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Publisher’s Notice
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Title: Governing California in the twenty-first century : the political

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Jolly Emrey, Nadine Koch, Melissa R. Michelson.

Description: Eighth edition. | New York : W.W. Norton & Company, 2021. |
Includes bibliographical references and index.

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Contents
PREFACE ix
1 • California Government: Promise and Practice 1
The California Dream? 2
Why Study California Politics? 2
What Determines the Content and Character of California’s
Politics? 5
Who Are Californians? 5
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? How Is the California
Population Changing? 6
The Crisis of California Politics 10
The Ease of Passing Initiatives 11
Term Limits 12
The Two-Thirds Requirement for Raising Taxes 12
Lack of Consensus on Fundamental Questions 13
Reform Ideas 14
Conclusion 16
A Guide to This Book 16
Study Guide 17
2 • The Constitution and the Progressive Legacy 21
The Rules of the Game: California’s Constitution 24
The 1849 Constitution 24
The 1879 Constitution 26
From 1900 to 1917: The Progressive Movement 30
From 1918 to the Present: Late Revisions 31
The Progressive Movement and Its Impact on California
Politics 32
Local Politics 32
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? Who Draws the Lines in
California? 33
State Politics 35
Direct Democracy 37
Initiative 37
Referendum 42
Recall 43
 Debating the Merit of Direct Democracy 44
California’s Constitution: Where Are We Now? 46
Study Guide 47
3 • Interest Groups and the Media in California 53
Character of Interest Groups 54
Diversity of Interest Groups 55
Proliferation of Interest Groups 57
Interest-Group Strategies 60
Lobbyists 60
Campaign Contributions to Candidates 61
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? Who Spends Money in
California Politics? 64
Grassroots Mobilization 65
The Legislature, Bribes, and Scandals 66
Regulating Campaign Contributions 68
Clean-Money Elections 71
Contribution Limits 71
Conflict-of-Interest Laws 71
The Media 72
Television 72
Newspapers 73
The Internet 74
Media and Political Campaigns 76
Interest-Group Politics in California: Where Are We Now? 76
Study Guide 78
4 • Parties and Elections in California 83
Political Parties 84
The Progressive Impact on Political Parties 84
The Democratic and Republican Parties in California 85
Third Parties in California 87
Party Affiliation of California Voters 88
California’s Local Political Cultures from Left to Right 93
Elections in California 95
The Battle over the Primary 95
Presidential Primaries: Maximizing California’s Clout? 98
Initiative Campaigns: Direct Democracy or Tool of Special
Interests? 99
 The 2003 Gubernatorial Recall Election 102
The 2008 Election: Demographic and Ideological Shifts 103
The 2010 General Election 103
The 2012 Primary Election 104
The 2012 General Election: More Demographic and
Ideological Shifts 105
The 2014 Election 106
The 2016 Primary Election 107
The 2016 General Election 107
The 2018 Election 110
The 2020 Primary Election 113
The 2020 General Election 114
Campaigning in California 117
Money and Politics: California Style 117
Campaign-Finance Reform in California 119
Voting in California 120
How You Can Register to Vote 120
Who Votes in California? 121
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? Who Votes in California? 124
What Reforms Are Needed? 127
Study Guide 128
5 • The California Legislature 133
Functions 135
Representation 135
Policy Making 137
Members and Districts 137
Elections 139
Fund-Raising 140
Districting 140
Organization 142
Leadership 142
Committees 144
Staff 145
Legislative Process 146
Differences from U.S. Congress 148
Challenges Facing the California Legislature 149
Money 150
 Term Limits, Knowledge and Expertise, and Diversity 150
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? How Diverse Is the State
Legislature? 153
Partisanship 154
Gridlock, Minority Rule, and Lack of Accountability 154
Initiatives 155
Recent Sessions of the Legislature 156
California Legislature: Where Are We Now? 157
Study Guide 158
6 • The Governor and the Executive Branch 163
The Invisible Governor? 164
Formal Powers of the Governor 167
Appointments 167
Independent Executive Actions 169
Commander in Chief 169
Organizing and Managing the Executive Branch 170
Budget 171
Veto and Line-Item Veto 172
Legislative Powers 172
Legislative Recommendations 173
Judicial Powers 173
Public Roles of the Governor 174
Gavin Newsom as Governor 175
Structure of the Executive Branch 176
Personal Staff 176
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? How Does California’s
Governorship Compare? 178
The Cabinet and Agency Heads 179
The Plural Elected Executive 179
Agencies and the Bureaucracy 183
California Executive Branch: Where Are We Now? 184
Study Guide 185
7 • The California Judiciary 189
Structure of the California Judicial System 192
The Lower Courts 192
The Supreme Court 192
Jurisdiction 194
 Access to the Court 195
Federalism and the California Courts: The Case of Medical
Marijuana 196
Judicial Selection 198
Judicial Elections 200
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? Who Are California’s Judges?
201
Removing Judges from the Bench 204
Contemporary Issues in the Judiciary 204
Change in the Court 204
Legislative Redistricting 204
Judicial Review and the Statewide Initiative 205
Caseload 206
California Courts: Where Are We Now? 208
Study Guide 209
8 • The State Budget and Budgetary Limitations 213
How Is the Budget Formed? 215
Executive Proposal 215
Legislative Adoption 215
Gubernatorial Action 217
Implementation 218
Other Groups Involved in the Budget Process 218
What Is in the Budget? 219
Revenues 219
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? Where Does California’s
Government Spend Its Money? 222
Why Do Revenues Vary So Much? 224
Is California Overtaxed? 224
Expenditures 228
Budgetary Limitations 230
Recent California Budgets and the Budget Process 232
Study Guide 233
9 • Local Government 237
The Legal Framework: Dillon’s Rule, Home Rule, and Local
Powers of Governance 238
County Governments 239
Legal Framework 240
 WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? Who Lives in California’s
Counties? 241
County Government Organization 242
County Government Functions and Responsibilities 243
Local Agency Formation Commissions 245
City Governments 246
Legal Framework 246
Incorporation and Dissolution 246
City Government Functions and Responsibilities 247
City Government Revenues and Expenditures 248
Forms of City Government and the Legacy of Progressive
Structural Reforms 248
Special Districts 255
School and Community College Districts 255
Nonschool Special Districts 256
Legal Framework 256
How Special Districts Are Created 256
The Advantages and Disadvantages of Special Districts 257
Regional Governments 257
Regulatory Regional Governments 258
Advisory Regional Governments 259
Local Government: Where Are We Now? 260
The Housing Crisis 261
Income Inequality 264
Study Guide 265
10 • Public Policy in California 269
Contemporary Policy Issues 270
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? Who Is Incarcerated in
California? 272
Public Policy Challenges 273
Water Policy 275
Health Insurance277
Employer-Sponsored Insurance 278
Single-Payer Proposal 278
Individual Health Insurance Marketplace 279
Medi-Cal 279
Medicare 280
 TRICARE 281
The Uninsured 281
WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS? Who Are California’s 3 Million
Uninsured? 282
California’s Infrastructure 283
Highways 283
Levees 284
The Future of California’s Infrastructure 285
Conclusion 286
Study Guide 287
ANSWER KEY 291
NOTES 292
CREDITS 303
INDEX 304
Preface
From 2017 through 2020, California assumed a new role: the epicenter of
resistance to the Trump administration. For four years, California was at
odds with his administration over many of its policy directives, including
immigration, the environment, trade, health care, and LGBTQ rights,
among other issues. Resistance came in the form of rhetoric from California
elected officials and over 100 lawsuits filed by the state against the federal
government. While these conflicts demonstrate federalism in action, and
underscore what makes California politics unique, the state is far from
homogenous. Even as California’s Electoral College votes helped elect Joe
Biden to the presidency in 2020, Republicans picked up seats in Congress
in red areas of the state. The same issues that challenged the country
heading into the 2020 elections divided the state along demographic,
geographic, and economic lines. Capping off those four years of conflict,
California will play a leading role in the new Biden administration,
including former senator Kamala Harris as vice president and attorney
general Xavier Becerra (the author of those 100-plus lawsuits) as the new
Secretary of Health and Human Services. This new edition explores
California’s starring role in the resistance to Trump and the political history
that brought us to this point, while also looking ahead to the new Biden
administration.

The first edition of this book, released in 2008, argued that California’s
political system and its politics were simply “broken.” The system was so
contradictory in its rules, norms, and mores that budgets couldn’t be passed
on time or balanced, programs and departments couldn’t be managed under
the existing set of rules, and citizen expectations were so out of line with
the ability of the political system to satisfy them that the level of negativism
and cynicism was as bad as could be found anywhere in the nation.

Since then, reforms have been put into place to solve many of those
structural challenges. The state has new incentives for politicians to be less
ideologically extreme on the right or the left, in particular the top two vote-
getter primary system and the indepedent citizens’ commission that draws
new districts for the Assembly, the state Senate, and congressional districts
after every diennial census. The state budget can be passed with majority
rule instead of a two-thirds vote, and budgets are now passed on time and
without last minute additions of pork-barrel projects. The nation’s strictest
term-limit rules have been modified to allow members of the Assembly or
state Senate to serve 12 years in a single house before being termed out and
forced to seek another office outside the state legislature, increasing the
level of expertise available among legislators and reducing the power of
lobbyists. Changes to the tax code to rely more on high-wage earners and
taxes on stock market trades have built up the state’s rainy day fund and
allowed the state to bank surpluses even amid the economic downturn that
accompanied the coronavirus pandemic.

