Projects were the point at which the financial mental world shared by James and his ministers fused with fiscal reality and practice. Their fiscal policies were conceived in terms of projects. Two remarkable instances of this contemporary project conceptualization have come down to us intact, but have previously failed to elicit recognition. Over three nights in December 1757, St. Paul’s coffee-house was the venue for the sale of Julius Caesar's library, mortgaged by one of his last descendants 'for £40 to an upholsterer for a debt'.! Caesar’s 193 volumes fetched £352, but not before the auction was postponed three weeks to allow Samuel Patterson to catalogue the collection.^ Patterson consulted Caesar's own catalogue of the library and copied the contents directly into the auction guide.® Sale item 52 was titled simply 'Projects’, taken from Caesar's original title, 'The Contents of the 14 booke, in fol[io] containing Proiects.'^ The volume was eventually purchased by the British Museum and became Additional Manuscript 10038.^ Something as interesting and significant is to be found in a report of 'pap[er]s touching] the Tresury & Excheq[uer] etc. delivered to Mr Wilson by Mr Dudley Norton out of the late L[ord] Tresorers study' in Whitehall.® Among more than 100 bags, boxes, and books once belonging to Salisbury was a volume called 'Suites and proiects'.^ At some point the book passed out of the keeper's hands and is now among the Harleian manuscripts.® Neither of these volumes are finds—Caesar’s, at least, has often been cited—but their significance has been unappreciated. These manuscripts represent !bL Lansdowne Ms 123, fol. Iv.
2bL Lansdowne Ms 123, fol. lv-3r. 'they would now (anno 1780) perhaps sell even for double this sum.'
®BL Lansdowne Ms 124.
4bL Lansdowne Ms 123, fol. 9r, 34r. The item was purchased for £2 1 Is by a Mr. Boddington (from the office
of the Tower ordnance) Lansdowne Ms 123, fol. 8r-8v. ®BL Lansdowne Ms 123, fol. 8v.
®BL Lansdowne Ms 168, fol. 211r-214v (21 June, 1612). 7fiL Lansdowne Ms 168, fol. 213r.
® 'Suites and Proiects presented to the late Earle of Salisbury Lord high Thier of England'. BL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. lr-68v. This may well have been present with papers Wilson found 'confusedly dispersed' among Salisbury's records; one of the items was titled 'sûtes of innovation & newe proiects.' HH Salisbury Ms 140, fol. 48r. He probably labelled the vellum cover of Harleian Ms 4807 when it came into his custody after Salisbury's death. Compare with Wilson's hand in HHL Ellesmere Ms 1672,1673.
Projects and the ConceptuaJization of Crown Finance
vital analytical tools for understanding how James' own ministers conceptualized and understood projects; they are Caesar's and Salisbury's practical definitions.
The overall shapes of the volumes are instructive. Caesar added projects as late as 1619, but almost all date to two periods, 1607-1609 and 1611-1613; Salisbury's projects overlap the first period, principally 1608-1609. These dates perfectly correspond to the most intense projecting periods. Caesar's is several times larger than Salisbury's, but the projects in each are wide-ranging; topics, if not actual documents, are duplicated between them while each volume contains unique projects. The disparity in size reflects Caesar's workhorse position in his partnership with Salisbury—and as a treasury commissioner (1612-1614) with Northampton. Caesar alone had the depth of expert treasury knowledge to best evaluate projects. However, personal endorsements and annotations are to be found throughout both collections. The volumes are replete with individual project documents, but Caesar's also contains several policy memoranda. This underscores the previous discussion about the processing of information, in this case individual projects, into policy prescriptions and counsel. The project case-study in the next chapter will particularly analyze this aspect of Caesar's volume. Most significantly, the opening documents in both volumes are copies of the instructions for and memorials of grantable suits for purposes of royal liberality and bounty.^ In no manner is the bond between projects and the patronage culture more starkly evidenced nor the awareness of James' ministers of the relationship. A holistic view of these volumes makes possible a synthesis of projects' chief characteristics: their origins in suits and petitions, with frequent patronage complications; employment of the languages of commonwealth and public good; the proto-privatization of government; monopolistic
possibilities; and projects as an early-modern European phenomenon. A closer look at |
several projects in the Caesar and Salisbury volumes will both elaborate and reinforce these
1
seminal characteristics. I
i
Salisbury held a project for populating the 'abundance of vacant and waste I
i
groundes'.!® The economic dislocation of the 1590's significantly heightened concerns about 4
I
9bL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. lr-2v; BL Additional Ms 10038, fol. 4r-4v.
