John Wilkes
born October 17, 1725 in London, died December 26, 1797 in London
British journalist and politician, and a central figure in a number of constitutional disputes that touched the political rights of ordinary people and brought Parliament into great disrepute in the second half of the 18th century.
Private Life
Born as the son of wealthy Clerkenwell distiller, Wilkes married Mary Meade, the aged heiress of the manor of Aylesbury. They had a daughter, Polly. While Wilkes’s early youth can be described as narrow and confined, he later became the proverbial man about town, leading a rakish and dissolute life that often brought him into debts. His marriage finally assured him some financial safety and furthermore allowed him to become part of the gentry of Buckinghamshire.Wilkes also was a member of the Hell-Fire Club, a society that met in the ruins of St. Mary’s Abbey at Medmenham and that was associated with excesses and the celebration of Black Masses.
Early years
In 1757, Wilkes became MP for Aylesbury. He had already stood for election in 1754 but was not returned to Parliament then. Having run an expensive election campaign (said to have cost him £7,000, most of it used for bribes) and chronically overspending, Wilkes hoped to improve his finances through political advancement. He supported William Pitt the Elder, but Pitt’s resignation from the cabinet was a serious setback for Wilkes’s ambitions. Wilkes was among the leading opponents of Lord Bute. Bute, who had tutored George III in his youth and thus had become the future king’s favourite, gained a lot of political influence after George’s succession to the throne, which gave rise to great politcal controversy.
The North Briton “affair”
In June 1762, Wilkes first published a weekly periodical with the satirical name North Briton. By choosing this name, he stressed the opposition to Tobias Smollett’s Briton, a paper financed by Lord Bute and consequently published in support of the Bute administration. In the North Briton, Wilkes supported a campaign against Bute led by Earl Temple. Bute was not only attacked personally and accused of a sexual relationship to the king’s mother, but Wilkes also included general abuse of Scots, and criticism on a number of other issues, like, e.g., the fact that London’s merchants were underrepresented in the House of Commons.
On 23 April 1763, Wilkes was arrested and imprisoned in the Tower of London after an article in No. 45 of the North Briton in which he attacked the Peace of Paris and denounced the ministerial statements of the King’s Speech of 1763 (of which he had obtained a preview by Pitt and Temple). This was the first time the King’s Speech was exposed as a factual government declaration. As a consequence, government could not hide behind the king anymore, but had to assume responsibilities for the statements made – a novelty in the 18th century. Wilkes was charged with seditious libel, i.e. the endangerment of public peace, for the publication of issue No.45. General warrants were issued by the Secretary of State, Lord Halifax, which, in case of seditious libel, allowed him to order the arrest of persons unnamed, as well as the search of all premises associated with these people. The issuing of the general warrants also enabled government to censor all prints and papers that were too critical of its proceedings. In the end, 49 people (including Wilkes) associated with printing or publishing issue No. 45 of the North Briton were arrested. Parliament even ordered the public burning of issue No. 45, but this was prevented by an angry mob of people supporting Wilkes and his cause.
Wilkes successfully challenged the use of general warrants. These were declared illegal in December 1763 by Chief Justice Pratt, Lord Camden, because the fact that no names of the people and property concerned by the warrant were given could “affect the persons and property of every man in the Kingdom and [this] is totally subversive of the liberty of the subject” (Arnold-Baker). Pratt also argued that “public policy is not an argument in a court of law” (Plumb). In 1766, the ruling was confirmed by the House of Commons, and in 1769 Wilkes won ₤4,000 damages from Halifax for wrongful arrest and thus secured a considerable victory for the liberty of the individual and the freedom of press.
Parliament’s reaction
However, government maintained its original position concerning issue No.45 and also dug up the obscene poem Essay on Woman written by Wilkes and Thomas Potter, a parody on Alexander Pope’s Essay on Man. In November 1973, the poem was read to the House of Lords and subsequently voted a libel and a breach of the privileges awarded to MPs. Reacting to the threat from Parliament and since he had only few influencial friends, Wilkes fled to the continent at the beginning of 1764. During his absence, he was condemned by the House of Commons for publishing a scandalous, obscene, and impious libel. The expulsion from Parliament followed shortly afterwards. Wilkes was outlawed in October 1764 for circumventing his sentence by fleeing to France.
