INTRODUCTION.
I
The reign of Edward the Third is one of the longest in
history, and long reigns tend to possess an interest which is
even more than proportionate to their length It is, however, an
interest that springs not so much from unity as from contrast
and change, the beginning and the end of such a reign lie
in different worlds The three visitations of pestilence in
1349, 1361 and 1366 make this especially true of the reign
of Edward III, few of those who were born before its stormy
opening can have lived to see its disastrous close, and the
contrast between the England of 1377 and that of 1327,
whether in regard to its external relations, its constitutional
development or its social and economic conditions, must have
been scarcely less striking than the more familiar contrast
between the beginning and the end of the Victorian era
In approaching the detailed study of such a period we
need the help of all the large landmarks that are available,
and it so happens that the fifty years of the reign divide themselves naturally into five epochs-each of which is almost
exactly a decade The commencement of the Hundred Years'
War marks the close of the first decade The second decade
ends with the victory of Crécy and the Truce of Calais The
middle period, which is rather longer than a decade, opens
with the Black Death in 1349, and after a renewal of the war
in 1355, and the victory of Poitiers in 1356, closes with the
siege of Paris, the dictation of terms and the imposition of an
indemnity in the form of a ransom by the treaties of Bretigni
and Calais in 1360 The fourth decade is one of nominal
peace with France, and the fifth, which opens with the second
renewal of the war in 1369 is one of continuous military
disaster and of increasing economic exhaustion
With this broad outline of the military history of the reign
in mind we are better able to map out its constitutional history
and to link together those aspects of its economic history
-mainly fiscal aspects-which are studied in this volume
Every campaign was preceded or accompanied by recourse
to unconstitutional forms of supply, and every truce was
followed by a Parliamentary crisis-the truce of Esplechin
by the crisis of 1340-1, the truce of Calais by the crisis of
1348, the treaties of Bretigni and Calais by the decisive
constitutional victory of 1362, and the truce of Bruges by the
Good Parliament of 1376 A less obvious and equally
significant fact is that each of these constitutional crises is
followed by a reshaping of what becomes in the course of
this reign one of the central fiscal organs of the government-
the Staple As far as the present volume of studies is concerned, the three principal epochs of the reign are marked by
the definite constitution of the Foreign Staple at Bruges in
1343, the establishment of the Home Staples by the ordinance
of 1353, and the setting up of the Calais Staple in 1363
The significance of the development as a whole may
perhaps be made clear by drawing a very broad analogy with
a more familiar period of fiscal history
The seventeenth century, like the fourteenth, witnessed a
transformation of the system of national finance The two
main features of change were in both cases a great and
permanent extension of indirect taxation and the creation of
a new form of national debt In the seventeenth century, as
in the fourteenth, both these innovations were initiated by the
Crown, and were strenuously resisted by Parliament, which
as the price of its final authorisation of them claimed and
secured an increased measure of control over national finance
The reader who is sufficiently forewarned of the limited
value of historic analogies will find it helpful to compare the
wool subsidy of the fourteenth century with the excise of
the seventeenth, and to think of the Governor and Company
of Staplers at Calais as the forerunners of the Governor and
Company of the Bank of England
II
The most serious attempt hitherto made to deal comprehensively with the commercial policy of England in the reign
of Edward III is undoubtedly that of Dr Cunningham In
view of this fact, and of the great authority accorded to Dr
Cunningham's conclusions, it is desirable to have those conclusions clearly before us and to use them as a basis from
which any further discussion of the subject may set out
The most fundamental position, as stated in the third edition of
Dr Cunningham's "Growth of English Industry and Commerce," is admittedly a hypothetical one It is that "the
wars of Edward III were not dictated by personal ambition
but that his policy was thoroughly English, and that he
aimed at the development of the national resources and
increase of the national power"
"The main object of Edward's continental wars was to
establish national industry and commerce upon a wider territorial basis To have established a firm hold upon Gascony,
Flanders and England would have been to create a remarkably
powerful commercial federation it was a thoroughy
statesmanlike plan and would justify the reputation Edward
III enjoyed as the Father of English Commerce." "This
must, of course," says Dr Cunningham, "be mere
hypothesis, as we cannot hope at this distance of time to
become thoroughly acquainted with the precise motives which
influenced the King, but it is an hypothesis as to his political
intentions which has much in its favour since it renders his
attitude towards industry and commerce intelligible" (fn. 1) But
if we cannot now discover the King's political motives, what
clues have we to his attitude towards industry and commerce?