Challenges remain, but the state is certainly no longer broken. The Eighth
Edition of Governing California offers a ray of hope but also the reality of a
long distance to go.

Highlights of this revision include the following:

1. NEW coverage of the 2020 state and presidential elections (Chapter 4)

explores the issues that were at stake and the propositions that were on
the ballots, and provides a thorough analysis of the election results and
what they say about where California is heading as the country looks
toward the congressional races in 2022.
2. NEW “Who Are Californians?” features by contributing author R.
Allen Bolar (Bakersfield College) explore state government spending
(Chapter 8) and crime and incarceration rates in the state (Chapter 10).
In addition, all of the other features have been thoroughly updated to
help students understand the data behind big questions about state
government.
3. NEW information on California’s political landscape provides points
of comparison and contrast on issues affecting people across the
country, including the Black Lives Matter movement, the coronavirus
pandemic, and the fate of Dreamers.
4. A thoroughly revised InQuizitive course helps reinforce the key topics
and concepts in each chapter by quizzing students on what they still
need to learn, not on what they’ve already mastered. InQuizitive is
customizable to align the chapters and sections that you assign to your
 students. In addition, a test bank is available for all your assessment
needs.

In order to provide the most knowledgeable analysis of the diverse topics in

the table of contents, we divided the book as follows:

1. California Government: Promise and Practice—Anagnoson

(tanagno@calstatela.edu)
2. The Constitution and the Progressive Legacy—Michelson
(melissa.michelson@menlo.edu)
3. Interest Groups and the Media in California—Bonetto
(gbonetto@roadrunner.com)
4. Parties and Elections in California—Koch (nkoch@calstatela.edu)
5. The California Legislature— Anagnoson
6. The Governor and the Executive Branch—Michelson
7. The California Judiciary—Emrey (emreyj@uww.edu)
8. The State Budget and Budgetary Limitations—Anagnoson
9. Local Government—Michelson
10. Public Policy in California—Emrey

We would like to acknowledge the helpful recommendations from

professors who have reviewed the book. Their comments have assisted us
in updating events and materials. For the Eighth Edition, we thank the
following reviewers:

Tressa Tabares, American River College

Wesley Hussey, California State University, Sacramento

Kristina Flores Victor, California State University, Sacramento

James Starkey, College of the Canyons

Kristine Brooks, Saddleback College

Catherine Brinkley, University of California, Davis

We also thank the several students who have communicated their
comments.

We would be glad to hear from you about the book. Please use the email
addresses on the previous page to communicate with us.
 1
California Government:
Promise and Practice
WHAT CALIFORNIA GOVERNMENT DOES
AND WHY IT MATTERS
What power does government have during unprecedented times? The
COVID-19 crisis in 2020 and with it the resulting closure of all traditional
institutions of society moved us into a new era, and for most citizens, a new
level of governmental power, raising new questions about the role of
government in our lives. Does the federal, state, or local government have
the power to keep us all at home? Can they really tell us to restrict our
travel only to the grocery store, the medical clinic or hospital, or the bank?
Can schools and colleges be shut down and told to offer courses only
online?

Modern governmental actions—anything at all substantial—are normally

met by lawsuits. In the United States we tend to defer to the courts for the
ultimate decision as to what government can and cannot do. In 2020 those
limits were tested: lawsuits were filed by those wanting to evade social
distancing measures and assemble in church, by those wanting to protest at
the Capitol building, and by those objecting to the governor’s plan to help
those who are undocumented. All of them were met with court decisions
upholding the government’s right to act against a pandemic. In one suit,
Judge John A. Mendez cited a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that was 115
years old, from 1905, finding that “a community has the right to protect
itself against an epidemic of disease which threatens the safety of its
members.”

The government’s ability to shut down the economy and keep us all in our
homes demonstrates its vast power. The crisis showed that the governor
even has the power to order the state to make payments to undocumented
immigrants to help them deal with sudden unemployment resulting from the
economic shutdown.

The federal government passed the responsibility for leadership to the states
during the COVID-19 crisis. Governors whose states faced severe
problems, such as California’s Governor Gavin Newsom, suddenly had
more power than they did before. But with more power comes more
pushback. In this case, the pushback came from those seeking to return to
normalcy before the pandemic had passed. How California’s state
government exercises its power is the subject of this book. We’ll explore
the scope of that power, who exercises it, what individuals and
organizations influence it, how it shapes local government and the
economy, and what public policy looks like as a result.
The California Dream?
For almost 200 years the California dream has attracted residents from
other parts of the United States as well as immigrants from abroad. Former
governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, in his 2004 State of the State address,
said that California represents “an empire of hope and aspiration” where
“Californians do great things.” To some, the California dream is sun and
surf; to others, the warm winter season and a house on the coast amid
redwoods and acres of untrammeled wilderness; and to still others, the
luxury of three or four cars per family.

The core of the dream is the ability to live a middle-class lifestyle in the
most congenial climate in the nation, but that lifestyle is becoming
increasingly difficult to attain in California. A 2018 analysis of the
California dream posted on CalMatters.org shows that by 2014, median
California families made only 8 percent more than they did in 1980. The
median U.S. family made 22 percent more.1 The modern conception of the
California dream seems to have become finding a way to stick it out here,
finding a decently paying job, buying a house, and educating children.
More and more, younger Californians are leaving the state because of the
high costs of housing.

No matter what the conception, some of the dream is attainable for many—
California’s winter weather is the envy of most of the nation—but much of
it is not, as the exodus of younger Californians for other states shows. One
of the themes of this book is the conflict between dreams and reality,
between the ideals that we set for ourselves and the reality of our everyday
lives. Particularly vivid for politicians is the conflict between our
expectations of them versus the constraints we place upon them and the
reality of what they can accomplish.
Why Study California Politics?
The obvious answer is that you have to: your California history and government
courses meet a requirement for graduation or your major, and the state of
California decided that every college student should know something about
California’s history, the state constitution, and California government and politics.
But more important—why care about California politics?

You are the residents and voters of the present and future. The policies
and political trends occurring today will impact your lives, affecting
everything from university tuition fees to the strength of the job market.
California politics is plagued by low levels of participation and turnout, so
much so that the electorate is older, more politically conservative, wealthier,
more educated, and less ethnically diverse than would be the case if every
eligible adult voted. So your vote and participation really can make a
difference.
California politics also suffers from too much interest-group participation
and not enough citizen participation. The general interests of large groups
of citizens need to be represented at the table.

That’s the narrow answer. The broad answer is that California is one of the most
interesting states to study, different from other states in many ways:

We have more cultural diversity than other states, including a much higher
proportion of Latino and Asian residents. By some measures, we are the
country’s multicultural trendsetter. Our diversity affects our politics, and our
solutions to multicultural issues have become an example for other states.
We were one of the five largest economies in the world before the
COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. The California economy in 2017, according
to the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis, was the fifth largest in the
world, surpassing Russia, Italy, Brazil, the United Kingdom, and India. Only
the United States without California, China, Japan, and Germany had larger
economies. How large the California economy will be after the COVID-19
pandemic seems to depend on how California and other nations emerge from
the pandemic.
We are the most populous state, with almost 40 million people, and we
have grown more quickly than other states. In 1960, New York had 41
members in the U.S. House of Representatives; California had 38. The 2010
Census gave California 53 seats, followed by Texas with 36 and Florida and
New York with 27 each. These numbers will change again after the 2020
Census. In the past, California was forced to develop creative solutions to
the problems engendered by high growth—problems such as uneven
population distribution among various regions of the state and the need for
housing and schools.
California is currently losing more people to other states than it is gaining,
and in recent years the exodus has grown as a result of high housing costs,
taxes, and other costs of living. (The most popular destination for those
leaving is Texas.) California’s population is still slowly increasing on
account of our having more births than deaths in recent years, but the
population changes mean that the average age is growing, and that the state
has more senior citizens than it has had in the past. In the near future, we
could even see California’s population decline slightly each year. Projections
show the number of congressional seats declining by one seat after the 2020
Census.
We are more majoritarian than other states, meaning that we rely more on
the measures for direct democracy—the initiative, the referendum, and the
recall—that were added to the state constitution by the Progressive
movement in 1911. Every state uses majority rule for most decisions, but in
a majoritarian state the public is more likely than elected representatives to
be directly involved in making important policy decisions.
 The initiative was added to the California Constitution by the Progressive
movement in 1911 as a way to promote the direct involvement of the people
in public policy and affairs, bypassing the legislature. In November 2020
there were six propositions on the ballot, including a referendum seeking to
replace cash bail with risk assessments. The proposition failed.

Consider the following continuum:

A majoritarian government is one that is highly influenced by the public at

large, through public-opinion polls and measures such as the initiative, the
referendum, and the recall that enable voters to decide government policies
directly. A republican government is one in which we elect representatives to
make our decisions for us, based on the Madisonian model for the federal
government.
California government has moved much more toward the majoritarian model than
other states. Initiatives to amend the constitution are routine, and interest groups
often collect signatures for an initiative in order to pressure the legislature into
voting in their favor. By voting directly on public policies and constitutional
amendments that are placed on the ballot, California voters can influence policy
in their state more than voters can in other states.