Return to England
Wilkes returned to England in 1768, mainly because he had run out of money. Still, he was greeted enthousiastically by his supporters. People had not forgotten that, four years ago, government had acted for the Crown and violated the freedom of the press and the individual. These anti-governmental sentiments made possible his election as MP for Middlesex in the same year. Although the outlawry charge was repealed on a technical basis, Wilkes waived his privileges as a MP. Accordingly, he was convicted for libel and sent to prison for 22 months. Wilkes had taken this decision to waive his rights based on political calculations, since he hoped to become a popular hero and martyr once more. But as his petition for a pardon was refused, he soon continued his anti-governmental polemics. After Wilkes’s imprisonment, on 10 May 1768, 20 000 people demonstrated for him at St George’s Field. The military intervened, 11 people were killed.
On 3 February 1769, Wilkes was again expelled from Parliament because he continued his polemic attacks against government from prison (fuelled also by government’s congratulations for the troups of St George’s field). But Wilkes’s popularity ensured his re-election on 16 Frebraury 1769. Parliament again expelled him, but he was re-elected a second time in March 1769. This was followed by another expulsion and the third re-election in April 1769. But despite Wilkes’s repeated re-election, Henry Luttrell (the government’s candidate) was declared elected – although he had only received a minority of votes – and Wilkes was declared incapable of ever taking a seat in Parliament. This government intervention led to a tide of petitions claiming the right of the electors to choose their candidate (counting 60 000 signatures on the whole).
Later Years
Wilkes was released from prison in 1770. In January 1769, he had been elected Alderman in the City of London, and on his release was able to finally take his post. In 1770, he intervened in the so-called ‘Printer’s Case’, when Parliament tried to reinforce the technical secrecy of its debates against the printers to prevent further public agitation over its proceedings. However, a court of law refused to sentence journalists and printers for reporting from Parliament, and so Parliament decided to arrest these journalists and printers on its own authority. Here, Wilkes successfully prevented the arrest of the printers by taking advantage of the judicial privileges of the city. Subsequently, reporters were exclueded less frequently from parliamentary debates as it was reluctant to risk another conflict.
In 1774, Wilkes became Lord Mayor of London. In the same year, he and 11 of his supporters were elected to Parliament and could take their seats without disturbance. Wilkes and his supporters pursued a serious program at first, including shorther parliaments and bills against placemen and crown contractors. In 1776, Wilkes included the principle of universal male suffrage into his measure for parliamentary reform. This also included the claim for true representation, i.e. the demand for a reform of the borough system, but this was rejected by Parliament. Wilkes also advocated complete religious toleration and supported the American colonists. Nevertheless, he was soon accused of insincerity and allegedly he only made his later speeches against government to maintain his public popularity. This popularity, however, faded during the Gordon riots of 1780 when Wilkes firmly suppressed all unrest and thus opposed his former supporters. Although he was reelected to Parliament in 1779 and 1784 as MP for Middlesex, Wilkes’s popularity continued to fade, especially since the issues that had once made him popular had lost more and more of their significance to daily politics. Consequently, his movement could not make a lasting impression. Wilkes stayed in Parliament until 1790.
Supporters
From 1763 to 1774, ‘Wilkes and Liberty’ was slogan of the crowds demonstrating for his support. This support was especially strong and fervent in London: Parliament was thought unrepresentative and corrupt, and Wilkes the personification of liberty. However, the movement failed to get substantial support in the rural areas.
On 20 February 1769, Wilkes most active supporters founded the ‘Society of Supporters of the Bill of Rights’ to defend the legal freedom to support “Mr. Wilkes and his Cause” (Kluxen). The Society raised ₤20,000 until 1770 in order to cover Wilkes’s debts. What is more, they were the first to use modern methods of agitation, i.e. the press was deliberately and carefully exploited, and paid agents were sent around in the country to make speeches.
Wilkes managed to gain support even from America. While he was in prison, Virginia sent tobacco, Boston turtles, and South Carolina voted him ₤1,500 to pay his debts. Similar to his English supporters, the Americans felt themselves to be the victims of prejudice, blind insistence on constitutional rights, and ignorance of the principles of justice and humanity. Wilkes was also supported also by the Rational Dissenters, who hated his morals, but were leading advocates of parliamentary reform.
However, it should not be forgotten that Wilkes needed the conflict with the British government to maintain his popularity.He is thus often called a “champion of mass politics” (Cannon), which is one of the strands of popular radicalism.
Sources
Arnold-Baker, Charles. The Companion to British History. Tunbridge Wells: Longross, 1996.
Cannon, John Ashton (ed.). The Oxford Companion to British History. Oxford: University Press, 1997.
Haan, Heiner und Gottfried Haan. Geschichte Englands vom 16. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert. C.H.Beck: München, 1993.
Kluxen, Kurt. Geschichte Englands. Kröner: Stuttgart, 1968
Plumb, J.H. England in the Eighteenth Century. Penguin: Harmondsworth, 1950.
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