evaded by
the Sheriifs
or great
men.
Regulations
enacted in
1406.
Penalties
for infringe-
ment of
these.
Residents to
be chosen.
264 ConstiMional History. [chap.
the words which directed the election of persons who had taken
no part in the recent quarrels1 ; his interference in the elec-
tions of 1397 was 0ne °f the grounds of his deposition2, and
IIenry IV had been taken to task for excluding lawyers from
the parliament of Coventry in 1404 s. Yet there can be little
doubt that the right, however jealously watched, was sparingly
exercised; that, under the influence of the crown or of the
great lords, the sheriffs often returned their own nominees ;
and that neither the composition of the county court, the regu-
larity of its proceedings, nor the way of ascertaining its de-
cisions, was very definitely fixed. Sometimes a few great men
settled the elections, sometimes a noisy crowd failed to arrive
at any definite choice, sometimes the sheriff returned whom he
pleased. It was to remedy this uncertainty that Henry IV in
1406 enacted on the petition of the commons that, in the first
county court held after the reception of the writ, proclamation
should be made of the day and place of parliament, and that all
persons present, whether suitors duly summoned for the purpose
or others, should attend the election; they should then pro-
ceed to the election freely and indifferently, notwithstanding
any request or command to the contrary, and the names of the
persons chosen should be written in an indenture under the seals
of the persons choosing them : this indenture should be tacked
to the writ and considered to be the sheriff’s return 4. This act,
so far as the electoral body was concerned, only declared the
existing custom ; but the notice, the prohibition of undue influ-
ence and the institution of the indenture, took from the sheriff
all opportunity of making a false return. An act of 1410 vested
in the justices of assize the power of inquiring into the returns,
fining the sheriffs in the sum of £100 where the law had been
broken, and condemning the members unduly returned to forfeit
their wages 5. The first parliament of Henry V restricted both
the electoral vote and the choice of the electors to residents
within the county, city, or borough for which they were to elect
* Lords’ Report, iv. 727. ^ Rot. Part. iii. 420.
3 Above, p. 51. 4 7 Hen. IV, c. 15; Stat. ɪɪ. 156.
5ιι Hen. IV, e. I ; Stat. iɪ. 162.
XVIII.] Electoral Eights. 265
members1. In 1427 the effect of the act of 1406 was so far
modified as to allow the accused sheriffs and knights to make
answer and traverse before any justices of assize, to that they
should not be fined unless they had been duly convicted2. Three Forty-
years afterwards, in the eighth year of Henry VI, was passed the freeholders
restrictive act which, in consequence of the tumults made in the
county courts ‘ by great attendance of people of small substance
and no value, whereof every of them pretended a voice equiva-
lent, as to such elections, with the most worthy knights and
squires resident,' established the rule that only resident persons
possessed of a freehold worth forty shillings a year should be al-
lowed to vote, and that the majority of such votes should decide
the election3. In 1432 it was ordered that the qualifying free- Freehoiato
hold should be within the county 4. These regulations received the county,
further authority by an act of the twenty-third year of the same
king, which, after recounting several abuses that had recently
revived, gave minute rules for the enforcement of these and the
preceding statutes, and prescribed that the representatives of the Knights, not
ɪ , -, -, yeomen, to
shires, henceforth to be chosen, should be notable knights, be chosen,
esquires, or gentlemen able to be knights, and not of the degree
of yeomen or under5. The restriction of the electoral franchise
to the class which was qualified to serve on juries commended
itself to moderate politicians of the fifteenth century. There is
no evidence to show that the allegations of the statute with re-
spect to the disorders of the county court are untrue. But the
history of the particular years in which the changes were made
throws no light upon the special circumstances that called for
legislation, and, what is more curious, the acts seem to have
produced no change whatever in the character or standing of
the persons returned ; they were all, however, passed at the
request of the commons and in orderly times. Henry V had
not the will, and the council of Henry VI had not the power,
to reject a proposal of amended practice in favour of an ill-
defined and abused prescription. The key to the question is
* I Hen. V, c. I ; Stat. ɪi. 170. 2 6 Hen. VI, c. 4; Stat. ɪi. 235.
3 8 Hen VI, c. 7 ; Stat. ii. 243. 4 ɪo Hen. VI, e. 2 ; Stat. iɪ. 273.
5 23 Hen. VI, c. 14; Stat. iɪ. 340 sq.