!®Guy, 'Second reign', 18. BL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 14r.
Projects and the Conceptualization of Crown Finance
social stability and crime, No late Elizabethan councillor or 'magistrate would have
doubted that vagrancy was criminal, that democracy was the worst form of government, and that plebeian forces were dangerously on the increase.'T hese apprehensions stayed with ministers like Cecil at James' accession and explain his interest in this project. It is structured in a style common to nearly every project: premises, mechanics, assurances (in anticipation of objections), and benefits. There were numerous wastes within forests, parks, chases, but because they remained 'common to all' they were neither 'inclosed nor inhabited with honest industrious people, that may convert the same into tillage and pasture and other suche profitable uses for the common wealthe'.i^ James could reverse this by leasing 100 acres each to 5000 yeomen who would enclose and work the land, while constructing a sturdy house and farm buildings. Their rent would be £20, yielding new revenues of £100,000 The projector anticipated James' concern for the adjoining forests and game with requirements that the lease-holder become a 'keeper and p[re] server of the deere' and provide 'gates and places of passage' through their enclosures for royal hunting. Another £100,000 flowing into the Exchequer was an obvious inducement for the crown, but promises of order and prosperity aimed at socio-economic concerns: 'whereby ten tymes five thousand people shalbe maintained to live, by this meanes his Ma[jes]tie shalbe better enabled in [military] force and strengthe by raisinge of soe many able subiectes, his subsedy so muche increased, the common wealth greatly imiched, and bettered by providing of so many dwellinge houses for so many desolate people w[hi]ch nowe doe wante placed of habitation.'i^ Increased agricultural production would also force down prices. It concluded with the mantra of all projects: 'This wilbe a meanes to set a number of idle persons on worke, wherby to avoide idlenes and drunkennes and all other foule vices w[hi]ch doe raigne chiefly by idlenes.' The
language of commonwealth, public good, and mutual gains to crown and society—pm bono
publico—v^ere consistent throughout p r o je c ts .S o too was the exposition of direct and
^Ijim Sharpe, 'Social strain and social dislocation, 1585-1603', Guy, Elizabeth 1 .193. l^Guy, 'Second reign', 18 and 11 respectively.
l^BLHarleianMs 4807, fol. 14r. l^BLHaiieianMs 4807, fol. 14v.
15por instance PRO SP 14/51/29, tbl. 95v (1609?); BL Additional Ms 10038, fol. 271r-272v (19 July, 1612).
Projects and the Conceptualization of Crown Finance
indirect benefits: £100,000 in revenue; a fitter populace, new subsidy-men, and secondary employment of 45,000 people.
The project for a company of exploration and discovery is an interesting counterpoint. It falls into a category of projects whose allure lay more in what was not said. Its bait was up-front: ’It is conceaved that a proiect may be delivered to his Ma|jes]tie by w[hi]ch he may satisfie a greate p[ar]te of his debtes.’^^ It was beneficial to and necessary for the commonwealth and prejudicial to none, but further explanation was not forthcoming. The author instead pressed his suit that a tenth of its proceeds be committed to establish a joint- stock exploration company in Plymouth, managed by a president and twelve councillors, and constantly maintaining two ships at sea in search of commercially exploitable discoveries. The contrast with the previous project is pointed. Repopulation was a project Salisbury
endorsed as fitting 'to be offred to ye P a r l i a m e n t . 'was a government project with clear
benefits to both crown and commonwealth. That of exploration introduces us to the suitor and projector: 'the partie w[hi]ch is to discover this proiect hath served this crowne and state twentie & sixe yeres and spente in yt att the least tenn thowsand markes.... yt is usuall in ffrance, Spaine and other kingdomes to allowe unto all such as by good meanes, w[i]thowt hurtinge or preiudicinge anie person, advantage the kinges revenewe or his purse, to some a fourth, to some a third, and others a moytie of the procedue of theire proiect.'^® Once James guaranteed the projector his percentage, he would be 'readie to declare the secrett to his Ma|jes]tie and the meanes to compassé yt.' The projector only disclosed that it was 'neither imposicon, tax, nor monopolie.' Corresponding gain was affirmed: the commonwealth would benefit by expansion of commercial opportunities, while James and the projector shared residual profits of the latter's expertise. Not surprisingly, obtuse projects of this sort often found little s u p p o r t .
Licensing apprentices particularly highlights projects' relationships to patronage, monopolistic possibilities, and the privatizing of government responsibilities. The premises
l^BL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 61r. l^BL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 15v, 18BL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 61r.
19por instance, BL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 16r-17v (23 March, 1607[16081).
