History - Henry Vii's Financial Policy

to achieve solvency by increasing royal income, decreasing expenditure and thereby restoring the Crown's financial strength

- described as 'the best businessman ever to sit upon the English throne' and on his death credited with being the 'richest lord that is now known in the world'

- actually lacked experience in govt and was untried and untested in the rigours of financial administration and diplomacy

- was acutely aware of the importance of strong finances if he was to remain safely on the throne as his usurpation meant there was always the possibility of others putting forward a claim

- he therefore deemed the availability of revenue and financial stability essential if he had to raise an army to defeat them

- felt secure only when rich: could use wealth to reward loyal service, bribe potential opponents and fund armies if necessary

- wealth helped him to consolidate the dynasty as if the succession was still challenged at the time of his death, a full treasury would provide her heir with the resources to fight to retain the throne

- why he wanted to reorganise financial administration: a wealthy king could better finance his way out of trouble

- knew he would encounter opposition from those who would be expected to pay

- had not the time nor experience to continue the Yorkist practice of using the Chamber (an office in the royal household responsible for the king's private income but the Yorkists had enlarged it to take over the functions of the Exchequer)

- under H the Exchequer resumed its control of the nation's finances

- as early as 1487 H admitted that focusing intensely on his personal security had neglected his estates - in Richard III's reign they had earned £25,000 per annum, falling to £12,000 in 1486

- restored the Chamber system to its former position as the most important institution of financial administration in the kingdom

- by the late 1490s it was once again the centre of royal finance, handling an annual turnover well in excess of £100,000

- dealt with the transfer of all revenue from crown lands, profits of justice, feudal dues and the french pension

- dealt with all sources of income except customs duties and the accounts of sheriffs, which remained under control of the Exchequer because their collection involved detailed information and a complex organisation of officers and records not available to the Treasurer of the Chamber

chief financial official responsible for the king's money

- led to further reorganisation within the royal household, from where the chamber originated

- the king's 'privy (private) chamber' increased most in importance, made up of his personal household servants

- this now took over the administration of the household as well as taking care of H's private expenditure, formerly a responsibility of the chamber

- because it continued to play a vital role in Tudor govt throughout the 16th century, and many Tudor ministers rose from its ranks

- on paper was the Treasurer of England, but had long been just a figurehead and the office was traditionally given to an important noble as an honorary position

- only holders of the office during H's reign were Lord Dinham (1485-1501) and the Earl of Surrey (1501-22)

- the Treasurer of the Chamber

- held by two of the king's most loyal and efficient servants, Sir Thomas Lovell (1485-92) and Sir John Heron (1492-1521)

- main advantage was that it gave the king much closer control over his finances

1465: appointed steward of the Stafford household

1485: knighted by H and appointed chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster

1492: appointed to serve on the King's council as chief financial adviser

1497: participated in the defeat and dispersal of the Cornish rebels at Blackheath, London

1499: presided over the council learned

1501: elected a knight of the garter

1503: died

- born in St John Bedwardine, Worcestershire in1440, second son of Sir Richard Bray

- educated at the Royal Grammar School Worcester

- father reportedly a physician to Henry VI

- Bray first found employment in the household of Sir Henry Stafford, second husband of Lady Margaret, H's mother

- through his successful stewardship: his skills and expertise in estate management and financial administration impressed H

- one of the most powerful of H's councillors, displayed long and loyal service, had a close relationship with H (like Jasper Tudor) and could rebuke and influence H, as chancellor of Duchy of Lancaster presided over council learned to direct a penal system of bonds and the enforcement of the prerogative rights of the king

- credited with restructuring the revenue system and restoring the financial health of the crown - his financial management enhanced the financial power of the crown, ensuring it became solvent by the end of H's reign

able to pay all just debts and for assets to exceed liabilities

the regular income on which the crown could rely to finance the costs of monarchy

crown lands, customs duties, feudal dues and profits of justice

- inherited all lands belonging to the Houses of York and Lancaster, including the Earldoms of Richmond, March and Warwick, the Duchy of Lancaster and the principality of Wales

- when his uncle and his wife died, their lands went to him also

- further enriched through attainders and escheats (when a landholder died without an heir, his lands passed by right to the King)

- he had few relatives to benefit - no brothers, Jasper tudor died in 1495 and Arthur in 1502

- only Prince Henry needed provision

- H had no obvious favourites and wasn't inclined to shower supporters

- efficient management, a thrifty nature and good fortune meant that annual income from Crown lands increased from £29,000 in 1485 to £42,000 in 1509

- an act of resumption in which the Crown recovered all properties granted away since 1455

- having stated his claim H didn't take back all the estates involved as he didn't wish to antagonise the majority of noble families affected by the act

- H knew if he wanted to consolidate his dynasty he must try to gain the support of the nobility by showing them he was prepared to compromise

- the Duchy of Lancaster, which had its own organisation, centred on its chancellor and had adopted new methods of estate management

- at the start of H's reign it brought in £650 a year to the Chamber but by 1509 this had increased tenfold to nearly £7000 under the skilful management of Sir Reginald Bray

- by 1509 its revenue had been overtaken by crown lands but it still provided 1/3 of the Crown's ordinary revenue

- tried to block many of the loopholes in the custom system

- from 1487 merchants involved in coastal trading (shipping merchandise from one english port to another) were required to produce a certificate from the first port specifying the duties paid

