Free City

A Free City is a settlement that has been granted royal charter exempting it from certain feudal obligations and interference in exchange for taxes, fees and/or rents. Citizens of the city are "free men."

Topography

• Parishes
  • Even the wards were not the smallest units of local government: that part was played by the parishes. Each had a parish clerk (fn. 26) and two or three constables. The constables were chosen annually in the presence of the aldermen and wardens of each ward, presented to the mayor, and their names enrolled. They were sworn to see the peace was kept, malefactors brought to justice, and felons and fugitives pursued; or, according to another record, to report affrays and debates, make arrests and summonses, do all the mayor ordered them, keep the pavements repaired and their parish clear of dung, mire, and corruption of the air. (fn. 27) The parish constables also played an important part in raising troops and the money for their wages. (fn. 28) They were at once constables of the peace and general agents of the officers of the city and the wards.
• Wards
  • The wards were territorial divisions of the city, and numbered six in 1380 and 1491, although there had been some modification of their boundaries in the interval. (fn. 19) Nor were they new in 1380. Constables arraying troops in the city are mentioned in the early 14th century, and in 1321 it is clear that these constables were each in charge of a ward and responsible for levying money in it for the repair of the walls. (fn. 20) These constables seem to correspond to the six serjeants in charge of the wards later in the century; (fn. 21) and in addition, in the 15th century, two aldermen and other wardens (three in the case of Walmgate Ward in 1491) were assigned to each ward. (fn. 22) The raising of troops, and money for their wages, and the inspection of the arms in the hands of citizens were all organized by wards; and in 1482 the ward serjeants were responsible for opening and closing the city gates, and the wardens for clearing the walls in their wards from rushes, nettles, and weeds. At the end of the Middle Ages the main importance of the wards seems to have been in the military organization of the city, the maintenance of its walls, and in the management of the common lands.
• Districts

Government

Though the city is granted charter directly from the king, he does not normally involve himself in its day-to-day governance. As he (rarely) sees fit, the king may attend himself, or send a representative (often, his steward) to attend council meetings. The government of a free city may properly be described as 'magisterial' in character, for at its centre stands the mayor. Authority has its focus in two buildings. The first is called the council chamber. Here the city council meets and the main officers of the city are accommodated. The other is the City Hall, where larger meetings assemble and where the court of the mayor and bailiffs are held, though there is also an inner chamber where the election of the bailiffs may be settled.

Officers

The normal civic official is an amateur, serving generally for a year at considerable cost to his pocket and doubtless at much inconvenience to his business. It is not, therefore, surprising that some men seek exemption from office by the purchase of royal letters patent. This is reasonable enough if a man was old or sick, but another matter entirely when a number of able and wealthy citizens secure exemption for life. These men are tend to be bound by ties of occupation. Eldermen are drawn exclusively, and the councillors preponderantly, from the class of wealthy traders, belonging to the manufacturing crafts and merchants. The free city is ruled not merely by an oligarchy, but by a mercantile oligarchy. Both eldermen and councillors are to have robes of violet, murrey, and crimson, and eldermen also robes of scarlet which those who have served as mayor are to wear on all civic occasions.

The Mayor

The mayor is elected annually (often on Midwinter Feast Day); re-election is common. The election of a mayor also occurs whenever the old mayor dies, retires, resigns, or fails a no-confidence vote consisting of a two-thirds majority of the council. It is his duty, which he swears to accomplish, to keep the city safe for the king, to maintain and advance its franchises, usages, and customs, and to do impartial justice to all. He is active in the various courts of the city and is the central figure in the city council. He is the recipient of mandates from the central government on every conceivable matter. He is escheator within the liberty, his name being certified to Chancery in this capacity as soon as he is elected. He acts as a liaison to the king in all civic matters. If the mayor's responsibility is great, so too is his dignity. He has a serjeant to bear his mace of office. The mayor does not serve gratis; the normal fee in is [£20] yearly.

The Small Council

AKA "The Twelve"

• The city is governed by the "Small Council," a council of 12 elders, a group of technically coequal members who head various major interests within the city, including the district aldermen. Meeting less often, the "Great Council" consists of 24 city elders, which convenes for matters that require a wider consensus. There is also a "Community Council" which includes up to 48 upstanding citizens. The role of the two inner circles is distinct from that of the outermost ring of counsellors. The latter is convened only occasionally for specific and, broadly speaking, political purposes, while the former constitutes the administrative council of the city and the mayor's regular coadjutors in government. Replacement of a councilman who dies or retires is not immediately required. If a vacancy in the council should be filled, the new member is chosen by vote of the current councilmen. The Small Council meets every Senday during the year to cover business relevant to the city.
• At that date the mayor appears to be surrounded by concentric circles of counsel. The innermost ring was the council of twelve, beginning to be called aldermen by 1399. (fn. 32) Then there was a second circle of 24, described as probi homines in 1402 to distinguish them from the aldermen, although the aldermen themselves were sometimes so described. Finally, there was an outermost circle of 48, often called the communitas, the representative element proper. (fn. 33) It is likely that, even at this date, the role of the two inner circles was distinct from that of the outermost ring of counsellors. The latter was convened only occasionally for specific and, broadly speaking, political purposes, while the former constituted the administrative council of the city and the mayor's regular coadjutors in government.