Dr Cunningham finds these in the Parliamentary enactments
of the reign "The Dialogus assumes that prosperity is a
good thing, but Edward III's legislation implies definite
schemes as to the best way of promoting that end He
endeavoured (a) to foster foreign commerce, (b) to foster
industry, and (c) to check extravagance by sumptuary legislation He desired to increase the volume of trade, and
he legislated in the interest of the consumer and in disregard
of the claims of particular classes He endeavoured to
develop a manufacture for which the country was specially
suited, and to do so he showed himself somewhat cosmopolitan
in inviting artisans from the Continent He set himself
to encourage thrift among the labouring population-more it
is true by precept than by example The necessity of
procuring large supplies forced him at times to make severe
demands from the commercial classes, and to levy heavy taxes
either in money or in kind, but he did not consciously and
habitually subordinate economic to political interest, in fact
it would be more true to say that, as in modern times, his
policy was very greatly determined by a desire to promote
economic interests" (fn. 1)
In a later passage which has had considerable influence on
the subsequent writing of economic history, Dr Cunningham
in describing the development of mercantilist aims in
the parliaments of Richard II, sets those aims in
sharp contrast to the policy which he had previously
attributed to Edward III "Edward had legislated in the
interests of the consumers and with the view of providing
plenty, the parliaments of Richard II took another turn and
insisted on introducing conditions which, eventually, as they
were worked out in subsequent centuries favoured the growth
of English power To some extent plenty is a condition
of power, and the two policies may have much in common
but whereas Edward III desired to see large cargoes, whoever
brought them, i e plenty, the Ricardian Parliament desired
to have more English ships, even if the home consumers were
for a time badly supplied with wine" (fn. 2)
It is very instructive to note the modifications of these
views which further investigation and study have led Dr
Cunningham to adopt in the more recent editions of his work
He has come to take a less favourable view of the statesmanship of Edward, and is inclined to regard the hypothetical
scheme of a great commercial federation as "highly
ingenious" rather than as "thoroughly statesmanlike" He
now considers that while "Edward may possibly have recognised the cohesive power of commercial intercourse, his plans
were not farseeing, and they broke down because he failed to
bring conflicting interests into harmony" "The privileges
he conferred on Flemish merchants roused the jealousy of
English subjects while the arrangements which were favourable to sheep farmers and to consumers in this country proved
to be injurious to English shipping" (fn. 1) Not only therefore
was Edward's commercial and industrial policy inconsistent
with his supposed scheme for commercial federation but the
several parts of that policy did not form a consistent whole
This view is much more in accordance than the earlier
one with the estimate formed of Edward III by the other
historians Professor Tout, who is perhaps the most
appreciative of the strong points in Edward's character, considers that "he lacked the self-restraint and sense of proportion which would have prevented him from aiming at objects
beyond his reach The same want of relation between end
and means, the same want of definite policy and clear ideals,
marred his statecraft" (fn. 2) The judgment of Stubbs is more
decisively unfavourable "Edward III was not a statesman,
although he possessed some qualifications which might have
made him a successful one He was a warrior, ambitious,
unscrupulous, selfish, extravagant, and ostentatious His
obligations as a King sat very lightly on him He felt himself bound by no special duty either to maintain the theory
of royal supremacy or to follow a policy which would benefit
his people Like Richard I, he valued England primarily
as a source of supplies A King whose people fly from
his approach, a King overwhelmed with debt, worn out with
luxury, the puppet of opposing factions such as Edward in
his later years became, is a very different thing from the
gentle, gay, and splendid ideal King of chivalry" (fn. 3)
The reader of the studies contained in this volume is likely
to admit the wisdom of Dr Cunningham's later reservations
as to the statesmanship of Edward III, and may even be
disposed to go much further in the same direction Dr
Cunningham still holds that the hypothetical federation was
a highly ingenious plan and would justify the reputation
Edward III enjoyed as the Father of English Commerce.
