Dissent and Toleration

It is widely accepted among historians that the House of Lords in the eighteenth century was an obstacle to religious change. Its unfriendly mien appears to be confirmed by the fate of several Quaker tithe bills and Dissenting petitions. Despite the passage of limited relief acts for Roman Catholics and Dissenters in 1778 and 1779 respectively, it was unusual for such legislation to be well received, or even to find a sponsor, in that chamber. Yet, in the summer of 1789 the House of Lords and that House alone witnessed what has been a neglected episode in ecclesiastical and political history. This was the attempt by the third earl Stanhope to amend the law concerning religious toleration. Although admittedly far from an exception to the rule in the way in which it was greeted by the peers, it has received scant notice from modern historians of toleration. Stanhope himself, of course, has become known to the historically minded as one of the celebrated eccentrics of the period; the image of ‘Citizen Stanhope’ the defender of the French Revolution and the ‘minority of one’ is unlikely to be effaced. Accordingly such discussion as there has been of the earl's bill has tended to emphasise Stanhope's personal idiosyncrasies and peculiar brand of aristocratic radicalism rather than the detailed provisions of the measure

Aesthetics · Art history · Caveat emptor · Dissent · Dissenting opinion · Iconoclasm · Legislation · Notice · Period (music · Political science · Politics · Toleration · American Constitutional Law and Politics · History · Law · Philosophy · Religion, Gender, and Enlightenment · Scottish History and National Identity

• The parliamentary struggle over the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, 1787–1790 1

  G M Ditchfield•The English Historical Review•1974

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• The Protestant Dissenting Deputies

  Carl B Cone, Bernard Lord Manning et al.•The William and Mary Quarterly•1953

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