Projects and the Conceptualization of Crown Finance
were straight-forward. The 1563 statute of artificers ordered apprentices to be indentured for seven years, but it was not done for want of a responsible official.^» Consequently, ’unskilled artificers exceedingly increase, wherfore auncient artificers doe finde themselves much impoverished by yonge men that daylie sett upp & use trade contrarie to the said statute’.^! The project posited the privatization of legal enforcement. The projectors hoped James would grant by ’letters patent to some meet person full power and authoritie to enroull & record the said indentures in such places ... where their is not alreadye any authorised for that purpose'.22 They also sought power to dispense with the statutory fines against offenders already settled in their trades (penal fines).23 The structural deficiencies of Jacobean administration were to be remedied by patentees, a precipitating factor of projects throughout the period.24 The fiscal gains were uncertain, but like all projects speculation ran high. The projectors believed settled artificers would compound for up to a fourth of statutory forfeitures to receive a dispensation. Assuming 60,000 artificers in England and Wales capable of paying, the projectors believed they would realize £139,375.25 For their efforts, they asked for the standard 21 year grant and 5s in the pound for expenses, approximately £43,555.26 James would receive £200 in rent and the remaining proceeds of the compositions, over £90,000.2? Enforcement would produce socio-economic benefits. Unskilled artificers and shoddy goods would be curtailed while stopping pretended artificers who were little better than vagabonds and beggars.2s
Many lawfiill artificers suffered at the hands of informers for want of licences and were thr eatened with exposure and forfeitures. It was this clamour for legal dispensation that the projectors claimed inspired their proposal. However, the project had its immediate origins in patronage, neither profit for James nor benefits for the commonwealth had been
20b l Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 25r; BL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 63r.
21bL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 25r.
22b l Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 63r.
23bL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 63r.
2"^he discussion in Russell, Parliaments. 66-70 is useful.
25bL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 24r.
26bL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 25r.
27b l Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 25r.
28b l Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 64r.
Projects and the Conceptualization of Crown Finance
initial motives. This form of the project was insistently pressed upon James, who ordered Salisbury to have it examined by Caesar and others, it 'being now proponed for his Ma|jes]ties profitt especiallie & followed by Mr More ... that hertofore prosecuted it for my Lo[rd] Haddington'.29 The original project was blatantly designed for personal profit, but, when redrawn, James was fully prepared to turn it to his own ends. He resolved to 'make the best use of this sute for himself, so as it may evidentlie apeare to bringe a profitt w[i]th honor to his coffers & w[i]thout enormitie or inconvenience to his subiectes.'3® The crown would become the projector. Corporate towns had officers to enforce the statutes, but in other places Caesar replaced the project’s patentees with the clerks of the peace.^! He and Salisbury decided against it after Caesar judged 'the p[ro]fit veiy uncerteine & extreme small'; probably not a little from the unreliability of local officers with a variable revenue. When it was reviewed again in 1612, the chief inconvenience was that it would become a 'first and leading president of profitt... made by a penall lawe ... otherwise then in ordinarie forme of lawe.'^2
The fierce politics of patronage complicated situations when projects had their origins in suits.33 The common law judges were asked in November 1604 to answer whether the
prosecution and execution of penal laws could be contracted out to projectors.^ ^ James'
councillors were particularly intent upon exploiting the forfeitures of lands and goods in the
recusancy laws for revenue and p a tro n a g e.^ 5 The judges firmly declared that the legal
process was statutorily committed to the king and could not be given over to private persons for their own gain.36 Further, they disapproved of granting the benefit of forfeitures before
2^BL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 8r [emphasis mine] (23 October [16071; Roger Wilbraham to Salisbury), Haddington was originally acting for the earl of Dimbar. BL Additional Ms 10038, fol. 142r-143v (25 M y,
1607), For Dunbar's involvement, PRO SP 14/24/71, fol. 124r-124v (undated).
30bL Harleian Ms 4807, fol. 8r.
31bL Additional Ms 10038, fol. 15r (24 August, 1609).
22b l Additional Ms 10038, fol. llv (18 September, 1612).
33por example: BL Additional Ms 10038, fol. 61r-61v (outlawries/Lord Haddington), 128r-129v (logwood, com, copper tokens/ Lord Montgomery), 148r-149v (conyskins/Edward Villiers), 212r-212v (oaths at
julies/Arabella Stuart; James' cousin), 230r-231v (ofïïce for appraising the goods of die dead/Lord Haddington), 271r-272v (register of burials and christenings/Henry Martin; Caesar's father-in-law), 389r-390v (latitats/Lord Cobham).