And Californians like being majoritarian. Surveys show that most don’t want to
restrict use of the initiative in spite of its extensive use and manipulation by
interest groups as well as other problems. Ballotpedia lists 373 initiatives from
1912 through 2018, and we had another 12 in November 2020, for a total of 385.2
California’s number of initiatives historically is second only to Oregon’s. Twenty-
seven states do not have the initiative at all, and the top five states account for
more than half of all initiatives considered from 1904 to 2012.3 In other words,
interest in and use of the initiative is highly concentrated in just a few states, one
of which is ours.
What Determines the Content and
Character of California’s Politics?
Three factors shape the content and character of California’s politics:

the underlying demographic and sociopolitical trends that affect California

and the other states;
the rules of the game, as set out in the federal and state constitutions and in
state laws; and
the decisions of voters and politicians.

In Chapters 1 and 2 we will discuss the underlying demographic and

sociopolitical trends and the rules of the game. The decisions of voters and
politicians, and the way they shape California politics, will be discussed later in
the text.
Who Are Californians?
The preamble to the California State Constitution begins, “We, the People of the
State of California.” This is fitting for a democratic form of government, which
seeks to give voice to the people in the governing of their community affairs. So,
who are Californians? Do the demographic characteristics of California differ
from those of the United States as a whole? And how have changing demographic
and socioeconomic trends contributed to the political challenges that face
California voters and politicians? (See the “Who Are Californians?” feature.)

RACE AND ETHNICITY In many respects, California’s population has a

notable degree of racial and ethnic diversity compared with the U.S. population.
Latino or Hispanic is not a racial category in the official census, but a separate
census question asks about Hispanic or Latino origin. Answers to this question
reveal that about 18 percent of the United States is Latino but that Latinos make
up about 39 percent of California’s population.4 Almost a quarter of that
population is of Mexican heritage. Many political issues involve race and
ethnicity—in spring 2020 as Governor Newsom proposed the May revision to his
2020–21 budget, advocates complained that the budget cuts differentially affected
the poor and historically marginalized groups, while White Americans, who
disproportionately benefit from tax breaks, were relatively unaffected.

AGE California’s population is relatively young, mostly because of immigration.

Immigrants tend to be younger and have larger families than those who have been
residents for longer periods. However, in recent decades the proportion of senior
citizens has been increasing, from 10.6 percent in 2000 to 11.4 percent in 2010
and to an estimated 14.3 percent in 2018. California is therefore still a relatively
young state. Nevertheless, because of the increase in the number and proportion
of senior citizens, there has been an increased need for caregivers. Issues
regarding the quality of care in nursing homes in the state have persisted for many
years. Several Public Policy Institute of California studies have documented that
the electorate is disproportionately composed of older White Americans, resulting
in a more politically conservative electorate than would be the case if all age
groups voted at the same rates.5
 WHO ARE CALIFORNIANS?
How Is the California Population Changing?
California’s demographics are changing rapidly. The state used to be primarily
composed of non-Latino White Americans, but since 2000 the majority of the
state’s population has not been White. Latinos and Asians in particular are fast-
growing populations, while White Americans and Black Americans are an
increasingly small proportion. If these trends continue, by 2060, less than 31
percent of Californians will be White, while close to half (45 percent) will be
Latino.

At the same time, the total size of the state’s population is expected to continue to
grow rapidly, from 40 million people in 2019 to 51 million in 2060. Population
density will increase in the state’s urban areas as well as inland areas, particularly
in the Central Valley and Inland Empire, where housing is substantially less
expensive.

Projected population growth by demographic group

Projected population growth between 2019 and 2060 by county

SOURCE: Frank Hobbs and Nicole Stoops, “Demographic Trends in the 20th
Century,” U.S. Census Bureau, www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/censr-4.pdf
(accessed 8/3/20); Jonathan Vespa, David M. Armstrong, and Lauren Medina,
“Demographic Turning Points for the United States: Population Projections for
2020 to 2060,” U.S. Census Bureau,
www.census.gov/library/publications/2020/demo/p25-1144.html (accessed
8/3/20); and State of California Department of Finance, “Demographics,”
www.dof.ca.gov/Forecasting/Demographics/projections/ (accessed 8/3/20).

for CRITICAL analysis

1. What impact are these shifting demographics likely to have on politics? Will
they change the issues that the state government focuses on? Will they
change the issues that are the subject of citizen-driven initiatives?
2. California’s coastal regions have traditionally been more densely populated,
but rapid population growth and rising housing costs are increasingly driving
populations to settle farther inland. How will this change California politics
in the inland counties, particularly in areas traditionally dedicated to
agriculture?
EDUCATION Californians are relatively well educated, with a greater
proportion having gone to college or completed a bachelor’s degree or higher
than in the United States as a whole (33.3 percent in California versus 31.5
percent in the United States). Fewer, however, have graduated from high school
in recent years (83 percent from 2014 to 2018 versus 88 percent for the United
States as a whole). About 80 percent of California’s 3 million college students
attend a University of California (UC), California State University (CSU), or
community college campus, with 44 percent of the total attending community
colleges. Even with those numbers, analysts anticipate that the state in 2030 will
face a long-term shortage of college-educated workers, with about 33 percent of
the state’s workers having a college education in 2030 but with over 38 percent of
all jobs requiring a college education.6

MOBILITY AND FOREIGN-BORN RESIDENTS About 60 percent of all

Americans live in the state in which they were born, but only 50 percent of all
Californians were born in California. In fact, 27 percent are foreign-born, more
than twice the percentage of foreign-born residents in the United States as a
whole (13 percent). “More than half (52%) of California’s immigrants are
naturalized U.S. citizens, and another 25% have . . . legal status.”7 As one might
expect with such a large foreign-born population, only 55 percent of those over
age 5 speak English at home in California, as opposed to 78 percent nationwide.
That is a substantial difference by the standards of social science. Many political
issues have arisen from this, ranging from debates over whether local store signs
should be written in foreign languages to the “English as the official state
language” movement.

INCOME The U.S. Census Bureau has estimated California’s median household
income at $71,228 for 2014–18—$10,935 higher than the national figure of
$60,293. The state poverty rate is almost the same as the national figure: 13.3
percent (California) compared to 12.3 percent (United States). The official
poverty line does not account for California’s cost of living, particularly housing
costs. A California-based poverty line calculated by the respected Public Policy
Institute of California (PPIC) and the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality
puts the 2016 poverty line at 18 percent, about 6.9 million people. Another 19
percent of Californians live within 1.5 times the poverty line, which means that
37 percent of state residents were poor or near-poor.8

Income inequality in California has increased in the last 35 years. A study by the
PPIC found that pretax cash incomes of top earners in California are 40 percent
higher than they were in 1980, but middle incomes are only 5 percent higher and
low incomes 19 percent lower. Bay Area incomes are twice those in the Central
Valley, on average. The report did find that California’s safety net, including tax
credits as well as nutrition, cash, and housing assistance, had played a significant
role in lessening inequality in the state. When local, state, and federal safety net
programs are included, the amount of inequality shrinks by about 40 percent.9

GEOGRAPHY AND POLITICS Over the last 40 years, the population of

California has shifted, so the coastal regions have become significantly more
liberal and aligned with the Democratic Party than have the inland regions, which
in turn have become more conservative and aligned with the Republican Party.
These liberal coastal regions include every county on the coast from Del Norte
County near Oregon south to Los Angeles County. The Central Valley and Inland
Empire (Riverside and San Bernardino counties) are disproportionately
Republican. Orange and San Diego counties have been very Republican in the
past but less so in recent elections. Local politics, on the other hand, is quite
different even among Democratic- or Republican-leaning cities. For example,
both San Francisco and Los Angeles are controlled by Democratic Party
politicians, but San Francisco’s local politics is very liberal compared with Los
Angeles’s more moderate politics.

POPULATION GROWTH Except for the four years from 1993 to 1996,
California’s population has grown by about 450,000 people per year for more
than two decades until the early 2000s. The 2010 Census listed California’s
population as 37,691,912; at the end of 2019 the state Department of Finance
estimated the population at 39.8 million. California’s current rate of growth has
slowed: the rate for the 10 years preceding 2020 was 251,000 per year.
Regardless of this slowdown, which includes outmigration, many of the problems
that have plagued the state in the past will continue to raise issues in the future.
The following are some of these issues:

Housing and transportation Even with the decline brought on by the

recession of 2008–2009, housing prices and rents in many areas have
skyrocketed in recent years. Many lower- and middle-class people who work
in San Francisco’s Bay Area must live in the Central Valley, while many of
those who work in the Los Angeles area must live in Riverside and San
Bernardino counties. Commutes of one to two hours each way are common
for residents of these areas. Housing costs in 2020 have risen so much that
many younger families are leaving the state for other states. And our
 transportation systems, built for a much smaller population, have not kept
pace with this growth.
Schools Population growth means more schoolchildren and thus a higher
demand for teachers across the state. In recent years, California has lacked
enough fully qualified or credentialed teachers to meet this demand,
particularly in many urban areas. Projections of the educational requirements
of the future job market indicate that approximately 38 percent of jobs will
require a college degree in 2030. The UC, CSU, and community college
systems do not produce sufficient numbers of graduates to meet this goal,
which means that well-educated workers from other states will move in to
fill the positions. The proportion of students who receive a college degree
should be rising to meet future job requirements; instead, it is falling. More
evidence on the inadequacy of California’s degree production comes from
data on high school graduates and where they go to college. The numbers
who go out of state are up markedly from just a decade ago, with data from
the U.S. Department of Education showing that about 40,000 high school
graduates left the state for college in 2016, compared with the 22,000 who
did so in 2006.10
Immigration California has experienced high levels of immigration since
the 1950s, but in recent decades the trend has slowed. Between 1970 and
2017 the percentage of immigrants in California’s population increased from
9 to 27 percent; the 27 percent of the state’s population in 2017 that was
foreign-born is double the proportion of 13 percent nationwide. Most of
California’s immigrants were born in either Latin America (50 percent) or
Asia (40 percent); 4.3 million come from Mexico alone, composing some 43
percent of the total immigrant population in California. The majority of
recent arrivals, however, are from Asia. Immigrants live in all parts of the
state, with those from Latin America more likely to live in Southern
California and those from Asia more likely to live in Northern California.
Immigrants are younger than nonimmigrant Californians and are more likely
to be poor, and although some have relatively high levels of education, most
are less educated than the native population.11 Table 1.1 shows the five
largest countries of origin for immigrants in California.

