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The Right Honourable The Earl of Hardwicke PC
Portrait byWilliam Hoare
Lord Chancellor Lord High Steward for the trials of: List The Earl of Kilmarnock The Earl of Cromartie The Lord Balmerino The Lord Lovat
In office 21 February 1737 – 19 November 1756
Monarch	George II
Prime Minister	SirRobert Walpole The Earl of Wilmington Henry Pelham The Duke of Newcastle
Preceded by	The Lord Talbot
Succeeded by	In Commission
12thChancellor of the College of William & Mary
In office 1764–1764
Personal details
Born	c. (1690-12-01)1 December 1690 Dover,Kent,England
Died	6 March 1764(1764-03-06) (aged 73) London,England
Spouse(s)	Margaret, Lady Yorke
Children	7
Education	Middle Temple
Profession	Lawyer

Philip Yorke, 1st Earl of Hardwicke,PC (1 December 1690 – 6 March 1764) was anEnglishlawyer and politician who served asLord High Chancellor of Great Britain. He was a close confidant ofthe Duke of Newcastle, Prime Minister between 1754 and 1756 and 1757 until 1762.

A son of Philip Yorke, anattorney, he was born atDover. Through his mother, Elizabeth, daughter and co-heiress of Richard Gibbon of Rolvenden,Kent, he was connected with the family ofEdward Gibbon the historian. He was educated at a school inBethnal Green run bySamuel Morland, a nonconformist.^[1]

At age 16, Yorke entered the attorney's office of Charles Salkeld inHolborn, London. He was entered at theMiddle Temple in November 1708, and perhaps recommended by his employer toLord Chief Justice Parker as law tutor to his sons.

In 1715, Yorke wascalled to the bar, where his progress was, according toLord Campbell, more rapid than that of any other debutant in the annals of the profession, his advancement being greatly furthered by the patronage ofThomas Parker, 1st Earl of Macclesfield, who became Lord Chancellor in 1718, when Yorke transferred his practice from theKing's Bench to theCourt of Chancery, though he continued to go on theWestern Circuit. In the following year he established his reputation as anequity lawyer in a case in whichRobert Walpole's family was interested, by an argument displaying profound learning and research concerning the jurisdiction of the chancellor, on lines which he afterwards more fully developed in a celebrated letter toLord Kames on the distinction between law and equity.

Through the Earl of Macclesfield's influence with theDuke of Newcastle Yorke entered parliament in 1719 as member forLewes, and was appointed solicitor-general, with aknighthood, in 1720, although he was then a barrister of only four years standing.

Although in his youth he contributed toThe Spectator over the signature Philip Homebred, he seems early to have abandoned all care for literature, and he has been reproached by Lord Campbell and others with his neglect of art and letters. On 16 May 1719 he married Margaret, daughter ofCharles Cocks (by his wife Mary Cocks, sister ofLord Chancellor Somers) and widow of William Lygon (who died without issue in 1716),^[2] by whom he had five sons and two daughters:

• Philip Yorke, Viscount Royston (1720–1790), who succeeded him
• Hon. Charles Yorke (1722–1770), became, like his father, Lord Chancellor
• Lady Elizabeth Yorke (1725–1760), marriedLord Anson
• Hon. Joseph Yorke (d. 1792), a diplomat, created Baron Dover
• Hon. John Yorke (1728–1801),Member of Parliament forReigate andHigham Ferrers
• Hon. James Yorke (1730–1808), becameBishop of Ely
• Lady Margaret Yorke, marriedSir Gilbert Heathcote, Bt

In 1739, he purchasedWimpole Hall, the greatest country house in Cambridgeshire.

He is buried, with many of his descendants, at the St. Andrew Churchyard at Wimpole. Hardwicke was succeeded in the earldom by his eldest son,Philip. His monument was sculpted byPeter Scheemakers.^[3]

His cousinSir William Yorke, 1st Baronet had a highly successful career as a judge in Ireland, becomingChief Justice of the Irish Common Pleas.

