Constitutional History of England, volume 3 of 3 (Illustrated)

It may seem rather an extraordinary position, after the last chapters, yet is strictly true, that the fundamental privileges of the subject were less invaded, the prerogative swerved into fewer excesses, during the reign of Charles II. than perhaps in any former period of equal length. Thanks to the patriot energies of Selden and Eliot, of Pym and Hampden, the constitutional boundaries of royal power had been so well established that no minister was daring enough to attempt any flagrant and general violation of them. The frequent session of parliament, and its high estimation of its own privileges, furnished a security against illegal taxation. Nothing of this sort has been imputed to the government of Charles, the first King of England, perhaps, whose reign was wholly free from such a charge. And as the nation happily escaped the attempts that were made after the restoration, to revive the star-chamber and high-commission courts, there was no means of chastising political delinquencies, except through the regular tribunals of justice, and through the verdict of a jury. Ill as the one were often constituted, and submissive as the other might often be found, they afforded something more of a guarantee, were it only by the publicity of their proceedings, than the dark and silent divan of courtiers and prelates who sat in judgment under the two former kings. Though the bench was frequently subservient, the bar contained high-spirited advocates, whose firm defence of their clients the judges often reproved, but no longer affected to punish. The press, above all, was in continual 2 service. An eagerness to peruse cheap and ephemeral tracts on all subjects of passing interest had prevailed ever since the reformation. These had been extraordinarily multiplied from the meeting of the long parliament. Some thousand pamphlets of different descriptions, written between that time and the restoration, may be found in the British Museum; and no collection can be supposed to be perfect. It would have required the summary process and stern severity of the court of star-chamber to repress this torrent, or reduce it to those bounds which a government is apt to consider as secure. But the measures taken with this view under Charles II. require to be distinctly noticed.

Effect of the press—Restrictions upon it before and after the restoration.—In the reign of Henry VIII., when the political importance of the art of printing, especially in the great question of the reformation, began to be apprehended, it was thought necessary to assume an absolute control over it, partly by the king's general prerogative, and still more by virtue of his ecclesiastical supremacy.[1] Thus it became usual to grant by letters patent the exclusive right of printing the Bible or religious books, and afterwards all others. The privilege of keeping presses was limited to the members of the stationers' company, who were bound by regulations established in the reign of Mary by the star-chamber, for the contravention of which they incurred the speedy chastisement of that vigilant tribunal. These regulations not only limited the number of presses, and of men who should be employed on them, but subjected new publications to the previous inspection of a licencer. The long parliament did not hesitate to copy this precedent of a tyranny they had overthrown; and by repeated ordinances against unlicensed printing, hindered, as far as in them lay, this great instrument of political power from serving the purposes of their adversaries. Every government, however popular in name or 3 origin, must have some uneasiness from the great mass of the multitude, some vicissitudes of public opinion to apprehend; and experience shows that republics, especially in a revolutionary season, shrink as instinctively, and sometimes as reasonably, from an open licence of the tongue and pen, as the most jealous court. We read the noble apology of Milton for the freedom of the press with admiration; but it had little influence on the parliament to whom it was addressed.

Licensing acts.—It might easily be anticipated, from the general spirit of Lord Clarendon's administration, that he would not suffer the press to emancipate itself from these established shackles.[2] A bill for the regulation of printing failed in 1661, from the Commons' jealousy of the Peers who had inserted a clause exempting their own houses from search.[3] But next year a statute was enacted, which, reciting the well-government and regulating of printers and printing-presses to be matter of public care and concernment, and that by the general licentiousness of the late times many evil-disposed persons had been encouraged to print and sell heretical and seditious books, prohibits every private person from printing any book or pamphlet, unless entered with the stationers' company, and duly licensed in the following manner; to wit,