To most visitors to the old Humber Ferry Pier on Hull’s
waterfront there are other more pressing priorities than noticing the white
gothic revival style statue of the city’s first Lord Mayor.
The figure of Sir
William de la Pole, rather heroically jaunty in his pose, the work by a Hull
sculptor as a 19th century commission now tends to be eclipsed by
the attention demanding, striking structure of The Deep, the swirling muddy brown water of the broad river and above all the prospect of a nice coffee or ice cream at a small café at the
entrance to the wooden planked promenade. This, until the opening of the Humber
Bridge, was the bustling arrivals and departures point of the old paddle steamers.
Born at the long lost (by coastal erosion) Ravenser, on an earlier version of
the shifting Spurn Point in the last decade of the 13th Century
William de la Pole became a successful merchant and trader and established himself
in the newly Royal Chartered town of Kingston upon Hull from where he rose to the
position of not only Mayor of Hull but through using his wealth to lend to
successive royals, Edward the Second and Third he is considered to have at least once saved
the English Crown from ruin.
In 1339 his reward was his appointment as Baron of the
Exchequer, the senior judicial and financial position in the kingdom. Those
were however turbulent times and de la Pole was not immune to failed businesses
which saw him imprisoned and his assets confiscated before some haggling with
the King resulted in a Pardon in return for cancelling the debts owed to him by
the Crown.
His contribution to Hull before his death in 1366 included hospital and charitable buildings
and even today his name is known in association with a residential street and
in memories of a former mental asylum.
One of his four sons, Michael, became
the 1st Earl of Suffolk and in that personage and his history is recent
speculation of a means of toppling, by legal impeachment, the current President
of the United States, Donald Trump.
Continuing in the status and power of Hull’s
first Lord Mayor, the de la Pole family courted high office and in 1386 as
Chancellor for Richard the Second Michael had the dubious honour of being the
first official to be impeached and thrown out for the citation of “high crimes
and misdemeanours”.
The reason was his failure to pay a ransom for the town of
Ghent which had been taken by the French.
Michael de la Pole
was not a criminal, fraudster or necessarily a bad man.
The term of “high
crimes and misdemeanours” is pretty vague now and even more so in the 14th
Century but by being so is able to encompass a broad range of actual and
perceived issues such as negligence, breach of promise, not taking well
intentioned advice, bribery, misappropriation of state funds, cronynism,
nepotism, common decency, obstruction of justice, perjury, dereliction of duty,
defiance of legislation and damage to the status and standing of the nation
from the abuse or violation of an oath of office and public trust by its leader
and head of state.
Impeachment was in its origins a tool for the Monarch and State
to expel those who politically, financially or in their influence became just
too much of a threat.
It was a lower level of sanction to accusations of
Treason, punishable by death but equally significant in that the alleged perpetrator
would suffer a fate considered equivalent to execution, that being dishonour and ruin through forfeit of the sources
and trappings of personal wealth and status.
The respect for English Law even amongst the fledgling rebel colonial America in the 18th Century saw many of its principles and statutes adopted in what became the U.S. Constitution as a safeguard against misconduct by all of those in high office including, what would in other regimes be an untouchable position , the President.
The use of Impeachment is very
much determined by specific and prevailing circumstances. Offences attracting
this legal action are usually those considered valid at a given moment in
history. In the current world order therefore where former and aspiring Super
Powers are vying for influence a greater emphasis is likely to be placed on perceived
misdemeanours of suppression of truth, conveying confidential information to
others and over bearing use of Presidential authority.
In the case of Michael
de la Pole, way back in 1386, he may just have been regarded by his peers as a bit obnoxious, unpopular, outspoken,
over confident in his own abilities, a self made man attracting envy, impatient of others, frustrated by fools and
poor at seeking and benefiting from the wisdom and council of those he should make a point of getting on with for an easier life.
Who says that history simply repeats itself?
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