The readmission of the Jews to in 1656, in the context of English economic policy* EDGAR SAMUEL

Oliver Cromwell's decision in 1656 to allow Jews to settle in England and to meet privately for prayer, marks the foundation of the modern Jewish community in this country. Itwas, therefore, a most important event in our one even history and which has been fully researched and discussed. Yet a though the topic is not new one, I feel it deserves further examination. The development of English philo-Semitism, which made the idea of the readmission acceptable to Englishmen, has been investigated expertly and in great detail. Professor Theodore Rabb's study of Richard Hooker's a Ecclesiastical Politie1 pinpointed sixteenth-century Anglican theologian whose attitude towards Jews was unprejudiced and sympathetic and who influenced Anglican opinion. Dr David Katz's book Philo-Semitism and the Readmission of the Jews to England 1603-1655 ( 1982) is a thorough study of the various strands of Christian philo-Semitism, which made the idea seem theologically acceptable to seventeenth-century English . Since the theological context has been examined so expertly, I propose to concentrate mainly on the background of English economic policy, which led to Cromwell's invitation toMenasseh ben Israel to come to England to petition for the readmission of the Jews and then to his decision, in 1656, to a license it on modest scale. It is a curious fact that although the Puritan Revolution produced some very important tracts, setting out ways inwhich none English trade could be reformed and improved, of these proposed the admission of Jewish merchants.2 All proposals to readmit Jews to England are presented in tracts on religious, rather than on economic, topics. A good example is that of Henry Robinson, whose tracts for the improvement of were English trade very influential, but whose advocacy of religious was a toleration published anonymously in different pamphlet from those in which he urged reforms of commercial policy. This is typical of the seventeenth century, when religious policy was at the eye of the storm. Control of the Church meant control of the media and of education, and Anglicans sought a single hierarchically controlled Church government. Presbyterians were a Church controlled not by the king or by bishops, but by a classis organization dominated by the Puritan gentry and citizens.

* on Paper presented to the Society 20 October 1988.

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Jewish Historical Society of England is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve, and extend access to Jewish Historical Studies ® www.jstor.org Edgar Samuel

The Independents, who won the day in 1648, favoured congregational autonomy with as much individual liberty of conscience as was consistent with public order. Since the only sound reasons for excluding Jews, Turks or Catholic merchants from England were religious, itwas natural that the matter should be debated as a religious issue, even though it looks to us today as though itwas a secular one. Most of the facts of the readmission are clear. In 1647 Rev. Hugh Peters - published A Word for theArmy and two Words for the Kingdom to clear the one and cure the other, in which he proposed that 'strangers, even Jews, to be admitted to trade and live with us'. After Pride's Purge, in December 1648, the Council of Mechanics resolved that all religions should be tolerated in England 'not excepting Turkes nor Papists nor Jewes'3 and the Council of War endorsed this policy. But then, in The Agreement of the People, they decided to limit their toleration to Christians.4 - In 1648 a strange tract was published An Apology for the honourable - nation of the Jews and all the sons of Israel ostensibly by Edward Nicholas, gentleman, but in my opinion almost certainly by a Puritan divine. The argument, to cite Dr David Katz's resume, is as follows.

England's present troubles derived in part from the 'strict and cruel Laws now in force against themost honourable Nation in theworld, theNation of the Jews, a people chosen by God' unless the Jews were readmitted to England with all possible rights and privileges, '(God putting their tears into his bottle) God will charge their sufferings upon us, and will avenge them on their He that he was to persecutors.' claimed persuaded publish this short tract 'not upon any man's motion of the JewsNation, but a thing that I have long and deeply revolved within my heart'. His effortswere intended 'for the glory of God, the comfort of those his afflicted people, the love ofmy own sweet native country of England, and the freeing ofmy own soul in the day of account'.5

The author's sincerity is manifest. The tract was translated into Spanish in the next year, apparently for the benefit of the Jews of Amsterdam. The author of the Apology refers to the Israelites, not, as is usual in English, as - the 'children of Israel' the phrase made idiomatic by the Geneva Bible - and by the Authorized Version but as the 'sons of Israel', which suggests was either that he accustomed to reading his Bible in Bishop Morgan's - Welsh version, where Bnei Yisrael is translated as Mebion Israel 'sons of Israel',6 or that he was a Hebraist who made his own translation. He does, however, state that he is a native of England. His other characteristic is a certain carelessness about historical dates. The expulsion of the Jews from Spain is stated to have taken place in 1493 instead of 1492. I have only

