Policy of the Lancastrians. Unpopularity of later Lancastrian rule. fourteenth century; they had improved their status and consolidated their position by the acquisition of royal charters. They were now, as events had shown, in a position to determine the struggle in their favour and to force their wishes upon the Crown. The poverty of Henry IV. weakened his power, and he was unable to withstand the interests of the mercantile classes. In 1404 it was enacted that alien merchants should receive the same treatment in this country as was extended to English merchants in other countries. They were forbidden to sell merchandise to one another, and were required to sell their wares 'within a quarter of a year next after their coming", and also to spend the money they received upon native commodities 1. The following year, however, the provision restricting the sale of commodities to a period of three months was repealed at the petition of the Italian merchants 2, and the Commons again renewed their complaints 3. Henry V. carried on the policy of his predecessor; and in 1413 and 1416 confirmed the measures against aliens. But the next reign witnessed a long stream of petitions complaining that the laws against aliens were not enforced. In 1427 the Commons made a strong remonstrance that the statutes relating to aliens "should be better kept " 5. Southampton secured special concessions, but one cause of the unpopularity of later Lancastrian rule was the neglect to execute the laws against foreign merchants, a policy which alienated the trading classes and weakened the attachment of the city of London to the dynasty. The Libelle of English Polycye, reiterating a complaint as old as the fourteenth century, lamented that Englishmen abroad were worse treated than aliens in England; in Brabant they were required to sell their wares and buy their goods within fourteen days. A Yorkist pamphlet on Commercial Grievances, published in 1452, shows 1 Statutes, ii. 145. 2 Rot. Parl. iii. 553 a; Statutes, ii. 150. 3 Rot. Parl. iii. 661 b (1411). 4 Ibid. iv. 13 a (1413); Statutes, ii. 197 (1416). 5 Rot. Parl. iv. 328 b. The reply was unfavourable: Le roi s'avisera. Hist. MSS. Comm. 11th Rep. App. iii. 45 (1444). 7 Political Poems, ii. 179. that commercial questions had already begun to affect political issues: "The third article and full grievous is this, that the Lombards, Easterlings, etc., be suffered to abide so long within the land, and to utter [sell] their goods at their own lust"1. Richard III. in his unsparing efforts to gain popularity passed an act, which revived the old restrictions on aliens respecting retail dealing and length of residence, though the period was now extended from forty days to eight months 2. Henry VII. at once repealed this act, though he granted a charter to London forbidding strangers to buy and sell to other strangers 3. Complaints against aliens continued during the sixteenth century. In 1514 a petition from traders and artisans recited that the realm "is so inhabited with a great multitude [of] needy people, strangers of divers nations . . . that your liege people Englishmen cannot imagine nor tell whereto nor to what occupation that they shall use or put their children"; and it demanded that aliens should only remain in England one month. The London shoemakers denounced their alien competitors on the amusing ground that "great ruth and pity it is to see great loss and decaying of all the king's subjects of this realm, that hath the use and wearing of such false stuff" 5 To agitate for laws against aliens was only one part of Hosting the burgesses' programme; the other part was to carry out of aliens. these laws by placing them under the control of English hosts, who were responsible for their guests and witnessed all their commercial transactions. The hostellers took oath "to be privy and oversee all manner [of] merchandise that any merchant alien, being under your said hostage and oversight, hath" 6. The system was an old one, for in the twelfth century Henry II. granted the burgesses of St. Omer as an exceptional privilege the right to have lodgings in London 1 Kingsford, English Historical Literature in the Fifteenth Century, App. xi. 363. 2 Statutes, ii. 489. 3 Ibid. ii. 507. 95 (1485). For the charter to London: Birch, Charters of London, 4 Schanz, Englische Handelspolitik, ii. 596, No. 141. Ibid. ii. 598, No. 142 (c. 1528). 6 Letter Book D, 194. A document illustrating the hosting of aliens is printed in English Economic History, Select Documents, 197. Difficulty the system. at their own choice, and to sell their goods to whom they would without view of justice or sheriff 1. An exception was also made in favour of Teutonic merchants: "The common law of the Men of the Emperor of Germany is that they may lodge within the walls of the city of London where they will" (c. 1130) 2. But it was difficult to enforce, and as early as 1269 twenty merchants were fined a thousand pounds, because they used their own weights and refused to lodge in houses belonging to citizens 3. In 1285 foreigners were forbidden by statute to be innkeepers for denizens or strangers 4. London sought in 1300 to make the system of hosts comof enforcing pulsory, and ordered alien merchants "that they for the future keep no hostels themselves for bed and board, but they shall lodge only in the hostels of freemen on pain of forfeiture of all their movables" 5. In 1377 another petition insisted" that no stranger keep hostel within the realm "". Early in the fifteenth century (1404) a vigorous attempt was made to establish the system on a proper footing, by compelling the local authorities in every town to which foreign merchants repaired to assign hosts for their reception. The demand that aliens should live in "some notable house", and buy only with the cognizance of the householder, became the burden of repeated petitions in 1411, 1413 and 1420; while in 1425 it was made the condition of a grant that merchant strangers shall be under host within fifteen days after their coming, and ere they make any sale of their merchandise "; and to sell their wares within forty days after their coming under host 8. The failure of all their efforts drove the Commons to intimidation, and in 1432 they demanded that any mayor or bailiff, who suffered alien merchants "to be at large under his control and will", 1 Cal. of Documents in France, 491. "" "all 2 M. Bateson, A London Municipal Collection", in English Hist. Review, xvii. 501, § 12. For another version of these early rules for foreign merchants, see Riley, Liber Custumarum, i. 61 seq. Amiens was also exempted, supra, p. 450. 