Ireland. The peerage of Ireland, on the union of that country, was dealt with, in some measure, upon different tive peers of principles from that of Scotland. The principle of representation was followed; twenty-eight representative peers being admitted to seats in the Parliament of the United Kingdom. But they were elected, not for the Parliament only, as in Scotland, but for life. Again, no Scottish peers could be created after the Union; but the peerage of Scotland was perpetuated, as an ancient and exclusive aristocracy. It was otherwise with Ireland. It was admitted that the peerage of that country was too numerous, and ought gradually to be diminished; and with this view, the royal prerogative was so far restricted, that one Irish peer only can be created, whenever three Irish peerages, in existence at the time of the Union, - have become extinct. But the object of this provision being ultimately to reduce the number of Irish peers, - not having hereditary seats in Parliament, to one hundred, it was also provided that when such reduction had been effected, one new Irish peerage may be created as often as a peerage becomes extinct, or as often as an Irish peer becomes entitled by descent or creation, to a peerage of the United Kingdom. Permission to Another peculiar arrangement, made on the Union of Ireland, was the permission granted to Irish peers of Irish peers to sitting in the House of Commons for any place in Great Britain, a privilege of which they have extensively availed themselves. sit in the House of Commons. 1 Beatson's Political Index, 1. 147. 2 lbid. 149, et seq. 8 By the Reform Bill of 1860, it was proposed to extend this privilege to bishops. At the same time, an addition of four lords spiritual was made to the House of Lords, to represent the epis- Irish reprecopal body of Ireland, and to sit by rotation of sentative sessions; of whom an archbishop of the Church in Ireland is always to be one. At the Union there were twenty bishoprics and archbishoprics of the Church in Ireland; but provision was made in 1833, by the Church Tem poralities Act, for the reduction of that number to ten.1 Since the Union, further additions have continually beer made to the peerage of the United Kingdom; and Peerages of an analysis of the existing peerage presents some the United singular results. In 1860, the House of Lords consisted of four hundred and sixty lords, spiritual and temporal. The number of hereditary peers of the United Kingdom, had risen to three hundred and creations. eighty-five, exclusive of the peers of the blood royal. Of these peerages, one hundred and twenty-eight were created, in the long reign of George III.; 2 forty-two in the reign of George IV.; and one hundred and seventeen since the acces sion of William IV. Thus two and hundred eighty-seven peerages have been created, or raised to their present rank, 8 Kingdom. Summary of places in Ireland, as well as Great Britain. In "A Letter to the Earl of Listowel, M. P. for St. Alban's, by a 'Joint of the Tail,'" 1841, the posi tion of his lordship as a peer of Ireland and a member of the House of Commons, was thus adverted to: "A peer, and in your own right — and yet a peer without rights! Possessor of a name, of a dignity having ne better reality than in a sound. True, you are at this moment a legislator, but by no right of birth, and only as a commoner; and, again, as representative for an English town, not for one in Ireland. However great your stake in that country, you could not, though fifty places were held open for you, accept one; your marrowless dignity gliding ghost-like in, to forbid the proffered seat." 13 & 4 Will. IV. c. 37, Schedule B. 2 Viz., two dukes, thirteen marquesses, thirty-eight earls, eight vis counts, and sixty-seven barons. 8 One duke, two marquesses, seven earls, three viscounts, twenty-nine barons. 4 Two dukes, five marquesses, twenty earls, six viscounts, eighty-four barons since the accession of George III.; or very nearly three-fourths of the entire number. But this increase is exhibited by the existing peerage alone, notwithstanding the extinction or merger of numerous titles, in the interval. The actual num ber of creations during the reign of George III. amounted to three hundred and eighty-eight; or more than the entire present number of the peerage.1 No more than ninety-eight of the existing peerages claim Antiquity of an earlier creation than the reign of George III.; the peerage. but this fact is an imperfect criterion of the antiquity of the peerage. When the possessor of an ancient dignity is promoted to a higher grade in the peerage, his lesser dignity becomes merged in the greater, but more recent title. An earl of the fifteenth century, is transformed into a marquess of the nineteenth. Many of the families from which existing peers are descended, are of great antiquity; and were noble before their admission to the peerage. Nor must the ancient nobility of the Scottish peerage be forgotten in the persons of those high-born men, who now figure on the roll, as peers of the United Kingdom, of comparatively recent creation. Great as this increase of peerages has been, it has borne no proportion to the demands made upon the favor of the 1 The following Table, prepared by the late Mr. Pulman, Clarencieux King of Arms, was placed at my disposal by the kindness of his son: Statement showing the Number of Peerages created within periods of Twenty Years, from 1700 to 1821. Total number of Peerages created, 667; of which 388 were created be tween 1761 and 1821. |