154 The readmission of the Jews to England in 1656

been able to identify one Puritan gentleman named Edward Nicholas. He was the son of Sir Oliver Nicholas, who was admitted to the Middle was Temple as a law student in 1650. Since he then probably aged seventeen or eighteen, he is not likely to have been the author of this a tract, which is obviously the work of mature writer; but it is quite possible that its author sought permission to use his name for the purpose. was I think that he was probably the Rev. Henry Jessey, who Yorkshire born, an excellent Hebraist,7 and a correspondent of . In January 1649 the Council of Officers considered the first practical proposal for the readmission of the Jews: the petition of 'Johanna Cartenright, widdow, and Ebenezer Cartwright, her son, freeborn of England, and now Inhabitants of the City of Amsterdam,' who Luden Wolf were states, without citing his source, ,8 'that the inhumane cruel statute of banishment made against them may be repealed, and they under the Christian banner of charity and brotherly love, may again be received and permitted to trade and dwell amongst you in this Land, as they do now in the Netherlands.'9 There are signs that the Cartwrights' petition was drafted by the same as person wrote the Apology for the honourable nation of the Jews. Jews are referred to not as the 'children of Israel' but as 'Israel's sons and daughters' - a - again perfectly correct translation of Bnei Yisrael perhaps Johanna Cartwright insisted on including the daughters. The carelessness about historical dates reappears, the York massacre being attributed to the reign of Richard II instead of Richard I. The argument of the petition is much same as in more more the the Apology, but concisely stated and with on move emphasis the need to convert the Jews and help them to to the Promised Land when the time is ripe. The fact that the petition was favourably received and ordered to be printed, and that the policy it advocated was eventually adopted by the revolutionary regime, shows that the Cartwrights' voices were not crying in the wilderness, but that their viewpoint had solid support among the officers of theNew Model Army. It was in this climate of opinion that in 1650 Haham Menasseh ben Israel published his Latin translation of his Spanish book Esperanza de Israel, 'The Hope of Israel', dedicated to the English Parliament and Council of State.10 The text concerns a claim by one Antonio Levi Montezinos to have discovered an Indian tribe in Ecuador, who were was descended from the Israelites of old and practised Judaism. Its effect cause a to Englishmen to regard Menasseh as representative leader and political spokesman of the Jews. When the army officers turned to Presbyterian majority out of

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Parliament in December 1648, their first aim was to execute the king and an establish a republic. In doing so they sought to replace inept, unreliable and extravagant government with one which would reform the nation and a pursue its interests. In theory England was ruled by collective leadership In provided by Parliament, and by Parliamentary Committees. practice, policy seems to have been decided primarily by two men, whom the - Leveller, John Lilburne, described as 'two covetous earthworms' Sir - Henry Vane Jnr and Chief Justice with much debate and discussion to assist or impede their government. The main and most noticeable achievements of Commonwealth economic policy were the Navigation Act of October 1651 and the First Dutch War which followed it in 1652. During the latter part of the Thirty Years War most of the trade between Spain and Flanders had been carried in English ships, and the English merchant marine had greatly expanded.11 The end of the war and the need to transport Spanish troops and war supplies, led to a European surplus of ships and a general slump in freight rates. This hit England, and especially , very hard because after the Peace of Westphalia of 1648, Dutch convoys of large, cheap, unarmed, lightly manned fluijts were able to cut the smaller, heavily manned and gunned English ships out of the Spanish trade with freight charges as low as half the English rates.12 were Matters not helped by Robert Blake's action off Portugal, when, in order to pressure the Portuguese into expelling Prince Rupert's privateers from Lisbon, he requisitioned the nine English ships out of the total eighteen in the Portuguese Brazil Company's fleet.13 After this, the Portuguese switched to chartering French and Hanse vessels in place of English ones.14 Some ships were used to sustain Cromwell's campaign in Ireland, but after its conclusion in 1650 the problem of idle ships and starving seamen, which now confronted the government, was a grave one. In an 1649 Sir Henry Vane headed Admiralty Committee for Reducing Virginia to Obedience. This committee consisted of Virginia merchants, including notably one Maurice Thomson. Its deliberations culminated in an Act of 1650 reservingthe colonial trade toEnglish ships. InMarch 1650 the shipowner's corporation, Trinity House, of which Maurice Thomson was an Elder Brother, petitioned Sir Henry Vane's Admiralty Committee to take steps to stop 'English merchants shipping their goods in strangers' bottoms, when English ships could be had'.15 The matter was referred to an Admiralty judge to hear evidence from the shipowners, the Merchant Adventurers and other merchants, but it raised wider issues and was not resolved.16

