222 Chapter X
lated boroughs should continue to have members in Parliament. But it was an argu-
ment much favored by opponents of electoral reform; it is found even in the highly
Whiggish Letters of Junius. It had a convincing sound—how could Parliament de-
stroy its own makers?—and it led to rethinking on the ultimate sources of lawful
power. If it was true that Parliament could not change the constituencies of the
House of Commons, then there must be some other power that could do so, some
really final and technically absolute power. In England this could not be the King;
what then could it be but the People? Here again we may note how the idea of the
sovereignty of the people, far from being the product of abstract speculation, arose
in the needs of debate against claims to inviolability made by constituted bodies.
The reform movement that reached its height in the Wilkes agitations subsided
during the 1770’s. It had set many precedents in its use of public meetings, its or-
ganization of opinion outside Parliament, its instruction of members, and its view
of them as deputies answerable to their electors. It had won publication of parlia-
mentary debates, and produced the first reform bill in 1776. The bill of course
failed to pass, and nothing more happened. Wilkes sat in the Commons from
1774 to 1790, but he had no further role of importance.
The American war was at first popular in England, but as it proved more diffi-
cult to conduct, and broadened into a war with France, a good deal of British
opinion turned against it, and blamed it on the stupidity, misgovernment, or des-
potism of the King. The rising taxes made necessary by the war gave offense to
many of all classes, who, being dissatisfied with the government and its policies,
attributed their financial troubles to “corruption,” that is, the award of pensions,
sinecures, or other expensive gratifications to the toadies, favorites, or political
minions of the crown. Such practices were no greater or more expensive than ever,
but they made a good target for discontent.
Demands for a change thus revived about 1778, among larger segments of the
population than in the days of Wilkes and Liberty ten years before. There were two
main centers of disaffection, which spread, merged, and fell apart. One was among
the landowners of Yorkshire, led by Christopher Wyvil. The other carried on the
radicalism of London, which now centered more in the adjoining city of West-
minster. Two distinct programs of reform were in the air: an “economical reform”
to reduce pensions, sinecures, and ornamental offices, and so save the taxpayers’
money and abate the royal power to “corrupt” or influence Parliament; and a politi-
cal or electoral reform to alter the composition of the Commons. The first was one
that good Whigs could heartily endorse, and its high moral tone and promise of
lower taxes gave it a wide appeal. The second was more radical; and though some,
like Wyvil, concluding that a corrupted Parliament would not abolish the means of
its own corruption, moved on to political reform as the necessary goal, others, like
Burke and many Whigs, in order to avert electoral change, increasingly made a
crusade of economical reform itself.
Wyvil brought about a county meeting at York, in December 1779, representing
in principle all the freeholders and gentry of Yorkshire. Six hundred attended, in-
cluding five dukes and earls and the Marquis of Rockingham. They claimed to
represent landed wealth within the county worth £800,000 a year. They passed
resolutions on the deplorable trend of public events, warned against the growing