TABLE 1.1● Leading Countries of Origin of Immigrants in California, 2017

Country Number of Immigrants in California

Mexico 4,100,000

China (including Taiwan) 969,000

Philippines 857,000

Vietnam 524,000

India 507,000

SOURCE: Public Policy Institute of California, “Just the Facts: Immigrants

in California,” May 2019, ppic.org/publication/immigrants-in-California/
(accessed 5/20/20).

As of 2017 there were approximately 2.4 million undocumented immigrants in

California, according to the Urban Institute and the Public Policy Institute of
California, which used the census figures on the foreign-born population and
subtracted the numbers of people who are naturalized or here on legal visas and
work permits.12 Undocumented immigrants are a continuing political issue, with
politicians arguing over the public services to which they should have access:
Should they be treated in hospital emergency rooms? (Federal law requires that
they be treated.) Should they be allowed to buy insurance on the state exchange
under the federal Affordable Care Act? (No, but they may be eligible for Medi-
Cal and they can purchase private health insurance outside the exchange, Covered
California.) As of 2015, California residents who cannot establish legal presence
in the United States can apply for a California driver’s license if they can
establish proof of identification and state residency. Table 1.2 lists the number of
undocumented immigrants by state. California and Texas have the highest
numbers of undocumented immigrants, at 2 million and 1.6 million, respectively.

Reflecting the controversies over both documented and undocumented

immigration in recent years, a number of demonstrations have taken place in
California on the immigration issue. These demonstrations have represented
different views: against more immigration, in favor of closing the borders, in
favor of a “path to citizenship,” against the 2006 proposed legislation that would
raise penalties for undocumented immigrants and classify them as felons, in
protest against the overcrowded and unsanitary conditions in the facilities that
hold immigrants, against President Donald Trump’s immigration policies, and so
on. At least one of the demonstrations involved more than 1 million people, the
largest ever seen in Southern California to date.

TABLE 1.2 ● Undocumented Immigrants by State, 2017

State Number of Undocumented Immigrants

California 2,000,000

Texas 1,600,000

Florida 825,000

New York 650,000

New Jersey 450,000

Illinois 425,000

Georgia 375,000

North Carolina 325,000

Arizona 275,000

Virginia 275,000

SOURCE: Jeffrey S. Passel and D’Vera Cohn, “Mexicans Decline to Less

Than Half the U.S. Unauthorized Immigrant Population for the First Time,”
Pew Research Center, June 12, 2019, www.pewresearch.org/fact-
tank/2019/06/12/us-unauthorized-immigrant-population-2017/. (Accessed
5/21/20).
The Crisis of California Politics
Is California government capable of making the decisions needed for the state to
thrive and preserve its standard of living through the twenty-first century? The
general sentiment among informed observers is that California was hamstrung by
voter-approved rules and regulations, some of which are admirable on an
individual level but make for a collective nightmare. However, the COVID-19
crisis in 2020 forced the state and many cities and counties to simplify some of
their regulations, and progress in governance seems to have occurred—of course,
it is also too early to tell for sure. In addition, some progress began during the
2003–11 Schwarzenegger administration and continued under Governor Jerry
Brown, who left office in 2019:

Proposition 11, approved in November 2008, took the power to apportion the
districts of the Assembly and state Senate (redistricting) away from those
bodies and gave it to a citizens’ commission. Later, the voters added
apportioning congressional districts to the duties of the new citizens’
commission. In the first years that the new districts have been used, most
observers consider them to be fair—that is, not gerrymandered. So far,
elections have been more competitive.
In 2010 the voters opted to change the state’s party primary elections to a
new top-two primary system, used for the first time in June 2012. Under
the new system, there is no party primary. Instead, the election system is like
a swim meet or a track meet, in which there are preliminary heats and finals.
Following the preliminary election, the top two candidates advance to the
finals in November, even if they are from the same party or are not in a
major party. Third parties such as the Green Party are strongly opposed to
the new system, since they rarely finish among the top two candidates in the
primary election and thus have no access to the general election ballot during
the two months when voter attention is highest.
In 2010 the voters also approved of a change in the legislative process for
approving the state budget. The previous requirement was a two-thirds vote
of the total number of legislators in each chamber (the Assembly and the
state Senate). It is now a simple majority (50 percent plus one). The budget
approved in June 2011 was the first to use the new system. In order to raise
or lower taxes, however, the state constitution still requires a two-thirds
majority of both houses of the state legislature, plus the governor’s
signature.
After the election of Governor Jerry Brown in November 2010, California’s
frustrating budget stalemate initially continued in spite of the new majority rule,
largely because the taxation system had not changed. In June 2012 the budget gap
was $16 billion—more than the total revenues received for the general fund in 40
of the 50 states. By mid-2014, however, the budget had a surplus almost as large
as the deficit from two years before, and this surplus has lasted until the COVID-
19 crisis in early 2020. The California taxation system is highly dependent on its
capital gains tax—income taxes paid on capital gains (funds received from
selling stock and other assets). It produced a huge surplus in 2013 and 2014 when
the stock market rose, inducing many investors to sell shares. The governor and
legislature agreed to use the surplus to build up a “rainy day” fund and to pay off
many old bonds issued when the budget was in deficit.

The rainy day fund buffered state government early in the COVID-19 crisis, but it
was insufficient to ward off severe budget cuts, as proposed by Governor Gavin
Newsom in May 2020 for the 2020–21 budget year, beginning July 1, 2020. The
2020 budget crisis provided ample evidence that no one should think that a
permanent era of plenty has arrived. California’s budget is unduly responsive to
the economy and especially to capital gains. Governor Jerry Brown said it best in
2018: “What’s out there is darkness, uncertainty, decline and recession,” meaning
that the problem is that no one knows when the next recession will begin or how
severe it will be.

California state government thus faces a series of paradoxes. On the one hand, we
see progress in cutting the deficit and in making the hard decisions necessary to
weather the national economic storm. On the other hand, the difficulty of those
decisions and the fact that taxes can be raised only by a two-thirds majority
means that a budget crisis has occurred every few years and can last for several
years, as the COVID-19 crisis threatens to do.

Let us take a closer look at some reasons for the recurring crises.
The Ease of Passing Initiatives
One factor in these recurring crises is certainly the ease with which special
interests collect signatures to propose, campaign for, and sometimes pass
initiatives to help their own causes. The initiative was added to the California
Constitution by the Progressive movement in 1911 as a way to promote the
involvement of the people in public policy and affairs. One recent example of a
special interest using the initiative for its own gain was the November 2016
referendum on the law banning single-use plastic bags statewide. The sponsors of
the referendum, opposed to the law, made—you guessed it—plastic bags. In fall
2020, Uber, Lyft, and DoorDash sponsored an initiative to exempt their
companies from the state’s new employment law that requires companies to give
benefits to more workers. In general, the initiative has ceased to promote direct
democracy for at least the last two decades. Instead, it has mostly become just
another method by which special interests convince voters who are paying little
attention to government and politics to enact rules, laws, and constitutional
amendments that benefit a particular interest at the expense of the public as a
whole. While there are exceptions, far too many initiatives fall into this category.
The end result is to lock up the state budget on required programs and reduce the
flexibility that legislators have to respond to immediate crises.
Term Limits
The term limit movement found fertile ground in California in the 1980s and
1990s. Proposition 140 in 1990 imposed what were then the severest term limits
in the nation on the legislature and the elected officials of the executive branch.
The voters in many California cities instituted term limits on their local leaders as
well. Part of the statewide anger and consequent push for term limit legislation
was directed against Willie Brown, then speaker of the California Assembly,
whose flamboyant lifestyle and prolific fund-raising provoked the ire of voters.

The term limit movement’s theory is that term limits will encourage members of
the Assembly and state Senate to pay more attention to their jobs and spend less
time raising money for future campaigns, and that the limits will make the
legislative bodies more welcoming to historically marginalized and female
candidates. Since term limits have been imposed, the proportion of Latino
legislators has indeed risen; however, members have less expertise on the matters
they vote on, and by the time they acquire this expertise they are term-limited out.
Additionally, many—perhaps most—members of the legislature spend a good
deal of their time in office worrying about their next job and raising funds for
future campaigns. Most observers believe that term limits have worsened the
legislature, not bettered it, and increased the power of lobbyists and interest
groups as inexperienced legislators rely on them for expertise.