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a Therefore, on 1 August 1650, the Rump Parliament established one Council for Trade under the presidency of Sir Henry Vane, to sit for year and consider the whole question of protecting and promoting English trade, industry, shipping and fishing.17 a Charles Ps Privy Council had had Committee for Trade which met at one stage on Tuesday afternoons and at another on Friday mornings, and occasionally consulted merchants on policy matters. It consisted of the king, the Great Officers of State, four earls and two lesser peers,18 and had been primarily interested in collecting revenue. The Commonwealth Council for Trade represented a practical attempt to consult merchants on the formulation of commercial policy, just as Lewes Roberts had recommended in his treatise The Treasure of Traffike, dedicated to parliament in 1641. Itwas to have its own offices inWhitehall and a full time secretariat. Its wide terms of reference included the setting up of free ports in England where goods could be stored in bond and re-exported free of duty, investigating the privileges of trading companies, monetary matters and themanagement of the plantations.19 Apart from the greater readiness of the Interregnum regimes to respond was a to merchant advice, there also change in the type of merchant whose advice was heeded. Until the First Civil War, the Lord Mayors, Sheriffs and Aldermen of London had been either retailers, or successful merchants from among the cloth exporters of the Merchant Adventurers and Eastland Companies, or else importers of luxury goods of the Levant and East India Companies. During Charles I's reign a new group of merchants had arisen who traded to New England, Virginia and theWest Indies and interloped in the East Indies. This group included some of the most enterprising and successful men in the City. However, they were kept out of the City government by the ruling oligarchy and found their trade impeded by the profitable Levant and East India Company monopolies. These colonial and interloping merchants tended to be Puritan in religion and Parliamentarian in politics. They therefore had religious, social and commercial motives for promoting and supporting radical changes in the government of the State, of the City and of English trade.20 They were also self-made men of greater enterprise and imagination than many merchants within the comfortable trading-company monopolies. With the revolution came of 1641-2 several of these colonial merchants to power in the City of a new London,21 and they also enjoyed influence with the Parliamentary government.22 - These West India merchants among whom Maurice Thomson was a - leading figure had a vested interest in the readmission of the Jews to

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England and her colonies, because Jewish refugees from Spain could help them break into the trade with Spanish colonies in competition with the Dutch and could help them capture and colonize them. The Royalists held the English colonies of Virginia, Barbados and Surinam, and the London West India merchants and shipowners had lost the whole of their trade to the Dutch, who were also well on the way to capturing the transatlantic recover slave trade from the Portuguese. They badly needed to this lost ground by copying Dutch methods. A group of Jewish merchants in London areas who had expertise and connections in all of these could be very useful. The cloth exporters, however, did not need Jewish merchants and feared their competition. The Secretary of the Council for Trade was Dr Benjamin Worsley, MD, a Londoner, who had served as Surgeon General to the Army in Ireland during the early 1640s,23 then graduated from Trinity College Dublin24 and spent further time studying in theNetherlands for a doctorate inmedicine, although he was never a licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians.25 as Sir Henry Vane took him into the service of the State, first Secretary to the Committee forReducing Virginia toObedience and then to the Council an for Trade. Benjamin Worsley proved himself energetic and capable Committee Secretary with the ability to expedite business and to a summarize the essentials of complex argument. The dynamism of the Council for Trade and of its Secretary is clearly portrayed, in the absence of any surviving minutes, by an impressive schedule of finished and unfinished business which Worsley prepared.26 He also wrote two pamphlets, which he published in 1652: The Advocate, under the pseudonym Philopatris, explains the need for the Navigation Act, and Free Ports,27 which recommends establishing free ports in England like Leghorn and Amsterdam. (One imagines that he had the decayed port of Dover inmind.) The threat of such potent rivalry from the outports stimulated the City to petition to have London made a free port too.28 This threatened to deprive the hard-pressed Commonwealth of a large part of its customs revenue. So nothing came of the scheme. In September 1650, the Master and Elder Brethren of Trinity House were invited to submit proposals to the Council for Trade on 'What are Commodities most fit to be Exported and Imported in English bottoms only'29 and they proposed that English shipping should have a monopoly a of carrying wide range of commodities and trades excepting only masts and timbers from the Baltic, where low freights were needed to sustain a ready supply of inexpensive English-built ships. The history of the Navigation Act is therefore clear. It arose from

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proposals by Trinity House for protection of their shipping against Dutch competition, and the originator of these proposals is likely to have been Maurice Thomson, ship owner, West and East India merchant and plantation owner.30 It was adjusted to suit the interests of the cloth exporters of the Company of Merchant Adventurers and other merchant. It was sympathetically received and acted upon because of Sir Henry Vane's concern for the Navy. But then an incident occurred which made it necessary to postpone its enactment. On 6 November 1650 William II of Orange died and shortly afterwards a republican regime seized power in the United Provinces. This led the Commonwealth to send Oliver St John and Walter Strickland as ambassadors to the Hague, in March 1651, to negotiate a close alliance. The secretary to the mission was John Thurloe, then a young man in the service of Chief Justice St John, soon to be 's Secretary of was State. The aim of the embassy to persuade the Dutch republican party to combine with the Commonwealth in an international civil war against both the English royalists and the Dutch Orangists and, at the same time, to to try get rid of the Dutch 'Redemption Treaty' with Denmark, which threatened to price English cloth exports and shipping out of the Baltic, and to settle other grievances.31 The Dutch could not be certain that Parliament would win the Second Civil War and they were not strong enough or so minded as to carry their differences with the Orangists to extremes. They countered the proposal for the political merger of the two countries with one formutual freedom of on trade the basis of the Great Intercourse Treaty of 1495 between Henry VII and Charles V, proposing that each country should extend this to their colonies.32 no The counter-proposal went way to help the Parliamentary party to against the Royalists, meet English grievances or to help English trade, shipping and fishing to recover from their depression, of which the major cause was Dutch competition. The negotiations certainly alerted the to ambassadors the importance of commercial issues, but from the English of a point view they proved total failure. While they were in the Netherlands to negotiate the Treaty, St John and Strickland visited the Amsterdam synagogue and made contact with Menasseh ben Israel, who was one of its three Hahamim. The circumstantial evidence suggests that this initiative may have been proposed by Dr Benjamin Worsley, the of was Baptist Secretary the Council for Trade, for it entirely consistent with his policy of building up English tradeby copyingDutch methods, as well as with the interestin the subject shown by theBaptist Minister the Rev. Henry Jessey and by Johanna and Ebenezer Cartwright.

