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II. Informing for Profit: A Sidelight on Tudor Methods of Law-enforcement

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 December 2011

G. R. Elton
G. R. Elton
Affiliation:
Lecturer in History in the University
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Extract

That the making of a law and the enforcement of it are two different things is a commonplace which is nowhere more clearly exemplified than in the history of economic legislation. As a recent essay on ‘The Smugglers' Trade’ has shown, the point applied with special force to the sixteenth century when the government attempted on an unprecedented scale to control the economic life of the country, and especially the export and import of goods. The problem was twofold. In the first place the administration of the customs limped badly behind the rest of the financial administration. It was not until 1536 that nationally uniform rates were imposed, and at no time could the central government be sure of exercising effective control over the local customers and searchers and their deputies. While the royal lands were put under a modernized administration in the hands of such courts as those of General Surveyors and Augmentations, nothing was done either by Henry VII or by Thomas Cromwell to go to the root of the customs question. Cromwell, indeed, produced a comprehensive code with a preamble which showed that at least he knew what the trouble was; but somewhat in contrast to his usual practice, he did not approach the administrative problem at all. The customs were left in the exchequer from whose palsied hands the royal lands had been removed; consequently, when in an age of rising prices the value of the customs revenue began to outpace that of fixed land rents, the government of Elizabeth could do no better than farm a revenue which their own machinery was incapable of handling efficiently. Until the reign of Charles II, the English customs administration was never thoroughly reformed, and governments fell back either on the inefficient exchequer or on the dubious expedient of farming.

Type
Research Article
Information
Cambridge Historical Journal , Volume 11 , Issue 2 , 1954 , pp. 149 - 167
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1954

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References

1 Ramsey, G. D., ‘The Smugglers' Trade: A Neglected Aspect of English Commercial Development’, Trans. R. Hist. Soc. (1952), pp. 131ff.Google Scholar

2 Gras, N. S. B., ‘Tudor “Books of Rates”’, Quarterly Journal of Economics, xxvi (1912), pp. 766ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 Letters and Papers [of Henry VIII], xi, no. 1433.

4 Cf. Newton, A. P., ‘The Establishment of the Great Farm of the English Customs’, Trans. R. Hist. Soc. (1918), pp. 129ff.Google Scholar

5 Cf. also T. F. T. Plucknett, ‘Some Proposed Legislation of Henry VIII’, ibid. (1936), pp. 125ff.

6 R. B. Merriman, Life and Letters of Thomas Cromwell, i, p. 387.

7 P[ublic] R[ecord] O[ffice], Exch. K.R., Memoranda Rolls, 317, Easter, m. 7.

8 On the common medieval difficulty of producing a local jury at Westminster, cf. Plucknett, T. F. T., Legislation of Edward I (1949), pp. 32ff.Google Scholar

9 P.R.O., Exch. K.R., Mem. Rolls, 317, Easter, m. 8d.

10 Ibid. 318, Michaelmas, m. 8d.

11 Ibid. Hilary, m. 17d.

12 Ibid. 319, Easter, m. 27.

13 Ibid. m. 32.

14 Ibid. Hilary, m. 4.

15 Ibid. m. 15. Peppys's will was proved in February 1542 (Pepys, W. C., Genealogy of the Pepys Family (1952), p. 35Google Scholar).

16 P.R.O. Exch. K.R., Mem. Rolls, 317, Easter, mm. 6, 7; Trinity, mm. 10, 30; Michaelmas, mm. 17d, 25, 27; 319, Trinity, m. 9.

17 Ibid. 319, Hilary, mm. 15–22d.

18 Letters and Papers, xvi, no. 137.

19 Ibid. nos. 146–7. The other ministers approached were the Lord Chancellor, the Chancellors of Augmentations and First Fruits, the General Surveyors, and the Master of Wards.

20 Ibid. no. 169, printed in full in State Papers of Henry VIII (1830–52), 1, pp. 650ff.

21 The offenders of whom Norfolk spoke at the end of his letter were Yorkshire rebels who had taken refuge in Scotland; they had nothing to do with the business discussed in the first part of the letter.

22 Letters and Papers, xvi, no. 180.

23 Ibid. nos. 180, 241.

24 Letters and Papers, xx, pt. 11, no. 788.

25 31 Henry VIII, c. 8, the famous Act of Proclamations. It ought by now to be generally realized (though it is not) that the chief purpose of this act was to create machinery for the enforcement of proclamations.

26 P.R.O., St[ar] Ch[amber] Proc[eedings], Henry VIII, bundle 28, files 14, 24; bundle 29, files 96, 175.

27 The proclamation does not survive, but its purport and date appear from Whelplay's bills and from a proclamation of May 1541 which lifted the ban as far as Calais and its environs were concerned (Letters and Papers, xvi, no. 844).

28 P.R.O., St. Ch. Proc., Henry VIII, bundle 27, files 40, 63, 64, 80, 87, 90, 91, 93 (twelve cases), 118.

29 Though the proclamation in question is not extant, an earlier one of November 1539, also concerned with the export and hoarding of grain, specifically awarded the informer half the fine. It also authorized him to sue in any of the King's courts at Westminster or before the Council as appointed by the Act of Proclamations. Cf. Schanz, G., Englische Handelspolitik gegen Ende des Mittelalters (1881), 11, pp. 669ffGoogle Scholar. This proclamation lapsed on 1 November 1540; it is probable that the proclamation of February 1541 was designed to replace it and that it contained much the same provisions.

30 P.R.O., St. Ch. Proc., Henry VIII, bundle 27, files 90, 118, etc.

31 Ibid, file 87; the place referred to is presumably Hall near Tilbury.

32 Ibid, file 80.

33 P.R.O., St. Ch. Proc., Henry VIII, bundle 27, file 63.

34 P.R.O., Exch. K.R., Mem. Rolls, 317, Trinity, m. 10.

35 P.R.O., St. Ch. Proc., Henry VIII, bundle 27, file 125(1).

36 The full Exchequer record is in K.R., Mem. Rolls, 317, Trinity, mm. 10, 10d, 28d.

37 P.R.O., Exch. K.R., Mem. Rolls, 317, Michaelmas, m. 25.

38 P.R.O., St. Ch. Proc., Henry VIII, bundle 27, file 94.

39 Or the 1st, according to the bill in Star Chamber.

40 £100, by the time Whelplay approached Star Chamber.

41 All these men were customs officials at Weymouth, being deputies to the superior officers at Poole.

42 This man was joined with Whelplay in his complaint to the Privy Council (above, p. 155) and appears to have been his chief assistant.

43 P.R.O., St. Ch. Proc., Henry VIII, bundle 27, file 135.