In June 2012 the voters approved Proposition 28, which allows legislators to
serve as many as 12 years in the legislature, as long as those 12 years are served
in one house. (The previous total service time was actually higher—14 years—
but was capped at 6 years in the Assembly and 8 in the Senate.) Currently, the
term limits are 12 years (six terms) for the Assembly, 12 years (three terms) for
the state Senate, and 8 years (two terms) for all statewide officials (governor,
lieutenant governor, attorney general, controller, secretary of state, treasurer,
superintendent of public instruction, insurance commissioner, and the four elected
members of the Board of Equalization). Most observers feel that the liberalized
limits have helped policy making in Sacramento.
The Two-Thirds Requirement for Raising Taxes
As noted earlier, until the voters passed Proposition 25 in November 2010,
California’s constitution required a two-thirds vote of the total membership—not
just those present and voting—in each house of the legislature to pass the budget.
Only three states, Arkansas, California, and Rhode Island, required such a strong
supermajority to pass the budget. Proposition 25 lowered the required vote to 50
percent plus one. So far, all the budgets passed under the new rules, which
financially penalize legislators if the budget is not passed on time, have been
passed around June 15, the constitutional deadline.

Passing a balanced state budget is a perennially contentious issue in

California. Governor Gavin Newsom’s 2020–21 May Revision budget
proposal to the legislature was a balanced plan to close a budget gap of more
than $54 billion brought on by the COVID-19 recession.

However, a two-thirds vote of the absolute number of legislators in both houses

of the state legislature is still necessary to raise or lower any tax level. With a
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
 621
scene of excess, unrestrained by any wise superintendence.” It
was therefore natural that the Prince’s friends should ply Parliament
with requests for larger funds in the spring of 1786. The matter came
up, not inappropriately, during debates on the deficiency in the Civil
List. That most brilliant of wits and most genial of boon companions,
Richard Brinsley Sheridan, had now espoused the Prince’s cause.
With his customary charm he dragged in the subject of the monetary
woes of his patron, pointing out that the dignity of the Crown
demanded an ampler provision and the payment of the existing
debts. Pitt replied that this matter was not before the House, and
added that, as he had received no instructions on the subject, he
would not be so presumptuous as to offer any private opinion on it.
Undeterred by this freezing rebuke to Sheridan, Fox on the next
day raised the same question, maintaining that it was a national
advantage for the Heir-Apparent to be able to live not merely in ease
but in splendour. This patriotic appeal fell on deaf ears. The country
gentlemen who on the score of expense had lately decided to leave
Portsmouth and Plymouth open to attack, were not likely to vote
away on the orgies of Carlton House an extra sum of £50,000 a year,
which in fourteen years would have made the two great dockyard
towns impregnable. Fox wisely refrained from pressing his demand,
and vouchsafed no explanation as to how the nation would benefit
622
from the encouragement of extravagance in Pall Mall. Clearly the
Prince’s friends were in a hopeless minority. Accordingly he began
more stoutly than ever to deny his marriage with Mrs. Fitzherbert; but
in such a case character counts for more than oaths and
asseverations.
So the miserable affair dragged on. The King refused every
request for help for the Prince, doubtless in the hope that debt would
compel him to give up his mistress. The debts therefore grew apace,
until in the summer of 1786 Carlton House was in danger of being
seized by the brokers. It is clear that Pitt sided with the King. George
III frequently commended him for his wise advice; but unfortunately
nearly all the letters from Pitt to his sovereign, especially on this
topic, long ago disappeared from the Library at Windsor, a highly
suspicious circumstance. We know, however, that, as early as March
and April 1785, the King approved the messages drawn up by Pitt
from the Sovereign to the Prince. In general they seem to have been
drafted by the Minister; and the following draft, in Pitt’s writing, but
dated by the King and with one slight correction, remains as proof
that Pitt was the mouthpiece for the royal rebukes. It is endorsed
“Draft of Letter from the King to the Prince of Wales”:

623
Windsor, July 8, 1786.
After so often repeating to the Prince of Wales the same
sentiments on the subject of his applications, and with so little
effect, I should add nothing further at present. But I must
express my surprise at receiving a letter from him in which he
states himself to be convinced that he has no reason to expect
either at present or in future the smallest assistance from me. A
624
reference to my last letter and to the former correspondence
might shew him what it was I expected before I could enter
further on the consideration of the business. If he chooses to
interpret what has passed into a refusal on my part to take
measures in any case for his assistance, the consequence of his
doing so can be imputed only to his own determination.625

That the details of the expenditure at Carlton House were laid

before Pitt is clear from the evidence contained in the Pitt Papers.
The packet entitled “Prince of Wales’s Debts,” affords piquant
reading. For, be it remembered, at the very time when Pitt was
straining every nerve to lessen the National Debt, to rebuild the navy,
and to enable England to look her enemies once more in the face,
the Prince was squandering money on rare wines, on gilding,
ormolu, and on jewellery for Mrs. Fitzherbert, £54,000 being
626
considered a “not unreasonable bill” by her latest biographer. An
official estimate fixes the total expenditure of the Prince for the years
1784–86 at £369,977 (or at the rate of £123,000 a year) and yet
there were “arrears not yet to hand.” Parliament had voted £30,000
for the furnishing of Carlton House; but in 1787 the Prince consulted
the welfare of the nation by accepting an estimate of £49,700 for
extensions and decorations; and late in 1789 he sought still further to
strengthen the monarchy by spending £110,500 on further
splendours. They included “a new throne and State bed, furniture
trimmed with rich gold lace, also new decorations in the Great Hall, a
Chinese Drawing-Room, etc.” The Pitt Papers contain no reference
to the sums spent on the Pavilion at Brighton in the years 1785,
1786; but, even in its pre-oriental form, it afforded singular proof of
the desire of the Prince for quiet and economy at that watering-
place.
Much has been made of the retrenchments of July 1786, when
the works on Carlton House were suspended, and the half of that
palatial residence was closed. Whatever were the motives that
prompted that new development, it soon ceased, as the foregoing
figures have shown. The Prince’s necessities being as great as ever,
he found means to bring his case before Parliament in the debates
of 20th, 24th, and 27th April 1787. Thereupon Pitt clearly hinted that
the inquiry, if made at all, must be made thoroughly, and that he
would in that case be most reluctantly driven “to the disclosure of
circumstances which he should otherwise think it his duty to
conceal.” The House quivered with excitement at the untactful
utterance—one of Pitt’s few mistakes in Parliament. Sheridan, with
his usual skill and daring, took up the challenge and virtually defied
Pitt to do his worst. Pitt thereupon declared that he referred solely to
pecuniary matters.
Everyone, however, knew that the Fitzherbert question was
really at stake; and the general dislike to any discussion, even on the
debts, was voiced by the heavy Devonshire squire, who was to find
immortality in the “Rolliad.” Rolle asserted on 27th April that any
such debate would affect the constitution both in Church and State.
Undaunted by Sheridan’s salvos of wit, he stuck to his guns, with the
result that on the 30th Fox fired off a seemingly crushing discharge.
As Sheridan had declared that the Prince in no wise shrank from the
fullest inquiry, the Whig chieftain now solemnly assured the House
that the reported marriage with Mrs. Fitzherbert was a low and
malicious calumny. When the tenacious Devonian plied him with the
final inquiry whether he spoke from direct authority, Fox replied with
the utmost emphasis that he did.
We now know that Fox had been cruelly deceived by the Prince.
But in that age the assertion of Fox was considered as almost final,
save by those who marked the lofty scorn poured by Mrs. Fitzherbert
on her unwitting traducer. In Parliament the victory lay with the
Prince; but even there Rolle firmly refused to comply with Sheridan’s
challenging request and declare himself satisfied. To the outside
world it was clear that either the heir to the throne or Fox had lied.
The letters of George III to Pitt in May 1787 and Pitt’s
suggestions for a settlement of the dispute, show that the perturbed
monarch placed absolute confidence in his Minister. Very noteworthy
is the King’s assertion that there could be no reconciliation until his
son consented to marry and to retrench his expenditure. His letter of
20th May 1787 to Pitt further proves that the proposal to add
£10,000 to the Prince’s income emanated from Pitt, and was
627
acquiesced in somewhat reluctantly by the King.
This expedient brought about a partial reconciliation between
father and son. On the strong recommendation of Pitt, Parliament
allowed the extra £10,000 a year, besides granting £20,000 on
behalf of the new works at Carlton House, and paying £161,000
towards the extinction of the Prince’s debts, on his express
assurance that he would not exceed his income in the future. The
vote was unanimous. Thereupon the King waived the question of the
Prince’s marriage; so at least we may infer from the fact that they
had a long interview on 25th May 1787 at the Queen’s House
(Buckingham House), at the close of which the Prince proceeded to
greet his mother and sisters. The parents had few happier days than
that; and their joy was crowned a little later by the return of
Frederick, Duke of York, after a long residence in Germany. Fanny
Burney describes the radiant gladness of the King and Queen as
they paced along the terrace at Windsor with their soldier son; and
the inhabitants of the royal city crowded to witness the pleasing
scene. It speaks well for the Prince of Wales, that he posted off from
Brighton on the news of his brother’s home-coming, in order to
double the pleasure of his parents. For a time, too, the Prince
thought more kindly of Pitt; so we may infer from the statement of St.
Leger to the Marquis of Buckingham that his feelings towards him
628
had altered since the negotiation on the subject of his debts. But
these sentiments of gratitude soon vanished along with the virtuous
and economical mood of which they were the outcome. Those who
break their word naturally hate the man to whom they had pledged it.
In the winter of 1787–8 the two Princes again abandoned
themselves to drinking and gambling. The dead set made against
Pitt over the Warren Hastings trial and Indian affairs so far weakened
his position that the Princes counted on his fall and hoped for the
advent to power of the Fox-Sheridan clique. Certain it is that they
drank and played very deep. General Grant, writing to Cornwallis,
6th April 1788, says:

The Prince [of Wales] has taught the Duke [of York] to drink
in the most liberal and copious way; and the Duke in return has
been equally successful in teaching his brother to lose his
money at all sorts of play—Quinze, Hazard, &c—to the amount,
as we are told, of very large sums in favour of India General
629
Smith and Admiral Pigot who both wanted it very much.
These play parties have chiefly taken place at a new club formed
this winter by the Prince of Wales in opposition to Brooks’s,
because Tarleton and Jack Payne, proposed by H.R.H., were
630
blackballed.