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In June 1651 St John and Strickland returned home.33 On 31 July the a and on Council for Trade presented report to the Council of State34 5 August it recommended the Navigation Bill to Parliament.35 a As finally enacted on 9 October 1651 after debate and amendment, the Act for the Increase of Shipping and Navigation made the following it provisions, under threat of confiscation of both ship and cargo: firstly, or reserved all import trade except bullion to ships of the exporting country seamen could to English-owned ships manned chiefly by English (exporters to at hire any ships they chose to use); secondly, it attempted hit the a Dutch entrepot trade by enacting that foreign goods, with few specified exceptions, might only be imported directly from their country of production; thirdly, it reserved all trade between English ports and English ships; and finally, it reserved the landings of fish and whale products to English fishermen and whalers, and the export of cod and other fish to English ships.36 One highly significant feature of the Navigation Act was that, on the whole, the government had the means to enforce it, and the nation had the shipping and seamen ready to take up the newly reserved trades. Worsley in The Advocate37 expressed the hope that the Dutch would not take exception to the new law; but the Navigation Act was tantamount to a declaration of war on Amsterdam, and themood in which itwas enacted was very much 'we don't want to fight but by Jingo if we do we've got themoney too!' The next day, 10 October 1651, the Council of State considered a letter fromMenasseh ben Israel which was followed, in December 1652, by an invitation to him to come to England, together with a safe-conduct.38 However, the Dutch War prevented it. Professor J. E. Farnell has argued that the Navigation Act and the Free Ports project were two aspects of a new commercial policy advocated by Maurice Thomson and supported by his fellow colonial merchants. This aimed simultaneously at protecting English trade from foreigners; at free and unrestricted competition between Englishmen; at replacing the entrepots of Amsterdam with English ones; and at copying other Dutch techniques.39 The admission of Spanish and Portuguese Jewish refugee merchants to England would accord entirely with this policy. The Act for theIncrease of Shippingand Navigation, and its successors, were to be key factors in the creation of the first British empire and then as a in its loss, and in the establishment of England first-class maritime and commercial power. The Commonwealth Council for Trade had given the leading English merchants a direct share in policy making. This experiment was not was repeated, but the line of policy laid down by them new, effective and durable.

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Like the Navigation Act, the Dutch War suited many merchants. It suited theWest India merchants and other owners of privateers, and also the Baltic merchants, who wanted the Redemption Treaty rescinded. It suited the cloth exporters, who benefited by the diversion of Spanish wool from Leyden to London, and from the capture of their competitors' ships and cargoes. Only the Levant merchants, the exporters of grey cloth to the Netherlands and some East India merchants would have been cool about the conflict, but even they had scores to settle with the Dutch. Once the confiscation of Dutch ships and cargoes had started, and the Commonwealth had refused to rescind the Act, the merchants and to shipowners of Amsterdam responded swiftly.Without troubling consult the States General and its slow-moving committees, the Admiralty of Holland ordered Admiral Tromp not to strike his flags and topsails to to and English warships in the Channel. Tromp sailed straight Dover an after exchange of discourtesies attacked the English fleet.40 The Dutch used their influence in Denmark to close the Baltic to in English ships and to have the twenty-two English ships the Sound seized. They thus cut off the Eastland cloth market and all supplies of ship-building materials other than from Norway, Nonetheless, English was merchants profited greatly by the in captured Dutch ships and cargoes. Dutch shipping and trade were badly mauled. Oliver Cromwell's accession to power meant a reduction in the influence of London merchants on foreign policy. Maurice Thomson and his associated were removed from all their offices for petitioning for the were over restoration of the Rump.41 Trade and Admiralty affairs taken by the Council of State and were ruled like so many other matters by new Cromwell and John Thurloe, his Secretary of State, although the Council of State, which consisted predominantly of army officers, naturally had need of merchants' advice on commercial policy. The most influential new power at Court in this field was Thurloe's brother-in-law, was Martin Noell, and though the influence of Maurice Thomson diminished, he too was consulted at times. Noell was a London scrivener who traded to the Caribbean and the Baltic. He was also a partner in a Maurice Thomson's East India interloping ventures, and major tax farmer. a Martin Noell's objective attitude to the Jews is shown by speech he made reason in Parliament in which he said that the only that the Jews of no Venice had to wear red hats was that they had State which could intervene to protect them.42 was Under , as under the Crown, foreign policy the perogative of the ruler who conducted itwith the aid of his Secretary of State. Naturally he sought advice on technical matters, gathered the best