But, after all, nothing but the clearest facts could warrant
us in imputing to Edward, whether as depicted by Froissart
or by Stubbs, an economic policy of such scope and elaboration that it anticipated the views of Cobden on the one hand
and those of Frederick List on the other, and the facts seem
to indicate that the first of the aims attributed to Edward-
his desire to "foster foreign commerce shown by legislation
in the interests of the consumer and in disregard of the claims
of particular classes"-his policy of plenty rather than power
is as hypothetical as his scheme of commercial federation
It rests on the assumption that Acts of Parliament are a sure
indication of royal policy-an assumption no more justifiable
in the reign of Edward III than in that of James I The
"free trade" enactments of Edward III's reign were carried
in response to urgent petitions of the Commons In the
two leading instances of 1335 and 1351-3 they imply the
reversal of a restrictive policy previously adopted by the King
without parliamentary sanction It is true that Edward in
making these concessions contrived in some cases to combine
them with arrangements that would equally serve his fiscal
purposes But the fact that he knew how to make 'free trade'
pay when driven to adopt it is no reason for crediting him
with a policy of 'plenty rather than power' When acting
on his own responsibility Edward persistently returned to a
policy of restriction and monopoly for the simple reason that
this policy enabled him to borrow, and he could only borrow
by heavily discounting the resources of the future
The second imputed object of policy-the fostering of
national industry by prohibiting the exportation of wool and
the importation of cloth and by inviting Flemish manufacturers to settle in England, whilst it accords much less than
the policy of "free trade" with the supposed scheme for commercial federation with Flanders, has somewhat more claim
to be connected with the personal initiative of the King
because the measures that purported to carry it into effect were
royal letters patent,-some of which were issued in advance
of the parliamentary enactments But when the whole
circumstances of the case as recorded in the studies on the
'Taxation of Wool' and the 'Estate of Merchants' are duly
considered, the part played by Edward in fostering English
industry is reduced to comparatively small proportions
The statute embodying the supposed industrial policy of
Edward III was passed in the spring of 1337 At that
moment his intended war with France gave the King two
strong preoccupations-to raise money at home and to get
allies in the Low Countries In conjunction with a group of
English merchants he was organising a monopoly in the
exportation of wool which was meant to serve both his fiscal
and diplomatic objects, and a temporary prohibition on the
exportation was an essential part of the scheme The prohibition on Flemish cloth and the invitation to Flemish clothworkers were meant to intensify the diplomatic pressure on
Flanders, whilst they might serve to mitigate English objections to restrictions on the exportation of wool This combination of devices was not new, it was one that tended to
recur whenever friction arose between England and Flanders
Its embodiment in a Parliamentary statute and the fact that
a number of Flemish clothworkers availed themselves of the
invitation have given it in this instance an altogether undue
prominence in English industrial history That it did not
represent any serious industrial policy in the mind of the
King is shown by the fact that it was deliberately intended
to lead-and did lead-to an alliance with Flanders by which
Flemish industry secured a predominant hold on the English
wool supply (fn. 1) The Flemish alliance, which thus involved a
reversal of the industrial policy attributed to the King, might
in itself have been part of a scheme for a commercial federation, but there is no evidence to show that this was actually
the case, and the subsequent history of the alliance is much
more intelligible in the light of the "dynastic ambition"
hypothesis
In regard to the third aspect of the policy attributed to
Edward- "he set himself to encourage thrift among the
labouring population" -the discrepancy between precept and
example, though bizarre and even ludicrous, is not on that
account incredible The hearts of princes are unsearchable,
and stranger contrasts are fully vouched for in the records
of mediæval psychology Two questions however need to
be asked Was the encouragement of thrift of such a sustained
and serious character as to deserve the name of policy, and
does the evidence warrant us in attributing it to the King
rather than to Parliament? Of the only two recorded
instances of this policy, in 1336 and 1363, the first occurred
at the opening of the great war, when taxation was reaching
a maximum, (fn. 1) and the second some years after the conclusion
of peace, when a recurrence of the plague had added to the
exhaustion caused by the war, and the Commons were
struggling to reduce taxation and to prevent a natural rise of
wages and prices In both cases the 'encouragement' is
embodied in an Act of Parliament and is easily explicable as
the product of a transitory movement of public opinion The
petitions of the 1336 Parliament are not extant, but those of
1363 show that the statute of that year was based on the
demands of the classes represented in Parliament The
Commons show that "divers victuals within the realm are
greatly enhanced in price by reason that divers people of
divers conditions use divers apparel not belonging to their
estate," and the statute made in response to this petition
proceeds to regulate the dress of every rank up to that of a