At this new club, called the Dover House or Welzie’s club, the
Prince often won or lost £2,000 or £3,000 at a sitting. In other ways
Frederick sought to better his brother’s example, so that his
631
company was thought mauvais ton by young nobles.
Compared with these buffooneries, political opposition was a
small matter. But the King deeply resented the nagging tactics of his
son at any time of crisis. Such a time came in March 1788, when a
sharp dispute arose between Pitt and the East India Company. It
originated in the Dutch troubles of the previous summer. The
prospect of war with France was so acute that the India Board sent
out four regiments in order to strengthen the British garrisons in
India. At the time the Directors of the Company fully approved of this
step; but when the war-cloud blew over, they objected to pay the bill.
Pitt insisted that the India Act of 1784 made them liable for the
transport of troops when the Board judged it necessary; and in
February 1788 he brought in a Declaratory Bill to that effect.
At once the Company flung to the winds all sense of gratitude to
its saviour, and made use of the men who four years previously had
sought its destruction. Fox and Erskine figured as its champions, and
the Prince of Wales primed the latter well with brandy before he went
in to attack Pitt. The result was a lamentable display of Billingsgate,
of which Pitt took no notice, and the Ministry triumphed by 242
against 118 (3rd March).
But the clamour raised against the measure had more effect two
nights later, when Fox dared Pitt to try the case in a court of law.
Instead of replying, Pitt feebly remarked that he desired to postpone
his answer to a later stage of the debates. This amazing torpor was
ascribed to a temporary indisposition; but only the few were aware
that the Prime Minister had drunk deeply the previous night at the
Marquis of Buckingham’s house in Pall Mall in the company of
Dundas and the Duchess of Gordon—that spirited lady whose
632
charms are immortalized in the song, “Jenny o’ Menteith.” Wit and
joviality were now replaced by a heaviness that boded ill for the
Ministry, whose majority sank to fifty-seven. Two days later, however,
Pitt pulled himself and his party together, accepted certain
amendments relating to patronage, but crushed his opponents on
the main issue. To the annoyance of the Prince of Wales and Fox,
the Government emerged triumphant from what had seemed to be
certain disaster. Wraxall never wrote a truer word than when he
ascribed Pitt’s final triumph to his character. Even in his temporary
retreat he had commanded respect, so that Burke, who hurried up
exultingly from the Warren Hastings trial, was fain to say that the
Prime Minister scattered his ashes with dignity and wore his
sackcloth like a robe of purple.
 The prestige of the Ministry shone once more with full radiance
on the Budget night (5th May 1788). Pitt pointed out that the past
year had been a time of exceptional strain. The Dutch crisis and the
imminence of war with France had entailed preparations which cost
nearly £1,200,000. The relief of the Prince of Wales absorbed in all
£181,000. The sum of £7,000,000 had been expended in the last
four years on improvements in the naval service. He had raised no
loan and imposed no new taxes. Nevertheless, the sum of
£2,500,000 had been written off from the National Debt, and even
so, there was a slight surplus of £17,000. The condition of the
finances of France supplied the Minister with a telling contrast. It was
well known that, despite many retrenchments, the deficit amounted
to £2,300,000. In these financial statements we may discern the
cause of the French Revolution and of the orderly development of
England.
In vain did Fox and Sheridan seek to dissipate the hopes
aroused by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. So experienced a
financier as Pulteney justified his statement, and the country at large
felt assured of the advent of a time of abounding prosperity. As for
France, the inability of her statesmen, even of Necker, to avert the
crisis caused by reckless borrowing and stupid taxation, seemed to
be the best possible guarantee for peace. Pitt’s concern at the re-
appointment of Necker in August 1788 appears in a letter to
Grenville in which he describes it as almost the worst event that
could happen—a curious remark which shows how closely he
633
connected the power of a State with its financial prosperity. Thus
the year 1788 wore on, with deepening gloom for France, and with
every appearance of calm and happiness for the Island Power, until
a mysterious malady struck down the King and involved everything
in confusion.
 CHAPTER XVIII
THE REGENCY CRISIS

Dost thou so hunger for mine empty chair

That thou wilt needs invest thee with mine honours
Before the hour be ripe?
Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part II.

The line which bounded the royal prerogative, though in

general sufficiently clear, had not everywhere been drawn with
accuracy and distinctness.—Macaulay.

T HE causes of insanity are generally obscure. In the case of

George III the disease cannot be traced to a progenitor, nor did it
descend to his issue, unless the moral perversity of his sons be
regarded as a form of mental obliquity. It is highly probable that the
conduct of the Prince of Wales and the Duke of York produced in their
father a state of nervous tension conducive to, if not the actual cause
of, madness. No proof of this is possible; but having regard to the
King’s despotic temper, his love of plain living, and his horror of
gambling and debauchery, we may plausibly refer to a private cause
the sudden breakdown of a strong constitution at a time when public
affairs had become singularly calm.
Throughout the summer of 1788 he became steadily weaker. A
stay at Cheltenham was of no avail. Indeed, an enemy of that place
tried to assign the King’s malady solely to its waters. The King had to
forego the long walks and rides which had formerly tired out all his
suite; and in October he returned to Kew much aged and broken.
Nevertheless the indomitable will asserted itself in one curious detail.
He always remained standing during interviews with his Ministers; and
he is stated by George Rose to have kept on his feet for three hours
and forty minutes during a portentous interview with Pitt, which must
634
have strained his strength to the breaking point. At the levee of 24th
October at St. James’s, he made a praiseworthy effort to appear well in
order “to stop further lies and any fall of the stocks.” But the effort was
too great, as Pitt perceived afterwards during a private interview.
Nevertheless, on the following day the King removed to Windsor.
There the decline in health continued, so that, after attending a hunt,
he exclaimed to Lady Effingham: “My dear Effy, you see me all at once
635
an old man.” Even so he continued his correspondence with Pitt
much as usual, until on 5th November there came a sudden collapse.
Again we have to confess ignorance as to the final cause. Mrs.
Papendiek, wife of the royal barber, ascribes it to the King’s annoyance
at the endeavour of the Duke of York to introduce Turkish military
instruments into the band of the Guards. Rose mentions a discussion
with the Duke at dinner on the 5th, relative to a murder. All, however,
are agreed that the merest trifles had long sufficed to make the King
flurried and angry, as had frequently appeared during the drives with
the princesses. This peculiarity now suddenly rose to the point where
madness begins. It is even said that at that dinner he without
provocation suddenly rushed at the Prince of Wales, pinned him to the
wall, and dared him to contradict the King of England. The Prince burst
into tears, the Queen became hysterical, and it was with some difficulty
that the King was induced to retire to his room. During that evening
and night he raved incessantly, and the chief physician, Sir George
Baker, feared for his life. A curious incident is mentioned by Mrs.
Papendiek. She avers that on the following night the King arose, took a
candle, and went to look at the Queen as she slept. She awoke in an
agony of terror, whereupon he soothed her and seemed to take
comfort himself. We may doubt the authenticity of the incident, as also
the correctness of Mrs. Papendiek’s narrative when she describes the
offensive air of authority which the Prince of Wales at once assumed,
his demand of an interview with the Queen, even on political affairs,
636
and his striking the floor with his stick to express displeasure.
It is certain, however, that the behaviour of the Prince was far from
seemly. He took the direction of affairs in the palace with an
abruptness which caused the Queen much pain. “Nothing was done
but by his orders,” wrote Miss Burney; “the Queen interfered not in
anything. She lived entirely in her two new rooms, and spent the whole
day in patient sorrow and retirement with her daughters.” Worst of his
acts, perhaps, was the taking possession of the King’s papers, a
proceeding which his apologists pass over in discreet silence. Among
those documents, we may note, were several which proved that Pitt
had not seldom drafted the royal rebukes. In other respects the
exultation of the Prince at least wore the veil of decency, therein
comparing favourably with the joy coarsely expressed by his followers
637
at Brooks’s Club.
Secret intrigues for assuring the triumph of the Whigs began at
once. It is significant that that veteran schemer, the Lord Chancellor,
Thurlow, proceeded to Windsor on 6th November, at the Prince’s
command, and dined and supped with him. The ostensible object of
their meeting was to consider the mode of treating His Majesty, who
638
had been violent during the night. But the design of the Prince was
to detach from Pitt the highest legal authority in the land. To this he
was instigated by Captain Payne, Comptroller of his Household, who
wrote to Sheridan that Thurlow would probably take this opportunity of
breaking with his colleagues, if they proposed to restrict the powers of
639
the Regent. Payne augured correctly. Thurlow had his scruples as
to such a betrayal; but they vanished at the suggestion that he should
continue in his high office under the forthcoming Whig Ministry.
This bargain implied the shelving of Lord Loughborough, who for
five years had attached himself to the Whigs in the hope of gaining the
woolsack. Had Fox been in England, it is unlikely that he would have
sanctioned this betrayal of a friend in order to gain over an enemy. But,
with Sheridan as go-between, and the Prince as sole arbiter, the
bargain was soon settled. Light has been thrown on these events by
the publication of the Duchess of Devonshire’s Diary. In it she says:
“He [Sheridan] cannot resist playing a sly game: he cannot resist the
pleasure of acting alone; and this, added to his natural want of
judgment and dislike of consultation frequently has made him commit
640
his friends and himself.” Perhaps it was some sense of the
untrustworthiness of Sheridan which led Fox, in the midst of a
Continental tour with Mrs. Armstead, to return from Bologna at a speed
which proved to be detrimental to his health. After a journey of only
nine days, he arrived in London on the 24th. It was too late to stop the
bargain with Thurlow, and he at once informed Sheridan that he had
swallowed the bitter pill and felt the utmost possible uneasiness about
641
the whole matter.
The Whigs now had a spy in the enemy’s citadel. At first Pitt was
not aware of the fact. The holding of several Cabinet meetings at
Windsor, for the purpose of sifting the medical evidence, enabled
Thurlow to hear everything and secretly to carry the news to the
Prince. Moreover, his grief on seeing the King—at a time when the
642
Prince’s friends knew him to be at his worst —was so heartrending
that some beholders were reminded of the description of the player in
“Hamlet”:

Tears in his eyes, distraction in his aspect,

A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
With forms to his conceit.