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intelligence he could and consulted the Council of State before taking major decisions, but Oliver Cromwell was more likely to seek advice from a soldiers than from merchants, and trading considerations had significant but secondary role in his policy making. Cromwell was as new to foreign affairs as he had once been to soldiering, but it did not take him long to learn. He had a natural instinct a for strategic planning, tendency to keep his options open and tomake bold and effective use of the resources at his command. The salient features of Cromwell's foreign policy were his decisions to make peace with the an Dutch, to negotiate alliance with France, and to wage war on Spain. Cromwell wished to end the Dutch War on ideological grounds, but were there good practical reasons for doing so too, especially from the run viewpoint of a Baltic trader such as Martin Noell. In the long the closing of the Sound would destroy English shipbuilding and the English merchant fleet. It would make itmore difficult to recover the Eastland Company's cloth market from Dutch and Hanseatic competition. Moreover the expense of the war had outrun available revenue. The peace terms negotiated with De Will rid the Netherlands of royalist influence for themoment and excluded the House of Orange from power. England kept her Navigation Act, and her prizes of war, and collected compensation for her assorted injuries.43 We gain great insight into the motives behind the other aspects of Cromwell's foreign policy from two memoranda written by Thurloe after the Restoration for the enlightenment of Charles IPs government (and the saving of his own neck). On e of these deals with relations with the Dutch,44 and the other with Baltic policy and relations with France and Spain.45 Cromwell decided to ally himself with France and to make war on was no Spain. Since Spain military danger, was a source of wool and bullion and a good customer for English cloth, this policy was strongly as criticized subsequently tending to build up England's natural enemy, a France, and to destroy profitable branch of trade. Thurloe's memorandum explains the reason. As an enemy France could help the royalists to invade England, Scotland or Ireland and reinforce them. could not. as an Spain France ally would expel the royalists from her territory and force them to depend on Spain, since the United Provinces were now to closed them. Spanish help would be ineffective, would the and antagonize Dutch would weaken the royalist cause in England, where Spain was regarded with fear and hatred.46 was Portugal keen for good relations with England. Cromwell demanded free trade in the Portuguese empire and religious freedom for

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a English merchants, and surprisingly obtained treaty granting both concessions.

Cromwell had in mind the prospect of breaking the Spanish trading a monopoly with its American colonies, by means of war against Spain at the time his peace negotiations with the Dutch in 1654, when he proposed a joint enterprise to partition the empires of Spain and Portugal between them.47 However, he commenced his attempt to break the Spanish trading war monopoly by peaceful means, and resorted to only when Spain refused to grant the same capitulations as Portugal had done. war a The alliance with France and with Spain were in the first place method of winning the Civil War by means of a forward aggressive strategy. In this respect the policy was entirely successful. In the second a place it offered chance to break into the trade with the Spanish Main. a Thurloe indicates that had war with France and alliance with Spain more course seemed profitable, then that would have been adopted.48 The choice made was that of a successful and aggressive general in command of a major maritime power. If the alliance with France was made for reasons of state alone, and the was was a with Spain necessary part of it, there were mercantile influences too at work in the formulation of the Western Design. While was sea at expanded, Baltic trade would flourish and the prospects of gain by attacking Spanish ships and colonies were highly attractive to shipowners and West India merchants like Martin Noell and Maurice Thomson. Indeed, it seems that it was at their suggestion that the was expedition to conquer Hispaniola launched, since they were assigned the task of planning it49and theymade use of the knowledge and advice of the Barbados Jewish merchant, Simon de Caceres. war This policy of empire-building by was essentially the same as that won which had the Dutch West India Company the 1628 silver fleet and the valuable Brazilian colony of Pernambuco. Indeed Noell and his an associate Thomas Povey set about forming English West India Company.50 From the point of view of merchants trading to Spain, wool importers, cloth exporters and the Newcastle colliers, whose fleets were destroyed by Dunkirk privateers, the war with Spain was a disaster, was no which in way compensated for by the capture of the silver fleet and the Spanish colony of Jamaica, and the long-term prospect of an expanded trade with Portugal. By the end of the First Dutch War, the English fleet amounted to no less than 160 vessels and these needed either to be put to profitable use or paid off. The very existence of this navy made war against another rich a a maritime power tempting prospect. It also meant that squadron could

