Petitions, Economic Legislation and Interest Groups in Britain, 1660–1800

Abstract

AbstractBetween 1660 and 1800, over 14,000 acts were passed at Westminster, with over a half of them directed at economic matters. Yet parliament was eager to ensure that proposed legislation had been duly considered. A key feature of this were the many thousands of petitions it received, mainly from interest groups, both for and against legislation, proposed and enacted. By systematically exploring the details of nine parliamentary sessions across the period, this essay considers the characteristics of petitions submitted to parliament regarding economic legislation. Controversies between petitioning groups overwhelmingly concerned economic matters, with many of the groups being constituted for the purpose. In this way, interest groups were usually much more important than parties in parliament. Two case studies show how such interests cohered and operated in practice.