3^HH Salisbury Ms 107, fol. 106r-107v; PRO SP 14/10/6, fol. 9r-9v (both 8 November, 1604). James' suspended the penal laws at his accession.
35b l Lansdowne Ms 168, fol. 344r-347v (27 November, 1604).
36hH Salisbury Ms 107, fol. 106r.
Projects and the Conceptualization of Crown Finance
they had been formally answered in the E x c h e q u e r.32 That said, loopholes were left for patronage. James might not be able to farm prosecution and collection, but the Exchequer taking could still be granted for those assisting the course of law.^s The council approved the judges' verdict and James ordered them to begin enforcing the penal laws again in the assizes,
circuits, and sessions of the p e a c e .^9 Courtiers became servant-informers-or employed
others in that capacity-performing the task of uncovering recusants for prosecution with the promise of forfeitures for their pains.^^
Projects were not simply an English phenomena, but characteristic of early-modern states.41 The French crown’s insatiable hunger for revenue spawned projectors, 'roundly denounced by Bodin’ as another opportunistic hand through which the king's money must pass.42 French projectors increasingly advanced credit to the crown for patents for their schemes, often the erection of new offices, tolls, or recovery of decayed revenues—much like their English counterparts.^^ Scotland suffered revenue woes under Mary and projects offered to her included retaining the benefits of wardship, licensing export of prohibited goods, exploitation of the coinage and mines, pre-emption of salt, monopolization of coal by the crown, and development of a Scottish fishing fleet."^ James' ministers possessed a genuine interest in foreign practices. Caesar had among his projects one for exactions employed by the French crown to pay its debts.45 Salisbury spoke of 'foreign industry and example offering] divers projects, good precedents to follow, for the adorning and enriching
32pRO SP 14/10/6, fol. 9r. 38pRO SP 14/10/6, fol. 9r.
39pRO SP 14/12/29, fol. 39r-39v (21 January, 1605).
‘^^Salisbury’s jmpers are strewn with petitions tor the benefits of recusancy. For example the work of Lord Saye and Sele, HH Salisbury Ms 114, tbl. 135r ([1605]); Salisbury Ms 117, fol. 162r-162v (20 September, 1606). For a large number of these petitions, KMC Salisbury. XXIII, 97-222 and KMC Salisbury. XXIV 1-229; Salisbury Ms P.1347 ([29 March, 1605]) is exemplary. PRO SP 14/14/64, fol. 139v (June, 1605) endorsed by Cecil as 'The Proiect of a l[ett]re wherby his M[ajes]tes pleasure is to be certefied whensoever any swte is made for Recusants'. Also M. C. Questier, 'Sir Henry Spiller, Recusancy and the Efficiency of the Jacobean Exchequer', Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 66 (1993), 251-266; John J. LaRocca, 'James I and his Catholic Subjects 1606-1612L Some Financial Implications'. Recusant History. 18 (1986-1987), 367-391,
'^iRichard Bonney, 'Early Modem Theories of State Finance', Bonney Economic Systems. 165-168 and 177- 179.
‘^^Bonney, 'State Finance', 168. ‘^3pent. Crisis in Finance. 58.
44b l Harleian Ms 4612. 50r-51v.
4^5b l Additional Ms 10038, fol. 32r-33v (1561).
Projects and the Conceptualization of Crown Finance
of this state’; unfortunately they often perished in execution.^6 George Carew’s remembrances of his embassy in France interested Salisbury.47 in them, Carew described the economic and physical wealth of France, made the greater by an industrious people so burdened with taxes they could not afford idleness.'^ While detailing the fiscal power and exactions of Henry IV and Sully, Carew seems to have been most impressed by Sully's reform of the revenue farms, 'reducing that to the king’s coffers, which was embezled by under-officers.'49
The connections of projects across states is difficult to ascertain. The Tudor commercial projects were often the work of foreign experts and the incorporation of new skills into the English economy was an explicit objective.^® Jacobean suitors continued to offer projects for the development of foreign technologies (particularly individuals with overseas voyages behind them).5i Caroline contracts with Dutch experts to drain 'drowned lands’ were among such projects.62 The most definite sharing of projects was across James' three kingdoms after 1603. The ongoing struggle to settle the Irish government and revenues saw the greatest level of participation.53 Salisbury despatched George Carew to Ireland in July 1611 with instructions to employ the usual approach of abatements, improvements, and new revenues.54 Carew and company collected and evaluated some 60 projects.^s Northampton, working with the Irish solicitor-general Robert Jacob, took even greater