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be sent to the Mediterranean under Blake to attack the Barbary Coast pirates and protect the Levant trade51 at the same time as Penn and Venables sailed to conquer Hispaniola. The Protectorate provided security for English trade to the Baltic and Levant, privileges for that to Portugal and Brazil and a secure base at an - Jamaica for interloping trade with the Spanish Main all solid, long - term, bullion-earing achievements even if Cromwell failed to capture Gibraltar and Hispaniola, to profit from Blake's seizure of the silver fleet or turn Dunkirk into a staple for English cloth on medieval lines. Once the Dutch War was over, Oliver Cromwell as was persuaded to take up the issue of readmitting the Jews once again. Cromwell's style was to proceed with caution and to test public opinion. Menasseh ben Israel was invited to England and was encouraged to present a petition on behalf of the Jewish Nation for their readmission. This he reinforced with his book the Humble Addresses, which seems to have greatly annoyed the Puritan clergy. A selected group of notable merchants and divines was invited to join with the Councillors of State at a - - Conference at Whitehall presumably in the Banqueting House to consider the matter.52 The Presbyterians succeeded in strongly discouraging the proceedings with William Prynne's forceful and learned attack on the proposal: The Short Demurrer against the Jewes their long discounted Remitter into England, which weakened the resolve of Henry Jessey, Hugh Peters and other clerical enthusiasts. Alderman Sir Christopher Packe, a cloth exporter, spoke strongly against the proposal, probably arguing from his experience as a merchant in Hamburg that the Jews simply acted as agents for Dutch exporters. The Short Demurrer also stimulated Menasseh ben Israel to write and publish his noble book Vindicae Judaeorum. Quite apart from the judges' ruling, however, that there was no law against Jews living in England,53 after the Whitehall Conference, the committee of the Council of State made the following report to the Council in seems me early 1656, which to to set out the terns on which they recommended that the readmission of the Jews should be made: It reads as follows:

That the Jewes derservinge itmay be admitted into this nation to trade and traffickeand dwel amongst us as providence shall give occasion. we That as to poynt of conscience judge lawfull for themagistrate to admit in case such materiall and weighty considerations as hereafter follow be provided for,about which tillwe are satisfyedwe cannot but in conscience suspend our resolution in this case.

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1. That the motives and grounds upon which Menasseh ben Israel in behalfe of the rest of his nation in his booke lately printed in this English tongue desireth their admission in this commonwealth are such as we conceave to be very sinfull for this or any Christian state to receave them upon. 2 That the danger of seducinge the people of this nation by their admission inmatters of religion is very great. 3. That their havinge of synagogues or any publicke meetings for the exercise of theirworship or religion is not only evill in itselfe,but likewise very scandalous to other Christian churches. 4 That their customes and practices concerninge marriage and divorce are unlawfull and will be of very evill example amongst us. 5. That principles of not makinge conscience of oathes made and injuryes done to Christians in life, chastity, goods or good name have bin very notoriously charged upon them by valuable testimony. 6. That great prejudice is like to arise to the natives of this commonwealth in matters of trade, which besides other dangers here mentioned we find very commonly suggested by the inhabitants of the City of London.'54

can We ignore these pessimistic negative comments about the danger of - Jews seducing Christians from their Faith and of commercial competition - because Cromwell had already made it quite clear in his speech to the Conference that he gave them no weight at all. What mattered were the practical terms on which the Lord Protector was authorized to allow Jews to settle in England. Of these, only the provision prohibiting Jews from - employing living-in Christian servants, was ignored and that would - have required special legislation but all the other terms seem to have been followed. The text continues:

7. 'We humbly represent. I. That they be not admitted to have any publicke Judicatoryes, whether civill or ecclesiasticall, which were to grant them terms beyond the conditions of strangers. II. That they be not admitted eyther to speake or doe anythinge to the defamation or dishonour of the name of our Lord Jesus Christ or of the Christian religion. III. That they be not permitted to doe any worke or anythinge to the prophanation of the Lord's Day or Christian sabbath. IV. That they be not admitted to have Christians to dwell with them as their servants. no V. That they bear publike office or trust in this commonwealth. VI. That they be not allowed to print anything which in the least opposeth

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our the Christian religion in language. VII. That, so farre as may be, not suffered to discourage any of their owne fromusinge or applyinge themselves to any which may tend to convince them of their error and turn them to Christianity. And that some severe penalty be imposed upon them who shall apostatize from Christianity to Judaisme.'54

It is plain from the petition signed by Menasseh ben Israel together with Carvajal and the other London Jews inMarch 1656 that Cromwell had by then assured the Jews that they could meet for prayer in their private houses, but that no action had been taken in response to Menasseh ben Israel's petition for public synagogues, free immigration and legal autonomy.55 The request for a written charter and licence to buy a cemetery was referred to the Council of State and deferred until the facts of the case of Antonio Rodrigues Robles had been investigated. Robles's ships and cargoes had been seized on the grounds that he was a Spaniard and an enemy alien. He claimed exemption on the grounds that he was a subject of neutral Portugal and not a Catholic, but a Jew.56 An idea which Cecil Roth promoted, which seems tome to be unsound and improbable, was his deduction from the fact that two pages were cut out of the Minute Book of the Council of State between the minutes of the on meeting Tuesday 24 June and of that of Thursday 26 June 1656 that: first, there must have been an unrecorded meeting of the Council on 25 June; second, that the Jews' petition for licence to lease a cemetery must have been granted on that day; and third, that the minute of this event was destroyed subsequently for political reasons. Such inferences from non? existent evidence seem tome to be unsound. The matter was well discussed in A. S. Diamond's article 'The Cemetery of the Resettlement'.57 Roth wrote: now 'It is possible to assert categorically that the decision authorising Jewish public worship in England, after a lapse of 366 years, was reached on Wednesday 25th June 1656 (O. S.).'58 It is equally possible to state categorically that the earth is flat, but in case each the supporting evidence is insufficient to sustain the thesis. The Jews' petition of February 1656 makes it plain that the Lord Protector had - - already given them leave on the Dutch model tomeet in their houses for private prayer. That meant that congregational worship was permitted, but attendance was by personal invitation only, as was then the case for Catholics and Jews in Amsterdam. The synagogue founded by was Antonio Fernandes Carvajal not at ground level, itwas deliberately on fitted out the first floor of a private house,59 and it remained in use there until 1701, from which it is fairly clear that neither under Cromwell nor or were under Charles II James II Jews granted the right to have public

