Mark Coleman Wallace PhD Thesis - University of St Andrews

“crush…democratic opponents wherever they emerged.” 65 Faced with
perceived threats from subversive organizations and a dramatic increase of
revolutionary sentiments in Britain, the government launched a campaign to
eradicate all traces of sedition, treason, and sympathies for reformist societies.
O’Gorman correctly notes that Pitt’s legislative policies “acquired
several different forms and operated on several different levels.” 66 Pitt’s first
method of implementing this repressive policy was to “utilize existing
disciplinary mechanisms as strongly as possible.” 67 This meant involving the
magistrates and warning them in 1792 to monitor any seditious literature and to
prevent – and if necessary, quell – any disturbances. Pitt also implemented a
system of local informants and spies to monitor public mood and sentiments.
The second method of policy enforcement was the mobilization of the
legal system. Intent on setting an example through the harsh sentences imposed
on prominent radical figures, Pitt was successful in intimidating and forcing into
submission numerous seditious leaders. Through harassment, threats,
prosecutions, and “legal compulsion and social prejudice,” Pitt’s policy
achieved its goal of stamping out popular dissent. 68 However, the “third and
complementary element in the government’s repressive reaction to domestic
radical agitation: its use of Parliament and parliamentary enactments,” had the
most significant impact on societies and the freemasons. 69
65 Roger Wells, Insurrection: The British Experience, 1795-1803 (Gloucester, 1983), 44.
66 Frank O’Gorman, “Pitt and the ‘Tory’ Reaction to the French Revolution 1798-1815,” in
Britain And The French Revolution 1789-1815, ed. H.T. Dickinson, (London, 1989), 30.
67 Ibid.
68 See O’Gorman, “Britain And The French Revolution,” 31-32.
69 Ibid, 32.
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