Constantine Phipps (Lord Chancellor of Ireland)

Sir Constantine Henry Phipps ( 1656-1723 ) was an English born lawyer who held the office of Lord Chancellor of Ireland . His term of office was marked by bitter political faction-fighting and he faced repeated requests for his removal. His descendants held the titles Earl of Mulgrave and Marquess of Normanby. Sir William Phips, the famous Governor of Massachusetts, was his cousin.^[1] and ^[2]

Early life

He was born in Reading, the third son of Francis Phipps and Anne Sharpe. Though described as gentry, the family do not seem to have had much money: Constantine was educated at the free school in Reading and his uncle James emigrated to Maine where his son William, the future Governor, was born. Constantine won a scholarship to St. John's College, Oxford in 1672.

He was admitted to Gray's Inn in 1678 and called to the Bar in 1684. He was a lawyer of ability, but also a strong Tory and suspected Jacobite^[3], which hindered his progress. His name became associated with political cases : he was junior counsel for the defence in the prosecution of Sir John Fenwick for conspiring to murder William III in 1696. It was his management of the defence of Henry Sacheverell, impeached for an inflammatory sermon, in 1710, that made his name and apparently caused Queen Anne to favour him.

Lord Chancellor of Ireland

In 1710 Richard Freeman, the popular Lord Chancellor of Ireland, died of a brain disorder, and Phipps was chosen to succeed him. He arrived in Ireland in December and immediately became embroiled in controversy, especially as he was also Lord Justice, with Richard Ingolsby, and a key member of the administration. As a convinced Tory, he sought to "pack" local Government with reliable sheriffs and justices. In Dublin itself the results were disastrous: a Whig mayor was elected whom the Government refused to recognise and for two years the capital had no effective Government.^[4]

Other smaller incidents increased Phipps' unpopularity: although his intentions may have been good, he showed very poor political judgment , especially in the Dudley Moore case. For several years it had been the custom to celebrate William IIIs landing at Torbay on 5 November with a performance of the play Tamerline by Nicholas Rowe. In 1712 the Government ordered that the prologue, which was considered too inflammatory, be omitted. When a young gentleman called Dudley Moore went on stage to read it a scuffle broke out and he was charged with riot. This struck most people as an overreaction: the prosecution lagged and was seemingly about to be withdrawn when Phipps made a speech to Dublin Corporation on the disorder in the city, and specifically referred to the Moore case. It is unlikely in fact that he intended to influence the result of the trial, but the speech was widely seen as an interference with the course of justice.^[5]

Moore's case was contrasted with that of Edward Lloyd, a bookseller who published the Memoirs of the Chevalier St.George, better known as the Old Pretender. He was prosecuted for publishing seditious matter, but Phipps intervened to end the proceedings by nolle prosequi. His motives were probably humane- Lloyd was not a rich man and the publication was purely a commercial venture- but it was widely seen as further evidence of a Jacobite conspiracy .Phipps well- meant efforts to ban the annual procession round the statue of William III in College Green increased his unpopularity.^[6]

In the 1713 election Phipps undertook to secure a Tory majority: in fact the new House of Commons was deeply hostile to him. By the spring of 1714 he was described as "the pivot on which all debate turned"^[7]: yet any action of his denounced by the Commons found support in the Lords. A petition from the Commons to the Queen demanding his removal was followed by a counter-petition from the Lords in his defence. The Queen's death at the beginning of August brought resolution since George I simply dismissed her Irish judges en bloc.

Last Years

Unlike some of his colleagues Phipps was left in peace after his dismissal and his last years were uneventful. He spoke at the trial of the Earl of Winton for treason after the 1715 rising; in 1723 he assisted in the defence of Francis Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester for treason, but died at MiddleTemple on 9 October. He was buried at White Waltham in Berkshire.

Family

Phipps married Catherine Swayer and they had one son William. He married Lady Catherine Annesley, daughter of James Annesley, 3rd Earl of Anglesey; she was a descendant of James II. Their son was Constantine Phipps, 1st Baron Mulgrave; later generations added the titles Earl of Mulgrave and Marquess of Normanby. The 1st Marquess was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and unlike his ancestor was popular with the Irish.

Character

Phipps is a difficult character to judge: he was divisive in his lifetime and had also divided historians. Duhigg ^[8]thought badly of him, and Elrington Ball, in the definitive study of the pre-1921 Irish judiciary, dealt harshly with Phipps as a foolish,vain,self-important man whose extreme political views paralysed political life and brought the administration of Dublin to a halt. On the other hand O'Flanagan in his work on the Irish Chancellors spoke highly of Phipps as a gifted and moderate man who made an honest attempt to calm political and religious strife in Ireland.

He was certainly a fine lawyer, and seems to have been a reforming Chancellor: O'Flanagan praises his efforts to make litigation cheaper and faster, and suggests this was one cause of his unpopularity.^[9] He showed poor judgement in politics, but there is no reason to doubt the sincerity of his beliefs, which were no more extreme than those of many of his contemporaries. He was certainly to blame in part for the paralysis in the Dublin city government, but it is hardly fair to suggest as Ball does that he was wholly responsible^[10]: indeed all his actions found supporters. If he made enemies he also had friends and it is notable that both Jonathan Swift and George Berkeley spoke well of him.

Notes

1. ^ Dunlop, DNB
2. ^ O'Flanagan, pp. 536-537 (indicating William was Constantine's father)
3. ^ Ball, p. 35
4. ^ Ball, p. 40
5. ^ Ball, p. 44
6. ^ O'Flanagan, p. 541
7. ^ Ball, p. 50
8. ^ Duhigg, p. 284
9. ^ O'Flanagan, p. 336
10. ^ Ball, p.50

References

• Ball, F Elrington (1926). The Judges in Ireland 1221-1921 2 vols. London: John Murray.
• Duhigg, Bartholomew T. History of the King's Inns, Or, an Account of the Legal Body in Ireland, from Its Connexion with England. Dublin: Printed by John Barlow, 1806. googlebooks
• Dunlop, Robert  "Phipps, Constantine (1656-1723)". Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900. 
• Ball, F E. The Judges in Ireland, 1221-1921. Clark, N.J: Lawbook Exchange, 2004. googlebooks
• O'Flanagan, J. Roderick The lives of the lord chancellors and keepers of the great seal of Ireland, from the earliest times to the reign of Queen Victoria 2 Volumes, London, Longmans, Green, and co., 1870 Hathi Trust Digital Library

External links