166 The readmission of the Jews to England in 1656

synagogues. In 1685 John Locke, who had been Benjamin Worsley's immediate successor as Secretary of the Board of Trade and Plantations, but was then in exile in the Netherlands wrote: 'If we allow the Jews to we have private houses and dwellings amongst us, why should not allow more them to have synagogues? Is their doctrine more false, their worship abominable, or is civil peace more endangered, by theirmeeting in public than in their private houses?'60 Public synagogues only became possible afterWilliam Hi's Toleration Act of 1689, and even then, some caution was observed. In these circumstances, Cecil Roth's claim that public Jewish worship was authorized by the Council of State, but that the documents a have been destroyed, is indeed strange flight of fancy. The readmission of the Jews to England was part and parcel of the were Commonwealth's mercantilist policy. In practice its results far less dramatic and successful than its proponents might have hoped. Jewish merchants contributed to England's penetration of Portuguese colonial trade. They were useful in the Caribbean in establishing trade from Jamaica to the Spanish Main. Their trade with the Canaries was a important. But it can hardly be argued that they made more than minor or contribution to the build-up of English trade, one which could be compared with the major role of the Jewish merchants of Amsterdam in building up that city's trade with Spain and her colonies. a Itwould have been simple matter for Charles II to have expelled the Jews from England, but his government gave them protection and adhered to much the same economic strategy as had Oliver Cromwell. A bigoted petition from the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen of the City of London (which was once again ruled by the cloth importers of the Levant Company and theMerchant Adventurers) demanded the expulsion of the Jews. Among other things itwas foolish enough to accuse the Jews of - exporting English cloth at lower rates than English merchants61 not an argument calculated to appeal to the wool producers who dominated both - Houses of Parliament and was treated with the contempt it deserved and was ignored. The Restoration saw Dr Benjamin Worsley back as a member and later as Secretary of a Privy Council Committee for Trade and Plantations. It a saw fresh navigation acts, two more Dutch wars and dramatic expansion of English foreigntrade and shipping. By imitating Dutch methods, the revolutionary governments of the one Interregnum gave English state policy a new purpose and direction, and a which their successors pursued for more than century after the restoration of the monarchy. They made the administration of trade and plantations a significant department of government. They actively

167 Edgar Samuel

consulted London merchants on policy making. They stimulated the growth of English overseas trade by giving monopoly rights and naval protection to English shipowners. They encouraged foreign merchants to settle here. Finally, they placed commercial objectives high among the priorities of foreign policy and used the power of State to obtain them. It was this mercantilist outlook, rather than the Millennarian theology of Henry Jessey or the Messianic optimism of Menasseh ben Israel, which led Cromwell to sanction the readmission of Jews to England and the establishment of Jewish communities in Barbados, Nevis, Surinam and Jamaica. But without the initiative of these two zealous interpreters of the Book of Daniel, it is unlikely that any English government would have come to such a decision so early as Cromwell's did. Itwas a decision which had beneficial consequences for English trade and prosperity, for the nature of English society and for the Jews of Europe.

NOTES

1 'The of the 1590s and the Stirrings 12 V. Barbour, 'Dutch and English Return of the to Jews England' Trans JHSE shipping in the Seventeenth Century' (1979) XXVI. Economic History Review II (1932) 261-90. 2 I am to grateful Prof. J. I. Israel for 13 S. R. Gardiner, History of the drawing attention to this point. Commonwealth and Protectorate 1649-1659 I 3 Cecil Roth,History of the Jews in (1894-1901)301. 3rd ed. England. (Oxford 1964) 52-3, citing 14 Charles H. Boxer, 'English shipping Mercurius pragmaticus 19-20 December 1648. in the Brazil Trade 1640-65' Mariners Mirror 4 Ibid. Citing History of the 37 (1951) 197-230. Independency ii,50. 15 M. A. E. Green (ed.) Calendar of State 5 David Katz, Philo-Semitism and the Papers, Domestic Series, 1649-50, p.20. Readmission to of the Jews England 1603-1655 16 Laurence A. Harper, The English a (OUP,Oxford 1982)81. Navigation Laws, seventeenth-century 6 I am to grateful Dr Gwillym Hughes experiment in social engineering (New York for this information. 1939). 7 E.W., The Life and Death of Mr 17 Charles H. Firth and R. S. Salt (eds) his Acts and the Henry Jessey, who, having finished Ordinances of Interregnum 1640 was testimony, translated, 4 Sept. 1663 166011 (1911)403. (London 1671). 18 C. M. Andrews, British Committees, 8 Lucien ben Israel's Commissions Wolf,Menasseh and Councils of Trade and Mission to Oliver Cromwell (London 1901) xx. Plantations 1622-1675 (Baltimore 1908) 13. - 9 Reprinted in Three Hundred Years a 19 Firth& Salt II (see n.17) 403. volume to commemorate the Tercentenary of 20 Robert Paul Brenner, 'The Civil War the Resettlement the in Great Britain Politics of London's of Jews Merchant Community* Past and Present No. 1655-1956(London 1956) 17. 58, February 1973, and 10 in Lucien 23 Commercial and Reprinted Wolf, op.cit. Change Political Conflict: et seq. the Merchant Community in Civil War 11 S. 'Fiscal of the London PhD J. Kepler, aspects (MS, Thesis, Princeton, January English carrying trade during the Thirty 1970). Typescript in University College Years War' Economic Review XXV History London Library. (1972). 21 See Valerie L. Pearl, London and the

