The liberal formula

The visit of the royal commission headed by St Leger in 1537 marks the real beginnings of the liberal policy of the 1540s. Already the mind of the future lord deputy can be observed groping towards the formula for the liberal programme. Having witnessed the transitory nature of the victory gained by the crown forces over O'Connor in Offaly, he drew the conclusion for Cromwell that ‘the same country is much easier won than kept, for whensoever the king's pleasure be to win the same again it will be done without great difficulty, but the keeping thereof will be both chargeable and dificil’. Nevertheless he was obviously convinced that the problem of the Gaelic borderers had to be faced. The solution he supported is significant. He returned from Ireland in 1538 with indentures concluded with three of the border lords, including O'Connor, in which they offered total submission to the crown's sovereign jurisdiction in return for noble status and hereditary tenure of their lordships by letters patent.

One other idea floated in the course of the visit of 1537 assumes major significance in retrospect. It came from a treatise on political reform devised by Bishop Staples of Meath, whom we have already met as the critic of Archbishop Browne's Reformation campaign in 1538. At the request of St Leger, Staples set down his ideas on political reform. For the most part the resultant treatise was given over to the needs of the four shires of the old Pale. That aspect need not concern us here, except to note that it demonstrates Staples's moderate and liberal attitude in politics as well as in religion.