In 1736 an almost united bench of bishops in the House of Lords scuppered legislation to relieve Quakers from prosecution for their refusal to pay tithes. In his first post for the Georgian Lords, Dr Ben Rogers considers how this controversy reignited disputes between the government, the Church of England, and religious dissenters, and led to an irretrievable breach between Robert Walpole and his former … Continue reading ‘A very unequal and a forced maintenance’: The failure of the Quakers Tithe Bill in 1736