168 The readmission of the Jews to England in 1656

Outbreak of the Puritan Revolution (Oxford 41 R. P. Brenner, Commercial Change 1961)Appendix II,309-38. (see n.20) 520. 22 R. P. Brenner, 'The Civil War 42 J. T. Rutt (ed.) Diary of Thomas Politics ...' (see n.20). Burton Esquire, member in the Parliaments of 23 R. P. Mehaffey (ed.) Calendar of Oliver and (1656-1659) - State Pavers relating to Ireland in the (London 1828). Reign ofCharles I (London 1901). 43 J. E. Farnell (see n.28) 443-4. 24 G. D. Burtchaell and T. V. Sadleir 44 Sir Charles Firth, Secretary Thurloe (eds) AlumniDubliniensis (Dublin 1935). (see n.32). 25 W. R. M?nk, The Roll of the College 45 Sir Walter Scott (ed.) Collection of ofPhysicians of London (London 1878). scarce and valuable tracts . . . (Somers Tracts) 26 Joan Thirsk and J. P. Cooper, VI (London 1809-15) 329-36. Seventeenth-Century Economic Documents 46 Sir Charles Firth (see n.32). (Oxford 1972) 64-5. 47 S. R. Gardiner III (see n.13) 82. 27 R. W. K. Hinton, The Eastland Trade 48 Sir Charles Firth (see n.32). and the Common Weal in the Seventeenth 49. W. C. Abbott, The Writings and Century(Cambridge 1958)Appendix B. Speeches of Oliver Cromwell 111 28 James E. Farnell, 'The Navigation (Cambridge, Mass. 1945) 413. Act of 1651, the First Dutch War and the 50 C. M. Andrews (see n.18) 55. London Merchant Community* Economic 51 S. R. Gardiner IV (see n.13) 150-8. History Review XVI (1963) 439 et seq. 52 Lucien Wolf (see n.8) 1, xxxiv. 29 Laurence A. Harper (see n.16) 42. 53 Ibid, xlvi-xlviii, citing Henry Jessey, 30 R. P. Brenner, Commercial Change A Narrative of the late proceedings at (see n.20), Chap. 4. Whitehall concerning the Jews etc. Harleian 31 S. R. Gardiner I (see n.13) 322-30. Miscellany VII 623. 32 Sir Charles H. Firth, 'Secretary 54 Ibid, lxxiv-v, citing State Papers Thurloe on - the Relation of England and Domestic Interregnum ci.118. Holland* English Historical Review 21 55 Ibid, lxxxvi, citing Ibid, cxxv 58. (1906) 319 et seq. 56 See Lucien Wolf, 'Crypto-Jews under 33 Dictionary of National Biography the Commonwealth' Trans ]HSE (1895) 60-6. (London 1888), see under: Oliver St John. 57 Trans JHSEXIX (1960) 166. 34 Thomas Violet, Briefe Observations 58 Cecil Roth, 'The Resettlement of the at of Whatte Hath Beene Acted the Council Jews in England in 1656' in V. D. Lipman (ed.) Trade to of 20 Aug. last Dec. 1651, 178, cited Three Centuries of Anglo-Jewish History in L. A. Harper (see n.16) 45. (London 1961) 15. 35 Journal of theHouse of Commons. 59 W. S. Samuel, 'The First London 36 Thirsk & Cooper (see n.26) 502-5, Synagogue of the Re-settlement' Trans JHSE give the full text of the Navigation Act. X (1924)plate 10. 37 R. W. K. Hinton (see n.27) Appendix 60 John Locke, 'A Letter Concerning B. Toleration' A Second Treatise of Government 38 Luden Wolf (see n.8). (Blackwell, Oxford 1966) 162. 39 J. E. Farnell (see n.28). 61 Trans JHSE IV (1903) 186-8. 40 S. R. Gardiner I (see n.13) 176-7.

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