The prosecution ofChristopher Layer fortreason as aJacobite raised Yorke's reputation as a forensic orator; and in 1723, having already become attorney-general, he passed through theHouse of Commons the bill of pains and penalties againstFrancis Atterbury. He was excused, on the ground of his personal friendship, from acting for the crown in theimpeachment of the Earl of Macclesfield in 1725; he soon found a new patron in theDuke of Newcastle.

Lord Hardwicke is also remembered as one of the two authors of theYorke–Talbot slavery opinion whilst he was a crown law officer in 1729. The opinion was sought to determinate the legality of slavery and Hardwicke (then Philip Yorke) andCharles Talbot opined that it was legal. The opinion was disseminated and relied upon widely. Lord Hardwicke would subsequently endorse the views in the opinion in a judicial capacity inPearne v Lisle (1749) Amb 75, 27 ER 47. He rendered valuable service to Walpole's government by his support of the bill for prohibiting loans to foreign powers (1730), of the increase of the army (1732) and of theExcise Bill (1733)^{[citation needed]}.

In 1733 Yorke was appointedLord Chief Justice of the King's Bench, with the title of Lord Hardwicke, and was sworn of thePrivy Council; and in 1737 he succeededLord Talbot as Lord Chancellor, thus becoming a member of Walpole's cabinet. One of his first official acts was to deprive the poetJames Thomson of a small office conferred on him by Talbot^{[citation needed]}.

Hardwicke's political importance was greatly increased by his move to theHouse of Lords, where the incompetency of Newcastle threw on the Chancellor the duty of defending the measures of the government. He resistedCarteret's motion to reduce the army in 1738, and the resolutions hostile to Spain over the affair ofCaptain Jenkins's ears. But when Walpole bent before the storm and declared war againstSpain, Hardwicke advocated energetic measures for its conduct; and he tried to keep the peace between Newcastle and Walpole^{[citation needed]}. He found that there was no sufficient ground for Horace Walpole's charge that the fall of Sir Robert was brought about by Hardwicke's treachery.

No one was more surprised than himself when he retained the chancellorship in the following administration, and he resisted the proposal to indemnify witnesses against Walpole in one of his finest speeches in May 1742. He exercised a leading influence in theWilmington Cabinet; and when Wilmington died in August 1743, it was Hardwicke who put forwardHenry Pelham for the vacant office against the claims ofPulteney. For many years from this time he was the controlling power in the government.

During the King's absences on the continent Hardwicke was left at the head of the council of regency; it thus fell to him to concert measures for dealing with the Jacobite rising in 1745. AfterCulloden he presided at the trial of the Scottish Jacobite peers, his conduct of which, though judicially impartial, was neither dignified nor generous; and he must be held partly responsible for the severity meted out to the rebels, and especially for the executions on obsolete attainders ofCharles Radclyffe and (in 1753) ofArchibald Cameron of Locheil. He carried out a major reform in 1746 which swept away the feudal power surviving in Scotland in the form of private heritable jurisdictions in the hands of the landed gentry. On the other hand, his legislation in 1748 for disarming the Highlanders and prohibiting the use of the tartan in their dress was vexatious without being effective. Hardwicke supportedChesterfield's reform of the calendar in 1751; in 1753 his bill for legalizing the naturalization ofJews in England had to be dropped on account of the popular clamour it excited; but he successfully carried aMarriage Act which became the basis of subsequent legislation.

On the death of Pelham in 1754 Hardwicke obtained for Newcastle the post ofprime minister, and for reward was created earl of Hardwicke and Viscount Royston; and when in November 1756 the weakness of the ministry and the threatening aspect of foreign affairs compelled Newcastle to resign, Hardwicke retired with him. He played a part in negotiating the coalition between Newcastle andPitt in 1757, when he accepted a seat in Pitt's cabinet without returning to thewoolsack. After the accession ofGeorge III Hardwicke opposed the ministry ofLord Bute on the peace with France in 1762, and on thecider tax in the following year. In theWilkes case Hardwicke condemnedgeneral warrants, and also the doctrine that seditiouslibels published by members of parliament were protected byparliamentary privilege. He died in London on 6 March 1764.