- in 1496 he tried to reduce some of the privileges enjoyed by foreign merchants, e.g. immunity from english taxation

- twice during his reign he updated the Book of Rates of customs duties to be paid in London

an account book recording the rates of tax paid by foreign merchants on goods imported and sold in England

- despite his efforts income didn't greatly increase

- average annual receipts from the first 10 years of his reign were about £33,000 and about £40,000 after

- smuggling seems to have continued despite stricter controls

- H couldn't manipulate international trade which was dependent on the fragile and changing relationships between all the european powers

- H determined to enforce these traditional rights to the full and exact max possible income

- initially proceeds from wardship and marriage were small, only £350 in 1487

- after 1503 a new officer (the Master of the King's Wards) was appointed to supervise them, and by 1507 the annual income had risen to £6000

- he ensured that most criminal acts, including treason, were punishable by fines rather than imprisonment and execution

- this brought him much more profit, as with his treatment of the rebels in Cornwall in 1497

- H also used attainder as punishment against opponents e.g. Sir William Stanley paid the Crown £9000 in cash (in income from his lands) and £1000 per annum after his treason in 1495

- only 1 parliament during the reign didn't pass attainders and the highest number in any session was 51

money which came to the Crown on particular occasions and therefore with no regularity

parliamentary grants, loans and benevolences, clerical taxes, feudal obligations, the french pension and bonds and recognisances

- 1487 to pay for the Battle of Stoke, 1489 to go to war against the French and in 1496 to defend his throne against attack from the Scots and Warbeck

- accused of cheating as he raised money for wars that never actually took place, as in 1496

- could be argued that the money was still needed in the event of a Scottish attack some time in the future, though there was no further trouble from Scotland - however some of the money was used to suppress the Cornish rebellion

- in 1496 when he was desperate for cash to defeat Warbeck and the Scots

- such requests were virtually impossible to decline though they were traditionally in the form of 'agreements'

- H seems to have asked for only modest sums, around £10,000, and there is no evidence of any resentment, likely as most of the loans appear to have been repaid in full

- H had little choice but to repay them because those subjects who were owed money by the king were more likely to support a rival claimant to the throne

- in 1491 when he intended to take his army across the Channel to protect Brittany from French aggression

- produced £48,500, a considerable amount when compared with the sums yielded by direct taxation - royal commissioners were stringent in its collection

- usually when Parliament made a grant, the Convocations followed suit with their own contributions

- in 1489 they voted £25,000 towards the cost of the French war

the church equivalent of parliament where clerics met in two houses - upper house of senior clerics and lower house representing parish priests - to discuss and transact Church affairs

- simony, charging £300 for the Archdeaconry of Buckingham on one occasion

- like many of his predecessors, he kept many bishoprics vacant for many months before making new appointments so that he could pocket the revenue in the meantime

- due to a rash of deaths in the final years of his reign, H received over £6000 a year in this way

- he did not, however, exploit this method as much as his contemporaries and rarely left a diocese without a bishop for more than 12 months

the selling of Church appointments and offices

- as chief feudal lord, the king had the right to demand feudal aid on special occasions, such as the knighting of his eldest son, the marriage of his eldest daughter and his own ransom if he were ever captured in war, a fate H avoided

- he could also levy distraint of knighthood, the medieval practice of forcing those with an annual income of £40 or more to become a mounted knight to fight for the king in time of war

- as part of the Treaty of Étaples in 1492 H negotiated the pension from the king of france

- the pension was a bribe offered by the french king so that the English armies would be removed from french soil

- H was promised £159,000 to compensate him for the cost of the war, to be paid in annual instalments of about £5000

the practice of subjects paying a sum of money to the crown as a guarantee of their future good behaviour

- a written obligation in which people promised to perform some specific action on pain of paying money if they failed to carry out their promise

- they had long been used as a condition for the appointment of officials, particularly customs staff, but in the later 15th century their use was extended to private individuals as a way of keeping the peace and ensuring loyalty to the govt

- formal acknowledgements of actual debts or other obligations that already existed

- under H, recognisances became the normal way of ensuring payment of legal debts owed to the crown

- such was H's personal interest in these matters that none was issued without his explicit agreement

- almost immediately after Bosworth he demanded a recognisance of £10,000 from Viscount Beaumont of Police and a similar sum from the Earl of Westmorland as guarantees of their loyalty in the future

- mostly used for routine transactions, such as those with merchants who postponed payment of customs duties

- others had dubious uses e.g. recognisances to cover the release of criminals from prison or for the pardon of murderers

- at best, and certainly in the first few insecure years of his reign, they were effective at restoring law and order and in most cases brought in the revenue that H wanted

- in first decade collected 191, rising to well over 200 in the later years of his reign

- receipts from bonds rose from £3000 in 1493 to £35,000 in 1505

- hounded by the king's officials, particularly those from the Council Learned, which was made responsible for bonds and recognisances

- became greatly feared because of the efficiency of 2 of its officials, Richard Empson and Edmund Dudley, in pursuing defaulters

- after Dudley's arrival the records of the council trebled

out of 62 noble families:

- 46 at one time or another financially at his mercy

- 7 under attainder

- 36 bound by recognisances or other obligations

- 3 by other means

- earned H a reputation for greed and cynicism