knight, whilst in the more important matter of diet its restrictions apply only to labourers in husbandry, journeymen and
other servants, or to those who have not goods and chattels
to the value of forty shillings (fn. 2)
From the standpoint of recent experience it is not difficult
to realise the mood of the governing classes which finds
expression in this legislation At a time of national exhaustion, vividly depicted for us in the sixth Passus of Piers
Plowman, when victory had been speedily followed by
plague and famine, when the freebooters who had wasted
France for twenty years had returned to pillage their peaceful
neighbours, (fn. 3) at a time when all classes were demoralised and
the restraints of custom and religion were widely disregarded,
there was a demand for national reformation in which all
classes except the nobility and the higher clergy were to
share But whilst there was no effective guarantee that
knights and their ladies would amend their lives and their
households at the bidding of an Act of Parliament, the
clauses that affected the labourer were an addition to a code
of class legislation for the enforcement of which special
machinery had been provided, and the stringency of which
had been greatly increased at the conclusion of the war The
Statutes of Labourers have been defended on the ground that
they provided for the regulation of prices as well as of wages
But whilst wages were fixed at a definite and impossible
maximum, prices were only required to be "reasonable", and
whilst the penalisation of excessive wages was universal and
drastic, the penalisation of excessive prices could only be
occasional and ineffective It fell upon the class of small
traders which was least responsible, if any class was
responsible, for the increased cost of living, and which was
little better represented in Parliament than the journeyman or
the labourer (fn. 1) Perhaps it was a sense of the futility and
injustice of this procedure that led to the inclusion in the
Statute of 1363 of the clause which aimed at checking the
monopoly of large importing merchants by restricting every
merchant to one branch of trade (fn. 2)
A single year of experience sufficed to show that these
measures of national reconstruction, however disinterested in
intention, had in fact served to increase the evils they
professed to cure, whilst they threatened to subject the nation
to a new and intolerable servitude The restriction of
merchants to one branch of trade had been made the basis
for the bestowal of chartered monopolies by the King which
had raised prices thirty per cent higher than before The
Commons therefore prayed that the whole statute might be
repealed, that the charters might be annulled, and "that all
people of whatever estate or condition may freely order their
sustenance, in food and apparel, for themselves, their wives,
children and servants in manner as seems to them best" (fn. 3)
III
When we speak of the economic policy of Edward III or
of his parliaments we make what is a natural but at the same
time a questionable assumption The word policy implies a
continuous unity of purpose in public affairs or an attempt to
achieve such a unity. Even the attempt is a late product of
historical development It implies the control of legislation
and of administration through a consciousness of the
interests of the nation as a whole, guided by more or less
adequate ideas, and capable of restraining and subordinating
the operation of lesser interests Now the records of Parliament in the fourteenth century, and indeed in many later
centuries, contain ample evidence of the effective operation of
a multitude of minor interests, and when we speak of national
policy we assume the existence of a national interest through
whose activity the partial interests of classes, or localities are
to some extent harmonised and controlled Have we any
evidence of this in the records of Edwardian Parliaments?
A near approach to it may perhaps be found in the petitions
to the King, frequently adduced as the ground of legislation,
which claim to express the views of the Commons or the "poor
Commons" or "the Community of the Realm" The demands
embodied in many of these petitions represented interests
wide enough to be called national, and they were maintained
with sufficient continuity to constitute a policy if they were
harmonious and effective The widest of these interests was
that of the taxpayers resisting the enormous increase of taxation made necessary by the war with France This was
indeed the most universal, powerful and continuous interest
operative in Parliament throughout the reign, but it did not
produce continuous effects in economic policy On the
contrary it tended, in conjunction with the King's increasing
demand for increased supplies of money, to produce a marked
discontinuity of policy in regard to the wool trade Unwillingness to grant direct taxes at first induced the Commons (1340)
to legalise for a limited time not only a very high export
tax on wool, but also the exercise of a royal monopoly in the
export trade, but a few years' experience of the evils of these
methods of taxation led them (1344) to offer a grant of direct
taxation on condition of the withdrawal of the monopoly and
of a speedy diminution of the wool tax. Later on (1353),
finding it impossible to get rid of the high export tax, the
Commons returned to the policy of withholding direct taxes
and of resisting the exercise of monopolies in the wool trade
But the petitions of the Commons reveal other widespread
economic interests which had more direct and continuous
effects upon fiscal policy The largest of these interests was
that of the wool producers-a body that must have included
