The Civil War and the Commonwealth

The Darien Scheme.

Another tragedy of William's reign was much more directly attributable to English influence. Scot tish commerce, which had been seriously affected by the civil war, the Dutch wars, and the war with France, was attempting to find new outlets, and William Paterson, the founder of the Bank of England, suggested a project for the colonization of the Isthmus of Darien. The scheme involved a challenge to Spain, which claimed the territory on which the Scottish emigrants were to settle, but the "African Company" formed to trade with Africa and the Indies, received a charter conferring powers of military colonization as well as trading privileges. The venture was un fortunate from the first. A strenuous and remarkable effort made by the Scots to raise capital was to be supplemented by English subscriptions, but the jealousy of English merchants was aroused, and the House of Commons compelled the withdrawal of the English shareholders. The Scots persevered and in the end of 1698, about 1,200 Scottish colonists landed in the pestilential region of Darien. There were two further expeditions, but disease, famine and Spanish attacks combined to render the adventure hopeless. At the time the chances of preserving peace in Europe depended upon William's successfully negotiating the Partition Treaties, and he could not give the Scots support against Spain. In March 1700 the remnants of the Scottish colony evacuated Darien ; their vessels were shipwrecked and few of the survivors reached home. It was the greatest disaster in Scottish commercial history, and the calamity which had overtaken the nation was ascribed to English hostility and to the refusal of William to maintain the privileges originally granted to the African Company.

The Constitutional Position After the Revolution.—When William died, in March 1702, the hostility between England and Scotland was so bitter that the continuance of a Union of the Crowns after the death of Queen Anne was in danger. The revo lution settlements in the two countries had, in fact, made the existing constitution unworkable. Before 1689, the Scottish par liament, except during the civil war (1638-51), had exercised only a slight influence upon the national history. It was much less representative than the English House of Commons, and its methods of procedure were such as to make it a tool in the hands of the Government. Its efficient powers were entrusted to a committee known as the Lords of the Articles, which, though consisting of members of parliament, was not elected by the whole House. The choice of its members was manipulated by the Gov ernment and on many occasions a majority of its members were also members of the Privy Council, the executive of the country. But, after the revolution, the Committee of the Articles was abol ished, and the Scottish parliament, having secured the rights for which the English parliament had long contended, could compel the sovereign to act in accordance with its demands in domestic affairs, and claimed also to control foreign policy. In the days of personal government, a monarch ruling over two independent kingdoms had no difficulty in securing unity of policy, but the new constitutional monarchy found it hard to reconcile the aims of two separate parliaments. A mere union of the Crowns could not suffice to meet the necessities of government.

Proposals for union had been made on several occasions since 1603. James VI. had tried to bring about a complete incorpo rating union with "one worship of God, one kingdom entirely governed [i.e., with a single government], one uniformity of law," but had been compelled by the opposition of the English Com mons to abandon his projects. Cromwell had forced a union upon the Scots, and, after the Restoration, they suffered from the loss of the trading privileges which a union had involved. In 1667

commissioners from the two countries met to negotiate a com mercial treaty, and when the English commissioners refused to exempt Scotland from the operation of the Navigation Act, Charles II. proposed a scheme of union which was discussed in 167o, but without result. At the revolution, the Scottish parlia ment itself appointed commissioners "to treat the terms of an entire and perpetual union between the two kingdoms," but though William did his best to encourage the scheme, his Eng lish parliament would not appoint English commissioners. William remained an enthusiastic advocate of union, and recognized in the bitter temper of both nations after the failure of the Darien scheme a reason for accelerating it. But again (1700) the Eng lish Commons would not agree to the appointment of a commis sion, and William, from his deathbed in 1702, sent a royal mes sage to the English parliament urging the necessity of a union for the preservation of peace between the two countries. As a mark of respect for his memory, Anne invited the two parlia ments to appoint commissioners. A commission sat in the winter of 1702-3, but the negotiations failed because of the opposition of the English merchants to a scheme which involved reciprocal freedom of trade.

The Problem of Union.

A union was recognized to be de sirable both for constitutional and for commercial reasons, but it was a political necessity that compelled the ministers of Queen Anne to take further action. In spite of the Act of Settlement, the Hanoverian succession could not be regarded as safe even in England. The Scots had made no settlement of the Crown after the death of Anne, and a Jacobite triumph in Scotland, on the occurrence of that event, would have meant a large increase of strength to the English Jacobites. It was therefore essential to bring about, in Anne's lifetime, a complete incorporating union on the basis of the Protestant succession, so that there would be, on the Queen's death, no legal means whereby the Scots, by them selves, could alter the succession. Such a union must involve freedom of trade, and to this the English Whigs, largely com posed of the mercantile classes, were opposed. In Scotland, the desire for a union which had been shown in 1689 had almost entirely disappeared, and its vehement opponents included not only the Jacobites but also a "Patriot" or "Country" Party, led by Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun, which championed the inde pendence of Scotland from French and English influence alike. A combination of Jacobites and Patriots brought about in a dangerous legislative warfare between the two parliaments, and an outbreak of hostilities between the two nations was well within the bounds of possibility.

The English Whig ministry, strengthened by Marlborough's victory at Blenheim, resolved to defy the prejudices of their own supporters and to offer a union on the basis of freedom of trade combined with securities for the safety of the Presbyterian Established Church and for the maintenance of Scots law and of the Scottish Courts of Justice. The Scottish Whigs responded to the offer and commissioners from both countries met in April 1706. The subject which gave rise to most discussion was the representation of Scotland in the future parliament of Great Britain. The numbers as finally settled gave Scotland the inade quate representation of 45 members in the Commons and 16 in the Lords. In Jan. 1707 the proposed Treaty of Union was con firmed by the Scottish parliament by a majority of 110 votes to 68, and the terms were embodied in legislative measures carried by each of the two parliaments. The union was distinctly un popular, but the Jacobite assertions that it was carried by bribery have been challenged.