Such at least was the judgement of the discerning few, who, with
Fanny Burney, saw more real grief in the dignified composure of Pitt
after that inevitably painful interview. Authority to “inspect” the royal
patient was entrusted to Thurlow, who thus stood at the fountain head
of knowledge. Yet these astute balancings and bargainings were
marred by the most trivial of accidents. After one of the Cabinet
Councils at Windsor, Ministers were about to return to town, when
Thurlow’s hat could not be found. Search was made for it in vain in the
council chamber, when at last a page came up to the assembled
Ministers and exclaimed with boyish frankness: “My Lord, I found it in
the cabinet of His Royal Highness.” The flush which spread over the
Chancellor’s wrinkled visage doubled the effect of the boy’s
643
unconscious home-thrust.
The question of the Regency has often been discussed on abstract
constitutional grounds. Precedents were at once hunted up, namely,
those of the years, 1326, 1377, 1422, and 1455, the last being
considered on a par with the present case. But of course the whole
question turned primarily on the probability of the King’s recovery. Here
it should be noted that George III had been afflicted by a mental
malady for a few weeks in the year 1765, and that a Regency Bill was
644
drafted but the need for it vanished. This fact was not widely known,
but it must have come to the knowledge of the Prince of Wales. In view
of the sound constitution and regular life of the King, there were good
grounds for hoping that he would a second time recover.
Nevertheless, the reports of Sir George Baker, on behalf of Dr.
Warren and the other physicians, as sent to Pitt, were at first
discouraging. As they have not before been published it will be well to
cite them here almost in extenso from the Pitt Papers, No. 228. They
are dated from the Queen’s Lodge, Windsor:

Nov. 6. 9 o’clock:—Sir George Baker presents his comp^{ts} to

Mr. Pitt. He is very sorry to inform Mr. Pitt that the King’s delirium
has continued through the whole day. There seems to be no
prospect at present of a change either for the better or worse.
H.M. is now rather in a quiet state. Nov. 8, 1788. 8 o’clock:—The
dose of James’s powder which the King had taken before Mr. Pitt
left Windsor produced a gentle perspiration but no diminution of
the delirium; a second dose taken six hours after the first, is now
operating in the same manner but with as little effect upon the
delirium. Nov. 10, 1788. 8 p.m.:—H.M. has but little fever, is very
incoherent, but without vehemence or bodily efforts, though his
strength appears to be very little impaired. Nov. 12, 1788:—H.M.
talked in a quiet but incoherent way the whole night and is this
morning just as he was yesterday. He has eaten a very good
breakfast. Nov. 15, 1788. 10 p.m.:—H.M. has been deranged the
whole day, in a quiet and apparently happy way to himself. Nov.
16. 10 a.m.:—This morning his discourse was consistent, but the
principle upon which it went for the most part founded in error.
Nov. 18, 10 a.m.:—H.M. had a good night, but the disorder
remains unabated. Nov. 21:—H.M. has been ... more than once
under the influence of considerable irritation. Nov. 22. 10 a.m.:—
H.M. is entirely deranged this morning in a quiet good humoured
way. Nov. 22:—H.M. shewed many marks of a deluded
 imagination in the course of the day. In the evening he was more
consistent.

* * * * *
[A letter follows from the Queen, that she consents to the
calling in Dr. Addington.]

* * * * *
Nov. 24, 1788:—His Majesty passed the whole day in a
645
perfectly maniacal state. Nov. 25, 1788:—His Majesty was not
enraged nor surprised at the strict regimen under which he was
put at 5 o’clock this evening, but grew quieter and went to bed at 9
o’clock, and is now asleep.

From the outset Pitt viewed the case with grave concern, but by no
means hopelessly. This will appear from the following new letters of
Pitt, the former to Bishop Pretyman (Tomline), the latter to the Marquis
of Buckingham:

646
Sunday, Nov. 10, [1788].
My Dear Bishop,
You will have heard enough already of the King’s illness
to make you very uneasy. The fact is that it has hitherto found little
relief from medicine, and, what is worst of all, it is attended with a
delirium the cause of which the physicians cannot clearly
ascertain. On the whole there is some room to apprehend the
disorder may produce danger to his life, but there is no immediate
symptom of danger at present. The effect more to be dreaded is
on the understanding. If this lasts beyond a certain time it will
produce the most difficult and delicate crisis imaginable in making
provision for the Government to go on. It must, however, be yet
some weeks before that can require decision, but the interval will
be a truly anxious one....
[Private.]
 * * * * *

647
Downing Street, Nov. 15, 1788.
My dear Lord,
I have not half time [sic] to thank you sufficiently for your
very kind and affectionate letter, and for the communication thro’
Grenville. You will learn from him that our last accounts begin to
wear rather a more favourable aspect, tho’ there is not yet ground
for very confident hope. There is certainly now no danger to his
life, but the other alternative, which there was some danger to
apprehend, was, if possible, more distressing. It seems now
possible that a total recovery may take place, but even on the best
supposition there must still be a considerable interval of anxiety....

Grenville, a man of singularly calm and equable temperament

(which procured for him the Speakership of the House of Commons on
the decease of Cornwall early in the next year) waxed indignant as he
described to his brother the tactics of the Opposition. On 20th
November he declared: “The Opposition have been taking
inconceivable pains to spread the idea that his [the King’s] disorder is
incurable. Nothing can exceed Warren’s indiscretion on this
648
subject.” The conviction gained ground that the Royal physicians
were in league with the Prince; and so high did feeling run that shouts
were flung at them—“So much the worse for you if he does not
recover.” This exasperation of spirit waxed apace as the jubilation of
the Prince’s friends became insolently patent. Indeed more terrible
than the lunacy itself was the spectacle of the intrigues to which it gave
rise.
As the reports privately sent to Pitt by the physicians were far from
hopeless, he determined to await developments as long as possible
before taking any decided step. On 12th November he proposed to the
Prince of Wales that Parliament, instead of meeting in the following
week, should be adjourned for a fortnight, to which there came a ready
649
assent. On the 17th he asked leave to inform the Prince of what he
proposed to do on the meeting of Parliament, but an interview was not
accorded. Eight days later the Prince inquired whether he had any
proposal to make, but was answered by a polite negative. The uneasy
truce between them evidently neared its end.
In his resolve to sift to the bottom the nature of the disease and the
probability of a cure, Pitt advised the calling in of his father’s doctor,
Addington, and he carried his point. On the 28th and 29th the Prime
Minister himself saw the Monarch, who was pleased to see him,
referred to questions discussed at their last interview, and showed
incoherence chiefly in wandering incessantly from one topic to
650
another, a characteristic of the converse of polite Society, which, if
judged severely, would warrant the consignment to Bedlam of half of
its most cherished talkers.
All observers are agreed that the King conversed quite rationally at
651
times, as was also the case in the attack of 1804. Pitt therefore
resolved to do nothing which would distress the King in the event of his
recovery. This it was which led him to decline all idea of a coalition with
the Whigs, and to insist on restricting the authority of the Regent in
regard to personal matters on which the King laid stress. The removal
of the monarch to Kew House seems to have been the wish of the
Prince as well as of the Cabinet; and it took place without mishap on
29th November.