the great majority of those who found representation in
Parliament Their first wish was to have no tax on wool,
but, if a tax must be laid, they desired that a minimum price
might be set on the various kinds of wool which it was hoped
would have the effect of throwing the tax on the foreign
consumer In the same way they were opposed to any
staple restrictions on the export of wool, but they preferred a
number of staples, where there would be comparatively free
access of both home and foreign buyers, to a single foreign
staple which was avowedly set up in the interests of royal and
mercantile monopoly
Quite apart from and often opposed to the interests of the
grower were the interests of the dealers in wool These did
not all run in one channel At least three distinct bodies of
mercantile interest can be observed in operation, each of them
associated with one of the three alternating staple policies of
the reign One body of merchants clearly agreed with the
growers in supporting the entire abolition of all staples so as
to have free access to upland supplies Another set of
trading interests favoured the establishment of home staples
which enabled them to reap a preferential advantage out of
their local connections, whilst the various monopoly projects
based upon the maintenance of a foreign staple attracted the
support of a small class of wealthy exporters
Numerous attempts were made during the first period of
the French war by the fiscal opportunism of the King to ally
itself with various combinations of the two interests last
named The failure of these attempts owing to the opposition of the Commons, the persistent bad faith of the King
and the conflict of the interests with which he sought alliance,
and the success of Parliament in absorbing most of these
interests, in defining its constitutional status and in formulating and enacting a measure that had some claim to be
considered a national policy-have been fully described in
two of the studies contained in this volume The taxpayers,
the wool growers and the smaller merchants were united in
opposition to the continuance of the monopoly embodied in
the staple at Bruges Fifteen years' experience of a succession
of syndicates of native monopolists led them to demand the
exclusion of English capitalists from the export trade and
the re-establishment of the home staples through which it
was hoped both the grower and the small dealer would get
the benefit of the free access of foreign capital The King
in return for his abandonment of a bankrupt monopoly system
received a grant of wool subsidy for three years, and willingly
consented to an exclusion of native exporters which secured
him a higher rate of export tax from aliens
But if the regulation of foreign trade in the middle decade
of Edward's reign exhibits a marked tendency towards a
national policy, there are two assertions that may be clearly
made about that policy It was not an Edwardian but a
parliamentary policy, and it was not a mercantilist policy,
i e, it did not aim at the protection of native merchants,
manufacturers or shipowners against foreign competition
Indeed it might be considered as anti-mercantilistic were it
not that mercantilism as a policy had scarcely as yet found
articulate expression The parliamentary policy arose in
deliberate opposition to methods of fiscal opportunism
practised by the King which had very much in common with
the methods of later mercantilism Edward III has no claim
at all to the title "Father of Commerce," but he would have
a genuine claim to be considered as the Father of Mercantilism,
if his fiscal and diplomatic devices had sought justification on
broad grounds of national interest Mercantilism became a
policy when the merchants and manufacturers became strong
enough in Parliament to represent their interest as the national
interest The attempts of Edward III to bargain separately
with the merchants show that in the early half of his reign
the interests of the landed classes as taxpayers, producers and
consumers were still predominant in Parliament
Nevertheless there is one phase of national policy closely
associated with the mercantilism of later reigns of which the
distinct beginnings are to be found in the legislation of this
period One of the main motives of the establishment of the
home staples as set forth in the ordinances was a desire 'to
replenish the realm with money and plate of gold and silver,' (fn. 1)
and this is too much in accordance with earlier petitions of
the Commons to be attributed solely to the fiscal exigencies of
the Crown The popular remedy for the evil of a disappearing currency had been found in the enactment in 1340 that
two marks of silver should be deposited at the Tower for every
sack of wool exported, (fn. 1) and an equivalent requirement formed
the central feature of the staple at Calais when Parliament
had become reconciled to it as a permanent institution and
had authorised its regulation Bullionistic policy was no
doubt motived largely by fiscal needs, but it was supported
by popular opinion, and this opinion, if it was a delusion,
was not an abstract or theoretical delusion (fn. 2) When papal
taxation was levied and the King's foreign allies subsidised
in English wool, it seemed a practical remedy for an actual
grievance to insist on cash payment for the chief national
export
The matter was indeed not so simple as this Inadequate
ideas on the nature of money and the almost universal dishonesty of governments at a time when the operations of
international finance were rapidly extending and a bi-metallic
system was everywhere in course of adoption, had reduced the
currency and the foreign exchanges to a state of permanent