The Great Council

AKA "The Twenty-four"

The Commonalty

AKA "The Fourty-Eight"

• In the Guildhall the officers and councillors of the city from time to time faced a more genuinely representative assembly. In the later 14th century, as we have seen, the 'commonalty' or 'community' was represented by the 48, few or none of whom—by contrast with the aldermen and councillors—had held municipal office, and most of whom were drawn from the manufacturing as distinct from the trading occupations. The assembly of the commonalty had certain specific constitutional functions. It had a part, however limited, in choosing the mayor and approving the choice of other officers; in assenting to the imposition of financial burdens like that of 1378 for the repair of the city barge; and in consenting to ordinances for the common utility of the city. (fn. 3) It had a role, in other words, in constituting the city government and in legislating for the city. But it also became the political assembly of the city, where all the internal stresses and strains of the day were ventilated

Other Officers

The Bailiff or Shariff

• The mayor, however, merely stood at the pinnacle of the city's government, and he had a number of coadjutors. First-were the three bailiffs, replaced after 1396 by the two sheriffs. Their duties are summarized in the bailiff's oath of 1353. They had to acquit the city of its farm, enforce the assizes of bread and ale and other market regulations, empanel jurors, do justice to rich and poor, and collect the issues of the city courts. (fn. 30) After 1396 we continually meet the sheriffs, alone or in conjunction with the mayor, as the addressees of mandates from the central government; and, as the officers responsible for the farm, they had at their disposal all the profits and commodites pertaining to the office from ancient times. These were husgable, rents from city property, tolls, stallrents in the markets, and the issues of fairs, courts, and The Ainsty. (fn. 31)
• Like the mayor, the sheriffs had their assistants and their dignity. Each had his serjeant-at-mace, responsible for making summonses, arrests, and so forth; (fn. 35) and there was a sheriff's clerk, originally appointed annually but during good behaviour after 1445. (fn. 36) The sheriffs moved about the city in some state, with a serjeant preceding them and an honest servant at their back, according to a decree of 1419. (fn. 37) This was one of the rules which made the office an expensive one. In addition, they had to provide an annual feast for the dignitaries of the city and a dinner after their yearly 'riding', during which they proclaimed the by-laws at various places

The Chamberlain

• Goods and riches were not less necessary for the chamberlains. Normally three in number, their year of office down to 1376 began at Michaelmas, but in that year it was changed to coincide with that of the mayor.

Also

• There were three coroners, chosen by the mayor, aldermen, and councillors, and responsible respectively for the area between Ouse and Foss, for Micklegate, and for Walmgate and Fishergate. The Ouse and Foss bridges were each in the charge of bridgemasters who were responsible for their maintenance, for collecting the revenues assigned to them, and for paying over any surplus to the city chamberlains. (fn. 51) There were also keepers of the city weights and measures, keepers of the gates, and, in the 15th century at least, city minstrels.
• The recorder and common clerk were representatives of a new professional class; (fn. 53) they were chosen for their professional skill and sometimes made their civic office a stepping stone to better things. It is no less noticeable that the recorders were variously employed. Apart from legal duties in the narrow sense, Metcalfe and Vavasour fulfilled the role of the city's ambassadors at large. They are found wherever the city had business to do or interests to pursue.
• The common seal was to be properly kept; the streets were to be cleaned; poultry was to be sold only in Thursday Market to prevent innkeepers forestalling victuals; the city's troops were to be commanded by the mayor's esquires—a blow aimed at Wrangwissh who was prominent as a soldier about this time; the esquires and common serjeants were not to buy their offices, but were to be appointed by the mayor and his brethren with the assent of the commons.

Courts

• More imporant was a court which sat every Monday in the Guildhall under the mayor and bailiffs (later the sheriffs), described in the 15th century as the court for 'common pleas' (i.e. pleas regarding wills, and of dower, services, waste, and so forth). In addition, in 1343, the mayor and bailiffs also claimed a court competent to deal with such matters as assault; (fn. 7) and between 1351 and 1392 distinct commissions of the peace for York were issued to the mayor, a few prominent citizens, and one or two royal judges. In 1392 Richard II conferred the commission of the peace ex officio upon the mayor and aldermen; and the powers they exercised in this capacity seem to have been fused with those of the older mayoral court to produce the court of the mayor and aldermen described in the city custumal. It met in the Guildhall from day to day at their discretion; and dealt with matters touching apprentices, offences against the customs and ordinances of the city, the faults of victuallers and craftsmen and civic officers, nuisances, rumour-mongers, disturbers of the peace, forgers of seals and charters, and made orders for governing the city and keeping the peace.

Rules

• Since 1502 the city had maintained a by-law that a freeman might not sue another in the king's courts, or those of any other lord, until the case had first been reported to the mayor.
• "Hew and cry"
• Cleanliness and dumping
• Citizenship
  • A bonded peasant escaping to live in the city may be considered free if not "claimed" after a year and a day

Features

Guilds

The guilds of the Capital are all designed to protect and further the social and economic interests of their membership. While not all of the Guilds have been granted or have been able to maintain a monopoly on the services and crafts they provide, they can nevertheless present a united front to any form of competition and have a recognized degree of political influence with the city council. On the first days of each season of the year, the Grand Council of Guilds meets at City Hall. All the city's Guildmasters are required to attend (and must send deputies should they be unable to do so). This meeting is used to discuss petitions and legislation before the city council that may affect the trade or business of one or more of the city's guilds, and allegedly serves the purpose of granting those city guilds not directly represented in the council a say in the city's governance.

Behind-the-Scenes

• The purpose of this article is to establish the baseline; some individual free cities will inevitably vary in their adherence

See Also

• Manor
• Barony
• Vicarship
• County
• Duchy
• Kingdom
• Empire