The Act of Union 1707
Two parliaments voted themselves out of existence in 1707, and the Scots went to bed in one country and woke up in another. How did it happen, and what survived?
Published
Quick Facts
- What happened
- England and Scotland merged into the single Kingdom of Great Britain
- Took effect
- 1 May 1707
- Scottish Parliament ratified
- 16 January 1707, by 110 votes to 69
- Monarch
- Queen Anne, the last Stuart ruler and the first monarch of Great Britain
- Treaty
- 25 articles negotiated by commissioners from both sides in 1706
- Scottish seats at Westminster
- 45 MPs and 16 representative peers
- Compensation payment
- The Equivalent, nearly £400,000, paid to Scotland
- What Scotland kept
- Its own legal system, Church of Scotland and education system
The night the Scottish Parliament voted itself out
The Acts of Union of 1707 joined the kingdoms of England and Scotland into one state, Great Britain, with a single parliament at Westminster. The oddest part is that the Scottish Parliament had to agree to its own abolition. On 16 January 1707 it did, by 110 votes to 69. The English Parliament passed its own Act that spring, and on 1 May the new kingdom came into being. The Scottish Parliament's last sitting was on 25 March 1707. The Earl of Seafield, who was Lord Chancellor, is reputed to have called it the end of 'ane auld sang'.
One king, two countries, and a very bad investment
The two countries had shared a monarch since 1603, when James VI of Scotland became James I of England. They kept separate parliaments, though, and by the early 1700s relations were poor. The Scots had just seen the Darien scheme collapse. This was an attempt to plant a colony on the Isthmus of Panama, and it swallowed a huge share of the country's investment money. Fever, hunger and Spanish opposition finished it by 1700. Meanwhile, England's Parliament passed the Alien Act of 1705, which threatened to treat Scots as foreigners and to cut off trade unless Scotland moved towards union. Queen Anne had no surviving children, and England wanted to be sure Scotland would not choose a different successor and bring a hostile king to its northern border. So London wanted security, and many Scots wanted access to English markets and colonial trade. The bargain was struck.
The people who made the deal
Commissioners from both sides drew up the treaty in London in 1706. On the Scottish side, the Duke of Queensberry steered it through Edinburgh as Queen Anne's commissioner, and the Earl of Mar worked on it too. The loudest opponent was Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun, who feared Scotland would become a province run from London. The Duke of Hamilton led the opposition in Parliament but wavered at a decisive moment and withdrew. Daniel Defoe was in Edinburgh at the time, working for the English government and writing in favour of union. He reported on the mood of a city where mobs jeered the treaty's supporters, and there were riots in Edinburgh and Glasgow. In 1791 Robert Burns summed up the grudge in his song 'Such a Parcel of Rogues in a Nation'.
Myths versus reality
The popular story says Scotland was simply bought. Money did change hands. The Equivalent, which was nearly £400,000, compensated Scots for taking on a share of English national debt and for Darien losses, and some of it paid individual commissioners. But the treaty also offered real trade rights, and the vote was won by argument, pressure and politics as much as by cash. Another myth says Scotland was absorbed into England. It was not. Scotland kept its own law, its own courts and the Church of Scotland, all guaranteed in the treaty. Scots law still differs from English law because Scotland retained its separate legal system. Scottish banks' right to issue sterling banknotes comes from separate, later legislation, now principally the Banking Act 2009, not from the Treaty of Union. A third myth is that everyone in Scotland hated it. Opposition was loud and widespread, but opinion was divided, and some merchants and landowners were keen.
What you can still see today
Edinburgh's Royal Mile still has Parliament House, where the Scottish Parliament met until 1707. It is now home to Scotland's senior courts, which is a reminder of how much of Scottish public life carried on. The treaty's legacy is also in the Union Flag, which merged the crosses of St George and St Andrew, and in the title 'Great Britain' itself. In London, Westminster is where Scottish MPs began to sit from 1707. The Scottish Parliament was reconvened in 1999, after nearly three centuries, and now meets in its own building at Holyrood, which opened in 2004. The union established in 1707 remains a foundation of the United Kingdom, and the debate about it is far from over.
Notable people
- Queen Anne
- James Douglas, 2nd Duke of Queensberry
- John Erskine, Earl of Mar
- James Ogilvy, Earl of Seafield
- Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun
- James Hamilton, 4th Duke of Hamilton
- Daniel Defoe
- Robert Burns
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