confusion But it has not been sufficiently realised by
historians that the evils for which the governments of the
middle ages continually professed to be seeking a remedy
were to no small extent the consequences of their own actions
Edward I, for instance, is represented as struggling in 1299
heroically but vainly against the outflow of his own and the
inflow of foreign coinage But the outflow of good English
coin was the result under "Gresham's law" of the King's
having begun in war time to coin money of a lower standard,
whilst the foreign money that flowed in was to a large extent
the exported English silver reminted into coin which was
quite equal to the King's new standard but upon which the
King's heavy charge for recoinage had not been paid
Similar complaints of the outflow and inflow of currency
became a normal incident of war finance under Edward III
And if the Commons did not fully grasp the causes of these
phenomena their demands were generally reasonable and to
the point It was not unreasonable at a time of social unrest
and of unstable prices to ask that the government should not
further dislocate the whole range of public and private contracts by tampering with the currency Nor was it unnatural
to expect that the government should receive as taxation the
inferior coinage with which it had been paying its debts, or
to demand that when money had lost a third of its former
value the prices paid by the royal purveyors for the people's
wool should be raised to a corresponding degree (fn. 1)
It seems then that there is little ground for attributing
any definite economic policy to Edward III except the one
implied in the judgment of Stubbs, "Like Richard I he
valued England primarily as a source of supplies." If any
distinctive policy is to be associated with the reign it must be
attributed to the action of Parliament This, however, only
serves to bring into greater relief the contrast that has been
made, in regard to economic policy between the reign of
Edward III and and that of his successor The change from
a 'policy of plenty' to a 'policy of power,' so far as it took
place, corresponded to a change in the mind of Parliament
itself, and was not due to the passing of a monarch of exceptional economic genius, who had anticipated the views of
Cobden and Gladstone It is not unreasonable to expect that
the studies collected in this volume should afford some new
light as to the reality, extent and significance of this important
change in public opinion, but as they are concerned with
only one of the contrasted periods, we need to be furnished in
advance with fairly accurate conceptions of the other period
Some of the leading elements of the "policy of power"
or mercantilism are undoubtedly to be found embodied in the
Acts of Richard the Second's Parliaments, but it would be
an entire mistake to suppose that Parliament during the reign
of Richard the Second consistently and continuously pursued
either a mercantilist or any other form of economic policy
Almost every session of Parliament witnessed a reaction and
sometimes a violent reaction from the policy of the previous
session. The Parliament of 1381 passed the first Act for the
protection of the native shipping interest The Parliament of
1382 practically repealed this Act, which had been supported
largely by the fishmongers, and passed an Act for securing
free trade in fish, which in the following Parliament was in
its turn repealed The same contrast is to be found between
the 'free trade' policy of 1391 and the anti-alien legislation
of 1393 Taking the reign as a whole we have to recognise
a distinct development of mercantilist opinion and policy in
Parliament, but the opposition continues to be active and
frequently successful (fn. 1)
But what of the other side of the contrast-the policy of
plenty or of free trade pursued by the Parliaments of
Edward III? As far as the mind of Parliament may be said
to constitute a policy we have here something much less
ambiguous The demand for 'free trade,' i e the relaxation
of staple restrictions and the free intercourse of alien exporters
and importers with native producers and consumers or their
agents-finds repeated and increasingly emphatic expression
throughout the first four decades of the reign and is embodied
at long intervals in the 'free trade' enactments of 1335, 1351
and 1365, as well as in that great commercial code-the
Statute of the Staple 1354 There is, moreover, no general
body of opposition to set off against this consistent and continuous expression of Parliamentary opinion Nevertheless
it would be a serious mistake to take the 'free trade' enactments as constituting in a practical sense the policy of the
reign In point of fact they were little more than protests,
and for the most part ineffectual protests, against the administrative and fiscal action of the King. Within a year of its
enactment each of the statutes of 1335, 1351 and 1365 had
become a dead letter The opposing force that served to
nullify them lay in the ever present exigencies of war finance
In actual practice there was probably less realisation of the
policy of free trade in the reign of Edward III than in that
of Richard II The contrast between the two reigns is not
one of policy in the sense of governmental practice, but one of
policy in the sense of the reasoned basis of statecraft It
implies a new growth of opinion and theory, and a new growth
of organised interests represented in Parliament, through
which the new opinions find effectual expression Such a
growth is, however, to be traced not merely by contrasting
the two reigns, but also by comparing the successive decades
of the reign with which the following studies are especially
concerned
G Unwin