3 De Antiquis Legibus Liber, 118-119. 5 Letter Book C, 65. 7 Statutes, ii. 145. 4 Statutes, i. 103. Rot. Parl. iii. 661 b (1411); ibid. iv. 13 a (1413); ibid. iv. 126 b (1420); ibid. iv. 276 a (1425). should pay the extreme penalty of sixty pounds for each alien 1. This violence overshot the mark, and the next year parliament extended the period of residence to three months and reduced the penalties: the mayor of London was to incur a fine of forty pounds for neglect, and other towns half the amount 2. But the government still refused to give way; the reply invariably was: Le roi s'avisera. In 1439 the pertinacity of the Commons, after many ineffectual attempts, seemed rewarded; and they were successful in placing upon the statute-book the act of 1439, by which aliens were to sell their wares within eight months and were brought under the control of English hosts, who should have cognizance of all sales. The act attracted great attention; it was to hold good for eight years, but contemporaries are agreed that it was inoperative. "The Commons desired that Lombards and aliens should be put unto hosts; but it was long afore it might be granted; and so it was granted and not performed, to great hindering of the merchants of England". The chronicler Bale also adds his testimony that "the ordinances took none effect" 5. The system of compulsory hosts survived under the Yorkists and Tudors, for in 1475 Norwich, in 1482 Ipswich, and in 1491 Yarmouth, ordered that no aliens should harbour strangers. At Newcastle, where the hostmen formed a corporation as early as 15179, it was laid down (1548) that no host should make purchases from his guest, but that a number of the fellowship should be appointed as "price-makers” or Ibid. iv. 454 a. 3 Statutes, ii. 303. 1 Rot. Parl. iv. 402 a. 4 Chronicles of London, ed. C. L. Kingsford (1905), 153. The act is also referred to in A Chronicle of London from 1089–1483, p. 126. Flenley, Six Town Chronicles, 114. The question of hosting seems to have stirred considerable feeling in Henry VI.'s reign. Cf. the Libelle": 189. "What reason is it that we should go to host In their countries, and in this English coast • Records of Norwich, ii. 101. .". (Political Poems, ii. 178.) ' Bacon, Annals of Ipswich, 147; Wodderspoon, Memorials of Ipswich, 8 Swinden, Antiquities of Great Yarmouth, 497, No. xx. • Records of the Company of Hostmen of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, ed. F. W. Dendy (1901), p. xxix. This company obtained a monopoly of the sale of coal. Taxation of aliens. Export of gold and silver. " viewers" to buy merchandise brought within the town by any stranger," at such reasonable price as by their discretions shall be thought convenient "; and the commodities purchased were then distributed among the members" according to the rates of shipping". Even in the time of Elizabeth a citizen of London, William Tipper, received a grant of letters patent (1576) by which he was to appoint hosts for merchant strangers in London and elsewhere, and to have the oversight of their trade and levy an imposition of twopence in the pound on the value of their purchases and sales. At Norwich (1578) the authorities, out of consideration for the strangers settled in their midst," and for the experience we have had of your godly disposition and good behaviour amongst us", purchased from Tipper the delegacy of his privileges in so far as they affected Norwich 2. The number of aliens settled in England was very considerable, and under Edward III. (1343) a proposal was made that they should be taxed. This expedient was in accordance with the anti-alien programme, but it was prompted also by the feeling that foreigners ought to share in the burdens of the country 4. In 1439 an annual tax of sixteenpence was imposed on resident aliens, and ten years later a subsidy of six shillings and eightpence was levied on foreign merchants and twentypence on their clerks. In 1453 domiciled aliens were required to pay forty shillings yearly, those who remained only for a period of six weeks twenty shillings, and aliens who became denizens ten marks 5. One charge directed against foreign traders was that they drained the country of gold, and depreciated the currency by circulating base money. The evil was already producing its inevitable effects in 1298 when men began to 1 Newcastle Merchant Adventurers, i. 52. 2 Huguenot Soc. Pub, i. part i. 39-41. The clauses of the grant relating to the oversight of trade and the levy of a tax were disallowed on the intervention of Archduke Mathias: ibid. 40. 3 Patent Rolls, 1429-1436, pp. 537-588, for a list of aliens who settled in England in the early part of the fifteenth century. 4 Rot. Parl. ii. 137 b. " 5 Ibid. v. 6 b (1439); v. 144 b (1449); v. 230 a (1453). Cotton, Exact Abridgement of Records (1657), 649, is inaccurate : And of every merchant alien being no denizen, £6, 13s. 4d. yearly ". • Proclamation enforcing the acceptance of current money: Letter Book |