In 1736 the King's Bench, under his presidency, delivered the seminal judgment inMiddleton v. Crofts 2 Atk 650, which held that canons made in the provincial clergy convocations could not, by themselves, bind the lay faithful. He held the office of Lord Chancellor longer than any of his predecessors, with a single exception. His decisions fixed limits and established principles ofEquity. His influence was powerful in obliterating the traditions of the judicial bench under the Stuart monarchy, and in establishing the modern conception of the duties and demeanour of English judges. While still at the bar Lord Chesterfield praised his conduct of crown prosecutions as a contrast to the former bloodhounds of the crown; and he described Sir Philip Yorke as naturally humane, moderate and decent.

Cases

• Gyles v Wilcox (1740) 3 Atk. 143, on fair use
• Attorney General v Davy (1741) 26 ER 531, on majority decision making in corporations
• The Charitable Corporation v Sutton (1742) 26 ER 642, on the duty of care
• Whelpdale v Cookson (1747) 1 Ves Sen 9, on the duty of loyalty and no inquiry rule
• Pearne v. Lisle (1749) Amb 75, 27 ER 47
• Penn v Lord Baltimore (1750) 1 Ves Sen 444, in relation to thePenn–Calvert boundary dispute

Legislation

• Marriage Act 1753

• Great Britain in the Seven Years War

The contemporary authorities for the life of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke are voluminous, in the memoirs of the period and in collections of correspondence. See, especially:

• the Hardwicke Papers;
• the Stowe manuscripts;
• Hist. manuscripts Commission (Reports 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11);
• Horace Walpole,Letters (ed. by P Cunningham, 9 vols., London, 1857–1859) (Walpole was violently hostile to Hardwicke);
• Letters to Sir H Mann (ed. by Lord Dover, 4 vols., London, 1843 1844)
• Memoirs of the Reign of George II (ed. byLord Holland, 2nd ed. revised, London, 1847);
• Memoirs of the Reign of George III (ed. by GFR Barker, 4 vols., London, 1894);
• Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors of England, Scotland and Ireland (ed. by T Park, 5 vols., London, 1806).

See also:

• the Earl Waldegrave,Memoirs 1754–1758 (London, 1821);
• Lord Chesterfield,Letters (ed. by Lord Mahon, 5 vols., London, 1892);
• Richard Cooksey,Essay on John, Lord Somers, and Philip, Earl of Hardwicke (Worcester, 1791);
• William Coxe,Memoirs of Sir R. Walpole (4 vols., London, 1816);
• Memoirs of the Administration of Henry Pelham (2 vols., London, 1829);
• Lord Campbell,Lives of the Lord Chancellors, vol. v. (8 vols, London, 1845);
• Edward Foss,The Judges of England, vols. vii. and viii. (9 vols., London, 1848–1864);
• George Harris,Life of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke; with Selections from his Correspondence, Diaries, Speeches and Judgments (3 vols., London, 1847).

Attribution

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Hardwicke, Philip Yorke, 1st Earl of".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 12 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 944–946.
• Hutchinson, John (1892)."Philip Yorke" .Men of Kent and Kentishmen (Subscription ed.). Canterbury: Cross & Jackman. pp. 148–149.

• Lee, Sidney, ed. (1900)."Yorke, Philip (1690-1764)" .Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 63. London:Smith, Elder & Co.

• 1690 births
• 1764 deaths
• People from Dover, Kent
• People from Wimpole
• Members of the Middle Temple
• Members of Lincoln's Inn
• Chancellors of the College of William & Mary
• Earls of Hardwicke
• Peers of Great Britain created by George II
• Lord chancellors of Great Britain
• Lord High Stewards
• Lord chief justices of England and Wales
• Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for English constituencies
• British MPs 1715–1722
• British MPs 1722–1727
• British MPs 1727–1734
• Members of the Privy Council of Great Britain
• Knights Bachelor
• Yorke family
• 18th-century British lawyers
• British fellows of the Royal Society

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