* * * * *
Six days later Parliament re-assembled, and rarely has it had to
face problems so novel and delicate. In contrast with other nations,
England had been singularly free from the perplexities attendant on a
Regency; but now she had to face them in an acute form. The
monarch was not unpopular, and his heir was distrusted. Yet it was
indisputable that, as Regent, he could choose his own Ministers; and
his hatred of Pitt implied the dismissal of that Minister and the triumph
of Sheridan, Fox, and the roystering set at Brooks’s. Pitt felt little doubt
on this point and calmly prepared to resume his practice at the Bar.
The sequel must have been a sharp conflict between the Prince’s
friends and the nation; so that the fateful year 1789 would have seen
the growth of a political crisis, less complex than that of France, it is
true, but fully as serious as that from which the nation was saved by
his timely decease in the summer of the year 1830. All this was at
stake, and much more. For who shall measure the worth to the nation
of the frugal and virtuous life of George III, and who can count up the
moral losses inflicted on the national life by his son in his brief
ascendancy?
The King’s physicians having been examined by the Privy Council
on 3rd December, their evidence was laid before Parliament on the
following day. While differing at many points, they agreed that recovery
was possible or even probable, but they could not assign a limit of
time. Adopting a suggestion of Fox, Pitt moved for the appointment of
a Committee of the House for the examination of the physicians. It
comprised twenty-one members selected from two lists suggested by
the Ministry and the Opposition. The reading out of the final list led to a
singular scene. Not much comment was made on the twenty names,
but before reading out the last name, Pitt paused for a moment. At
once the Opposition raised cries of “Burke.” Still Pitt remained silent.
The cries were renewed more loudly. He then very quietly proposed
Lord Gower. Burke threw himself back in his seat, crossed his arms
652
violently, and kicked his heels with evident discomposure. The
annoyance of the great Irishman was natural, as Pitt had evidently
prepared to inflict the slight. The Upper House appointed a similar
committee.
The report based on this inquiry was presented by Pitt to the
House of Commons on the 10th. It comprised the evidence, not only of
the royal physicians, but also of an outsider, the Rev. Dr. Francis Willis
who, during twenty-eight years had supervised some 900 cases of
lunacy at his residence near Boston. Everyone admitted his success in
this trying work, which may be ascribed to the influence of a
commanding personality, and the firm and judicious treatment which
he substituted for the frequently violent methods then in vogue. He at
once pronounced the case far from hopeless; and, if we may trust the
stories told of the King and his new physician, there was even at the
outset very much of method in the madness. Thus, on being informed
that Willis was a clergyman, the patient remarked that he could not
approve of his taking to the practice of medicine. This drew from Willis
the remark that Christ went about healing the sick, whereupon the
retort at once followed—“Yes; but I never heard that he had £700 a
year for doing so.” The acuteness of the King’s faculties also appears
in his remark that a letter which he had written to the Queen would not
reach her, as his recent missive to the Duke of York had not been
answered. Thereupon Willis offered to take it himself, and caused
great joy to the sufferer by bringing back an affectionate letter in reply.
Yet the King soon felt the domination of his will. This appeared
when the royal patient refused to go to bed. As the King petulantly
resisted, Willis raised his voice in commanding tones which ensured
complete submission. The trust which Willis reposed in the King led
him to lengths that were sharply censured. When the sufferer
expressed a desire to shave himself and complained that a razor and
even a knife had been withheld from him, Willis at once replied that he
was sure His Majesty had too strong a sense of what he owed to God
and man to make an improper use of it. He therefore brought a razor,
and kept the monarch under his eye until the growth of five weeks was
removed. This tactful treatment speedily wrought a marked change.
653
Willis was far more sanguine than the other attendants. In his
evidence before the Committee on 9th December, he stated that the
irritation was already subsiding, and that nine-tenths of his patients
who had been similarly afflicted recovered, generally within three
654
months from their first seizure.
Willis’s words aroused the liveliest hopes. In vain did the Prince’s
party and the physicians scoff at the assurance of the “quack” or
“interloper.” The Queen and the nation believed in Willis; and his report
greatly strengthened Pitt’s hands in dealing with the Regency. The
more we know of the motives that influenced votes in Parliament the
more we see that they turned on the opinions of the doctors. The
desertion of the Duke of Queensberry to the Prince’s party was due to
a long conversation which he had at Windsor with the pessimistic Dr.
655
Warren.
The conduct of the Prime Minister was cautious and tentative. On
10th December, after presenting the medical evidence, he moved the
appointment of a committee to investigate precedents. At once Fox
started to his feet and poured forth a vehement remonstrance. What
need was there for such an inquiry? It was merely a pretext for delay.
The heir-apparent was of mature age and capacity. He had as clear a
right to take the reins of government and to exercise the sovereign
power during the King’s illness as he would have in case of death.
Parliament had only to determine when he had the right to exercise it;
and as short a time as possible should elapse before the Prince
assumed the sovereignty.
Here, as so often, Fox marred his case by his impetuosity. Pitt
watched him narrowly, and remarked exultantly to his neighbour: “I’ll
un-Whig the gentleman for the rest of his life.” With eyes flashing
defiance, he denounced his assertions of the right of the Prince to
assume the Regency as a breach of the constitution, implying as they
did that the House could not even deliberate on the question. They
must therefore in the first place assert their own rights.
Fox at once rose, not to soften, but to emphasize his previous
statements. He questioned whether Parliament had the power of
legislating at all until the royal power were made good. Now that the
King had been admitted to be incapable, their assembly was a
Convention, not a Parliament. He next asserted that the Regency
belonged of right to the Prince of Wales during the civil death of the
King; and “that it could not be more legally his by the ordinary and
natural demise of the Crown.” This was tantamount to saying that
English law recognized lunacy as death, in which case an heir could at
once possess the property of a lunatic father, and a wife be divorced
656
from an insane husband. Of course this is not so. Fox concluded by
asserting that, if Parliament arrogated to itself the power of nominating
the Regent, it would act “contrary to the spirit of the constitution and
would be guilty of treason.”
Pitt, on the contrary, affirmed that the Prince had no such claim to
the Regency as would supersede the right of either House to
deliberate on the subject. He even ventured on the startling assertion
that apart from the decision of Parliament “the Prince of Wales had no
more right (speaking of strict right) to assume the government than any
657
other individual subject of the country.” This phrase is generally
quoted without the qualifying clause, which materially alters it. Pitt
surely did not mean to deny the priority of the claim of the Prince, but
rather to affirm the supreme authority of Parliament; the statement,
however was undeniably over-strained. In the main he carried the
House with him. In vain did Burke declaim against Pitt, styling him a
self-constituted competitor with the Prince. “Burke is Folly personified,”
wrote Sir William Young on 22nd December, “but shaking his cap and
658
bells under the laurel of genius.” The sense of the House was
clearly with the Prime Minister, and the committee of inquiry was
appointed.
At the outset, then, Fox and his friends strained their contentions to
breaking-point. In a technical sense their arguments could be justified
by reference to the dead past; but they were out of touch with the living
present. Fox himself had admitted that no precedent could be found for
this problem. A practical statesman would therefore have sought to
adapt the English constitution (which is a growing organism, not a
body of rigid rules) to the needs of the present crisis. By his eager
declarations he left this course open for Pitt to take; and that great
parliamentarian took it with masterly power. He resolved to base his
case on the decisions arrived at in the Revolution of a century earlier
which had affirmed the ascendancy of Parliament in all questions
relating to a vacancy in the Crown or a disputed succession. Men said
659
that he was becoming a Republican, and Fox a Tory. Fortunately he
had to do with singularly indiscreet opponents. After Fox had
prejudiced the Prince’s cause, Sheridan rushed in to mar its prospects
still further. In the debate of 12th December he ventured to remind Pitt
of the danger of provoking the assertion of the Prince’s claim to the
Regency. Never did Sheridan’s hatred of Pitt betray him into a more
660
disastrous blunder. His adversary at once turned it to account:

I have now [he said] an additional reason for asserting the

authority of the House and defining the boundaries of “Right,”
when the deliberative faculties of Parliament are invaded and an
indecent menace is thrown out to awe and influence our
proceedings. In the discussion of the question I trust the House
will do its duty in spite of any threat that may be thrown out. Men
who feel their native freedom will not submit to a threat, however
661
high the authority from which it may come.
 We must here pause in order to notice the allegations of Mr. Lecky
against Pitt. That distinguished historian asserted that the conduct of
the Prime Minister towards the Prince “was from the first as haughty
and unconciliatory as possible”; he claims that the plan of a Regency
should have been submitted to the Prince before it was laid before
Parliament; further, that, in defiance of the expressed wish of the
Prince, “Pitt insisted on bringing the question of the Prince’s right to a
662
formal issue and obtaining a vote denying it.” It is difficult to see on
what grounds this indictment rests. Surely it was the duty of the Privy
Council and Parliament first to hear the medical evidence and to
decide whether the need for the Regency existed. That was the
purport of the debate of 10th December, the details of which prove
conclusively that it was Fox who first, and in a most defiant way,
brought up the question of the Prince’s right to assume the Regency.
Pitt, in a temperate and non-committal speech, had moved for a
“Committee of Inquiry,” whereupon the Whig leader flung down the
gauntlet for the Prince; and two days later Sheridan uttered his
663
threat. Their auditors must have inferred that they acted with the
sanction of Carlton House. In any case, the Prince’s friends, not Pitt,
provoked the conflict. When the glove was twice cast down, the Prime
Minister could do nothing else but take it up and insist on having that
question disposed of; otherwise Parliament might as well have
dissolved outright. We may admit, however, that the intemperate
conduct of Fox and Sheridan led Pitt to assert the authority of
Parliament with somewhat more stringency than the case warranted.
To the contention, that the Prince ought first to have been
consulted on the proposed measure, I may reply that such a course
would have implied his right to dictate his terms to Parliament; and that
was the very question which Pitt wished to probe by the Committee of
Inquiry. Further, the historian’s assertion, that Pitt laid the Regency
plan before Parliament before submitting it to the Prince, is disproved
by the contents of Pitt’s letter of 15th December, published in full by
664
Bishop Tomline. In it the Prime Minister expressed his regret that
his words and intentions had been misrepresented to His Royal
Highness; for on several occasions he had offered to wait on him but
had received an answer that he (the Prince) had no instructions for
him. He denied the accuracy of the report that he was about on the