Observations on the Nature of Civil Liberty, Part I: Context

In an effort to continuously expand upon the narrative of the American Revolution as it is commonly understood, this series has thus far ventured in a number of relatively unorthodox directions. The contributions of women to the substance and character of the Founding Generation – or, to be fair, one woman in particular – have been discussed on more than one occasion, along with the efforts of political radicals, the middle classes, recent immigrants, and popular satirists. The lately-concluded series concerning the September 30^th, 1750 sermon of one Jonathan Mayhew (1720-1766) was pursued with precisely this spirit in mind, seeking, as it did, to present a contemporary expression of American socio-political thought from the perspective – in the context of mid-18^th century Massachusetts – of a mainstream religious authority. Thus far, however, all of the documents herein examined were either written by Americans or originally published in America. While this may seem like something of a given, it becomes less so when one recalls that the American Revolution was a trans-continental event as much as it was a provincial one. Yes, its primary instigators and leaders were American by birth or – as a result of having migrated to the colonies and then acknowledged the authority of Congress – by affirmation. And yes, the tendency of Parliament and the relevant British governments was indeed to treat the agitations of British America as though they constituted an isolated outbreak of spontaneous disloyalty. But the fact that British political mainstream was relatively uniform in its rejection of the American position – and that claims of violated sovereignty tended only to appeal to those who actively resided in the affected colonies – did not stop certain British nationals from loudly and effectively voicing their support for the American struggle.

Richard Price (1723-1791) was but one of these individuals, though his eloquence and his passion render him a particularly prominent example of the same. A contemporary of fellow Briton Thomas Paine (1737-1809), Price likewise showed himself to be an ardent supporter of the American cause in the 1770s and 1780s during which time he penned a number of treatises – Observations on the Nature of Civil Liberty the Principles of Government, and the Justice and Policy of the War with America (1776) being the subject of this series – expressing both his fundamental rejection of British policy in America and his belief that the separation of the former colonies from the British Empire stood to render significant benefit to the world at large. Unlike Paine, however, whose celebrated pamphlet Common Sense (1776) was written and published in Philadelphia, after its author had immigrated to colonial Pennsylvania in 1774, Price delivered his various literary broadsides while still residing in Britain proper. In consequence, while Paine faced little – if any – institutional scrutiny during the period of his most enthusiastic support for the American cause, Price was left at the mercy contemporary Britain’s distressingly thin protections against accusations of sedition or libel. While this might conceivably suggest something about the degree of risk these two men were respectively willing to face, it would seem more likely that their willingness or unwillingness to depart from the land of their birth while writing and publishing material that was bound to prove widely unpopular therein stemmed from the degree to which each of them identified with the socio-political forces that the Anglo-American crisis had effectively unleashed.

Price and Paine were most certainly both radicals by the standards of the era in which they lived. And both likewise owed their radicalization to certain trends and influences then at work in mid-18^th century British culture. But the manner in which this radicalism was expressed, and the degree to which they were each willing to pursue it, differed significantly between them. Paine – as discussed at length in the series on his celebrated pro-independence pamphlet – was a staunch opponent of monarchy. The British people, he thunderously asserted, were ill-used by their continued dependence on such an antiquated and arbitrary system of government, and it was consequently in the best interest of the American people to separate themselves from the former as quickly and as completely as possible. In Britain proper, this would have placed Paine on the very fringes of mainstream political discourse. In the Thirteen Colonies, however, particularly in the volatile years between 1773 and 1776, he received a far more sympathetic hearing, and simultaneously found himself surrounded by those who, if they were perhaps not yet willing to question the very concept of monarchy, were at least open to the suggestion that the Crown no longer functioned to serve their interests or protect their rights.

Price, by comparison, spoke vociferously in favor of the British Constitution and the ideal balance of power he believed it embodied. Certainly there were a number of things he expressed his support for which would have placed him outside the mainstream of contemporary political discourse. Parliamentary reform, for example, whereby the various irregularities and imbalances that over a course of centuries had led to an increasingly unequal representation in the House of Commons were to be finally and firmly addressed, was not a priority of either the Whig or Tory factions of Britain’s extant political culture. Nevertheless, Price’s support for a radical reallocation of seats in Parliament did not represent a rejection on his part of the core values of the contemporary British state. On the contrary, his support for reform arguably spoke to his wholehearted desire to salvage what he believed at bottom to be a viable system of government. Price was thus perhaps more sanguine than Paine as to the ability of the British Constitution and prospective British governments to protect and promote the rights and liberties of every subject living under the auspices of the same. The various arguments he put forward in the aforementioned Observations would seem to confirm this hypothesis. It was not the institutions of the British state that were to blame for the Anglo-American crisis, he therein affirmed, but rather the manner in which successive governments abused them and Parliament and the general population consented to the same. Thus expressed, Price’s support for the American cause in 1776 effectively linked contemporary provincial complaints over taxation to an existing tradition of political opposition that had been shaping public discourse in Britain since the turn of the previous century.

