[James I dictates the composition of the Commons, 1604]
He wasted no time in getting things started. In the proclamation by which he summoned his first Parliament, he assumed the power of dictating what manner of men should compose it, and directed that his Court of Chancery should decide whether or not the certificates of election fulfilled the royal conditions, “and if any shall be found to be made contrarie to this proclamation, the same is to be rejected as unlawful and insufficient.”[295] The commons, however, shortly after their convening, vindicated their privilege in the case of Goodwin and Fortescue, and succeeded in maintaining thereafter their right to decide upon the legality of returns.[296] In their “Apology of the House of Commons, made to the king, touching their Privileges,” nearly at the close of this session, the commons complained against the monopolies possessed by the great trading companies in the face of many statutes to the contrary, and the oppressive exercise of the ancient prerogative of purveyance.[297]
[James receives tunnage and poundage for life]
In the department of regular taxation, however, James at first adopted a conciliatory attitude. On the 26th June, 1604, James sent to the commons a letter “written with his own hand but corrected as to the spelling,” in which he expressed his pleasure as to a subsidy.[298] He stated his confidence in their good-will, assuring them “in the word of a King” that he would “be so far from taking it unkindly, their not offering” to him a subsidy, and that he would “only interpret it to proceed from the care they have, that our people should not have any occasion of distaste.” James’s letter accomplished for him what may well have been his purpose; the commons immediately granted to him tunnage and poundage for the space of his life.[299]
At the two subsequent sessions of 1605-6 and 1606-7 there was constant friction between king and commons, yet there were no very remarkable assertions of royal prerogative or of parliamentary privilege. At the session of 1605, Parliament granted the king three entire subsidies and six fifteenths, designed principally to meet the royal indebtedness, some of which held over since the time of Elizabeth.[300] After the prorogation, James called no session of Parliament until the 9th February, 1609-10.