A HISTORY OF SUFFOLK 



guarantors their goods were distrained to insure their appearance in parlia- 

 ment on the day fixed. In the reign of Queen Anne a property qualification 

 was demanded of the knights, and this was not repealed till 1858. 



The members for the boroughs were before 1430 usually elected in 

 the county court after the knights had been chosen. The mayor, bailiffs, or 

 the chief officers, with four or five citizens and burgesses, were sent as 

 representatives, and made in the court the formal election of their already 

 chosen burgesses. This method was found inconvenient, and from 1445 a 

 precept for the election was sent to the magistrates, which was to be returned 

 by indenture between them and the sheriff. The election was to take place 

 between eight and eleven in the morning, and the persons to be elected were 

 not to be below the degree of a yeoman. Members were paid by the county 

 and boroughs, and to escape the expense the latter sometimes sent none. 



There never was what could be called a free election. That was not 

 possible till the introduction of the ballot. The interference was not how- 

 ever wholly confined to local magnates. From the fourteenth century 

 onwards the crown tried to influence the return of members favourable to its 

 policy. With the centralization of the administrative this influence increased, 

 and under the Tudors and Stuarts royal agents were busy. Cromwell's 

 candidates for Henry VIII's parliaments were sure to be elected. Mary 

 insisted on the return of orthodox Roman Catholics, while Elizabeth in- 

 creased her influence by giving representation to Sudbury, Eye, and 

 Aldeburgh. James I tampered with the charters of the boroughs and gave 

 Bury two members, and in the time of Charles I the borough warrants had 

 a curious habit of straying into l private hands and remaining there. William 

 of Orange even made an electioneering tour through the county, while the 

 enormous sums expended by George III for this purpose are notorious. 

 Until 1586 all petitions regarding disputed elections came before the king 

 and council. But royal interference was necessarily intermittent and special, 

 while the influence of territorial families was permanent. In 1450 the 

 duke of Norfolk and the earl of March decided which knights were to 

 represent the county, and again in 1455 they issued the mandate that 'None 

 towards the duke of Suffolk (i.e. Lancastrian) were to be elected.' Under 

 Charles I the territorial influence was weakened by the strong growth of 

 religious ideas, and royal interference became necessary for the furthering of 

 despotic measures. In later times the county representation was often a 

 matter arranged by the two largest interests, each party sending one mem- 

 ber. There was a decided attempt about 1722 to extend the 2 Hervey 

 interest from Bury to the county by putting up one of the earl of Bristol's 

 sons. But the earl would not hear of it, for his son had neither the necessary 

 property qualification of £600 a year in land, nor the equally indispensable 

 social one of being able to drink without stint at quarter sessions with the 

 county gentlemen. The Grafton and Bristol interests usually carried all before 

 them. Farmers voted with their landlords as a matter of course, and land- 

 owners appeared at the poll followed by their tenants. 



In the boroughs the narrowness of the franchise had a very serious 

 effect on the political morals of the county. The right to vote was 



1 Sir Simonds d'Ewes, Pari. Affairs, Harl. MSS. 165. 

 * Letter Bk. of John Hervey, Oct. 1722. 



196 