But, as ever, we seem to be moving just a little too fast. For the moment, let us turn our attention to the author himself. Price, though English by reputation, was actually Welsh by birth, having come into the world at Llangeinor in the county of Glamorgan, the son of Rhys Price, a dissenting – i.e. non-Anglican Protestant – minister and Catherine Richards, his father’s second wife. At the time of his birth – February 23^rd, 1723 – Wales was still largely agrarian, its population was either illiterate or poorly educated, and the predominant religious faith remained mainstream Anglicanism. This began to change, however, during the early years of Price’s childhood. Beginning in 1731, Church of England minister Griffith Jones (1684-1761) set about establishing a system of “circulating schools” beginning in Carmarthenshire that would provide Welsh language education – a novelty at a time when all formal instruction was in English – using the Bible and the Anglican catechisms as primary texts. By remaining in place for a period or three months before moving on – or circulating – to a new location, these semi-permanent institutions were able to dramatically increase literacy rates over a relatively short period of time. That this came about through the medium of scripture was especially significant. When an otherwise undistinguished carpenter’s son named Howell Harris (1714-1773) experienced a religious epiphany during an Anglican service at Talgarth in 1735, converted to Methodism, and began a life of itinerant evangelization, his efforts were met by a population who could not only read the Bible themselves but knew its verses intimately. The ensuing religious revival – in large part coinciding with a larger “awakening” then occurring in Great Britain and its American dependencies – inaugurated a number of non-Anglican Protestant denominations at the same time that it revitalized and reawakened interest in existing sects that had previously split from the Church of England. The result, by the middle of the 19^th century, was that Wales had become a predominantly Non-Conformist community.

Having been born and raised in this increasingly literate and religiously conscious environment – and having furthermore been the son of a Non-Conformist minister – Price was very much a product of this shift in Welsh society and a devotee of its accompanying cultural and moral values. After first being privately tutored, he attended school at Neath, Pen-Twyn, and Howell Harris’s hometown of Talgarth. Throughout this experience it doubtless became clear to Price the degree to which Non-Anglicans were either neglected, ostracized, or persecuted by the various institutions of the contemporary British state. English remained the language both of government and the Church of England, neither of which offered much in the way accommodation for those who could not or would not speak it. That this – perhaps inadvertently – led to an entrenchment in illiteracy which was only alleviated by private action much likewise have seemed a damning symbol of institutional neglect. The further persecution by the Anglican hierarchy of figures like Howell Harris for preaching out of doors, promoting Methodist or Calvinist theology, and generally encouraging a sense of Welsh religious identity and the cultivation of an individual relationship between the self and the divine surely combined to form a distinct understanding on the part of young men like Price. Centralized authority, they had every reason to believe, always tended towards self-preservation, and justice was more often than not the product of individuals who chose to act in the spirit of selflessness and compassion. These lessons were if anything reinforced during the next stage of Price’s life.

After leaving Wales sometime around the year 1740, Price next settled in the area known as the Moorfields, a small and largely undeveloped portion of London near the so-called “Moorgate” in the city’s still-extant border wall. In spite of its use as a relief area following the Great Fire of London in 1666, the area did not see substantial permanent settlement until the 1770s and 1780s, and was best known in the middle of the 18^th century as a haven for the poor, a favored haunt of highwaymen, and the home of a number of brothels. Despite – or perhaps because of – its reputation for being an area of the city in which the fashionable dared not tread, however, it also became home in the 1690s to one of staunchly Anglican England’s many “dissenting academies.” These schools, established in reaction to such discriminatory policies as the Five Mile Act (1665) – whereby Non-Conformist ministers were prohibited from coming within five miles of any parish from which they had been previously expelled – and the Act of Uniformity (1662) – which proscribed the “acceptable” rites of public worship and mandated their recognition by all civil and religious officials – were funded by a mix of tuition fees and private donations, staffed by dissenting ministers, and open to students who sought an education in divinity but would have otherwise been prevented from attending Oxford or Cambridge. While not specifically prohibited by law, the dissenting academies were nonetheless forced to operate in a kind of legal gray area in which members of their faculty remained subject to periodic persecution in the ecclesiastical courts and physical isolation remained the surest guarantee of their continued existence.

Price left the school in Moorfields – rather generically known as the Fund Academy – in 1744, having studied under theologian and noted natural scientist John Eames (1686-1744). He next travelled to Stoke Newington – now a neighborhood of London, then a village in its own right – became a lecturer at the Presbyterian meeting-house at Old Jewry, married a woman named Sarah Blundell, and finally settled in Newington Green in 1758. Price’s subsequent posting as minister of the Newington Green Unitarian Church provided him with the platform from which he would proceed to establish a reputation for himself as a political and theological radical, an ardent reformer, and a pioneering theorist in the fields of finance and statistics. The allies and friends he consequently attracted form a veritable cavalcade of contemporary Britain’s most famous and influential liberal and anti-establishment thinkers. The 2^nd Earl of Shelburne (1737-1805) became a particularly noteworthy patron, through which Price met fellow reformer Elizabeth Montagu (1718-1800) – co-founder of the Blue Stockings Society – and by which he was able to secure employment for fellow dissenting intellectuals like Thomas Jervis (1748-1833) and Joseph Priestly (1733-1804). Price further expanded this circle of notables when he joined what then-colonial agent Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) referred to as “The Club of Honest Whigs,” and by hosting such varied guests in his home as Franklin himself, the aforementioned Thomas Paine, and William Pitt the Elder (1708-1778). By the time that Observations was published in 1776, its author was thus arguably both well-known and well-connected in the liberal intellectual circles of contemporary British culture and had extensive experience with various forms of organized political, religious, and social dissent.

