‘Men ought to have a voice in the assembly’

Alerting the reader that he was following in the footsteps of Hardinge and Richardson, Hatsell prefaced his Cases of Privileges (1776) as follows:

The Compiler of these has always been of opinion, that the easiest method of conveying to the Public the very useful information con­tained in those voluminous Collections, is, to select particular Heads or Titles; and, having brought together every thing that has any reference to any of these heads, to digest the whole in a chronological order, and to publish it in a separate volume.¹⁷

The skill-set that Hatsell identified was that of exploiting finding-aids.

depends upon the spirit and character of those who are hereafter to be called forth, either to fill the great offices of the State, to give advice to their Sovereign in matters of high import to the public welfare, or (in which they may be equally useful) to maintain such a conduct in Parlia­ment, as that, by their wisdom and prudence, and reputation with the

people, they may preserve inviolate that free constitution which was established at the Revolution.¹⁹

Service in the House was to be regarded as a professional commitment, Hatsell argued. The novice must learn to perform a variety of roles each of which required specialised knowledge. New members who sought to better their skills must commit themselves to acquire ‘habits of business’ common to the most experienced members of the House of Commons.

In dissecting Commons’ rule-making in projects of internal improve­ments, Hatsell found the ‘Commons as school’ metaphor sufficiently stimu­lating to rework it, on several occasions, into the body of his essays. ‘Men, who are to command the fleets and armies of a free country, ought as early as possible to have a voice in the Assembly of the people’. Members of the House, he continued, ‘may hear treated, and may themselves discuss with freedom, every question that concerns the administration of the gov­ernment of the country’.²⁰ In pursuing school-for-members as a theme in 1781, Hatsell made explicit one of Hardinge’s purposes for publication of the journals; this purpose was implicit in Hardinge’s report to the House of Commons (1742).

Hatsell understood that this worked in the reverse direction as well. The assembly’s acquisition of specialised knowledge otherwise committed to military expertise could be employed to critique government policy. For example, the House of Commons acquired the skills to assess the utility of the war in America and specifically the strategic aims enunciated by the North administration. The idea that recolonisation of some or most prov­inces was the best means of re-establishing profitable economic relation­ships was dubious. That recolonisation could be achieved by seizing and occupying seaports along a coastline of a thousand miles was even more problematic.

In one of his few recorded observations on the most important issue of the day, Hatsell shared his views with John Ley, his Clerk Assistant at the time, on the occasion of the failure of the Carlisle Commission’s peace mission to Philadelphia (1778), a topic I touch on in Chapter 3, this volume. Military victory in North America and re-establishment of British civil administra­tion would entail ‘the enormous increase of Patronage to the Crown [which] would soon overwhelm us’.

I am therefore satisfied that this loss of America, as it is call’d, is a fresh instance of the Divine interposition in favour of the preservation of the Liberty & Independence of this Island, & and that to bring about this gracious purpose, Providence, by means of George ye 3rd, chose out the only set of Men, that could be found in the Nation, for Ministers, by whose blunders, & inattention, & want of foresight, this blessing could have been dispensed.²¹

‘This John Milton deserves hanging’ 37 Hatsell’s correspondence rarely exposed his opinions on political matters. The foregoing passage was exceptional.

This office, at the time I received it from Mr. Dyson, ‘gratis,’ he might have disposed of, and not to an improper person, or one unacquainted with the business of the House of Commons, for 3000 l. - Mr. Dyson’s successors, i.e. Mr. Tyrwhitt and myself, have thought ourselves obliged to follow the example which he set; but it is one thing to be the first to refuse a considerable and legal profit, and another, not to resume a practice, that has been so honourably abolished by a predecessor.²²

Hatsell’s confession strikes an awkward note. He drew attention to the fact that Dyson declined the opportunity to gain ‘considerable and legal profit’ when Hatsell obtained his first position in the House. On the other hand, the fact that Hatsell secured personal advantage - through his arrangement with Ley after 1797 - seems inconsistent with the preceding passage. It was a mat­ter to which Hatsell had given some thought; earlier in Members/Speaker he doubted the wisdom of barring of ‘family and fortune’ from seats in the House of Commons because a young member of the House might also have obtained a government appointment.²³ Williams’s assessment, that John Ley’s friend­ship with Hatsell mattered a great deal to both men, must be taken to provide the best possible excuse for Hatsell’s renting his seat at Clerk’s Table. The arrangement permitted Hatsell to exploit dual-office holding to his advantage: he made himself a pensioned retiree while retaining the title as Clerk.²⁴

Through his correspondence we know Hatsell to have been an enthusi­astic European traveller. In one such tour Hatsell arranged a meeting with Voltaire at Ferney. His recollection of this interview, according to O.C.

was ordered to be taken into custody [and] ordered to be discharged, on the 15th of December following, paying his fees. - It appears, from the Parliamentary History, vol. xxiii. p. 54, that the complaint in favour of Milton was made by Andrew Marvel; and that Sir Heneage Finch, afterwards the Lord Chancellor Nottingham, said in this debate, ‘This Milton was Latin Secretary to Cromwell, and deserves hanging’.²⁶

John Hatsell is ‘generally reputed’, Williams concluded, to be ‘the lead­ing authority on parliamentary procedure’, despite the ‘four volumes of his rather ponderous book’.²⁷ Hatsell could not have achieved this celeb­rity without the vantage that service at Clerk’s Table made possible. Nov­elist’s gifts guided his pen when Hatsell recorded what he observed and digested into his Precedents of Proceedings. On the page Hatsell displayed the humanity he found beneath the personae which members carefully cul­tivated for their performances in the chamber.