As to the state of British politics at large at that time, it will here suffice to reiterate a few points that have doubtless been discussed in this program at some point in the past. The Prime Minister at that time, it is most certainly worth noting, was one Frederick North, Earl of Guilford (1732-1792). While North considered himself a Whig – as did nearly every public official during the period of Whig dominance between 1715 and 1783 – he has since been identified as perhaps the first particularly successful Tory head of government in British history. The reason for his identification with what was then the somewhat shriveled opposition faction in British politics was that, quite simply, he was friendly with George III (1738-1820) in a way that most Whigs were not. While this amiability towards the reigning monarch had arguably doomed the ministry of the Earl of Bute (1713-1792) – a member of the Scottish gentry and George’s former tutor – North was comparatively cannier and blessed with much better luck. Bute had been forced to contend with the often harsh realities associated with negotiating an end to a sustained military conflict – in this case the Seven Years War (1754-1763) – and also suffered for his government’s efforts to impeach radical Whig MP John Wilkes (1727-1797) for the incendiary criticisms he offered of the Prime Minister and cabinet alike. North, by comparison, came into office at a moment of national triumph following the expansion of the British Empire to its largest extent at the hands of its long-standing continental rivals. The North Ministry’s successful handling of the Falkland Crisis (1770) – during which Spain, still smarting from its recent defeat, attempted to seize the Falkland Islands from its small British garrison – managed to build upon this celebratory mood by further asserting British preeminence while also driving a wedge between Spain and its traditional ally, France.

The government of Lord North was accordingly very popular at the beginning of the 1770s, notwithstanding its leader’s willingness to indulge the reigning sovereign’s unaccountable tendency to involve himself in matters of domestic politics. Doubtless this was a cause for concern among people like Price and his liberal Whig compatriots. Whereas the contemporary British constitutional order had been built upon a foundation of strict separation between the powers and prerogatives of the Crown and Parliament – as particularly embodied by the events and implications of the Glorious Revolution (1688) – men like Bute and North appeared to threaten this settlement by being too closely aligned to the wishes and sensibilities of the reigning monarch. Granting that this distinction was in reality little more than a matter of style and perception – Bute and North, unlike the Tories of the late 17^th century, appeared to take little issue with the balance of power in government being decisively tilted towards Parliament – it was not one which contemporary Britain’s more ardent reformers and radicals were likely able to ignore. Whether or not the North Ministry was liable to actively reaffirm the significance of the royal prerogative, liberal Whig belief in the possibility of the same was almost certain to fuel suspicion, close scrutiny, public criticism, and ideological retrenchment. As traditional Toryism was also associated with the supremacy of the Anglican Church, dissenters like Price had particular cause to feel antipathy towards Lord North and his cabinet. North’s friendliness with the notably devout George might fairly embody this perceived alliance of interest and sentiment, just as the disdain successive monarchs reportedly felt for one of the defining Whig statesmen of the era, William Pitt, Earl of Chatham (1708-1788), arguably personified that faction’s relationship with the monarchy.

Price, in short, had some reason to feel as though his government was tilting in a direction that he found to be disagreeable. While it was admittedly the Whig ministries of George Grenville (1712-1770), the Marquess of Rockingham (1730-1782), and the aforementioned Pitt that had initiated the Anglo-American crisis by attempting to extract a revenue from Britain’s American dependencies, it was the supposed-Tory North who had sought to punish the resulting grassroots dissent by promoting the passage of the Intolerable Acts (1774) and by placing the government of Massachusetts under military control  via the appointment as Governor of Gen. Thomas Gage (1718-1787). Price, whose support for Parliamentary reform surely caused him to identify very closely with colonial complaints surrounding their lack of representation in the House of Commons, no doubt saw in these actions a kind of confirmation of his fears. North was evidently not interested in reaching a negotiated settlement, in considering the substance of American objections, or even in reflecting upon the implications of his policies for the liberties and livelihoods of his fellow subjects in America. On the contrary, he seemed to believe that the prerogatives – if not, indeed, the dignity – of the British state had been slighted, and that the best means to secure the loyalty of the American colonies was by an exercise of the authority which he understood to be properly vested in Parliament. Price, for a number of reasons, was given to disagree with this position, and responded in what had become his customary manner. The Britain that he loved – the Britain built by and upon the principles of Whiggism – stood to suffer under the leadership of men like North, and it was simply not in his makeup to stand idly by.