1747 - William IV Second restoration of the Nassaus
William died in 1702; and the patriotic party, who had trembled for the freedom of the republic during the government of this stadtholder-king, had sufficient credit once more to restore the perpetual edict, and to cause the stadtholdership to be abolished. The general direction of affairs was anew confided to their High Mightinesses, and proved no less successful than that which they had exercised previous to the accession of William III. The war, after being sustained with courage, was terminated by the peace of Utrecht; and two years after, the states-general concluded the famous treaty of the barrier—a treaty represented by some as a transaction of the most profound policy, and by others as an affair of complete insignificance.
The second War of the Succession, which commenced in 1740, at the death of the emperor Charles VI, occasioned a new alteration in the government of the republic. The Dutch arms being unsuccessful, the partisans of the stadtholdership thought a favorable opportunity afforded for exciting discontent. Loud complaints against the government were every where heard, and the people, always inconstant in their wishes, replied as before by calling aloud for a stadtholder.
Zealand gave an example which all the provinces successively followed; and in the space of fifteen days, the revolution was completed. The stadtholdership was restored, and with it, all the prerogatives arrogated by the last stadtholder. They went still further, and formally decreed, in favor of William IV what had been only proposed for William III. The dignity of stadtholder was declared hereditary in the house of Nassau-Orange, in the younger branch in default of the elder, and even in females in default of line masculine. This constitutive law, AD 1747, was passed by the states of Holland and West Friesland, on a motion made by the body of nobles. It completed the system of encroachment which constitutes the very history of the stadtholdership; and there now remained nothing more than a title to change.
It may be conceived, however, with what feelings those who still preserved the sentiments of Barneveld and John de Witt viewed a resolution which suspended the sword of captain general of the republic to the cradle of an infant girl. The prince who afterwards became William V was not yet born.
The stadtholder’s court now assumed all the outward signs of royalty. The people forgot the time when those grand pensionaries, before whom the pride of monarchs was humbled, had for their sole escort but a single valet, and scrupled not to encourage all the innovations of the chief magistrate. The stadtholder, king as in reality he was, saw even in his title the pledge of a popularity which might still be serviceable to him. It was this which induced Frederic the Great, when conferring his niece in marriage on William V, to say to her: “You are fortunate, my niece, you are going to settle in a country where you will meet with all the advantages attached to royalty, without any of its inconveniences.”
The reign of William IV was distinguished by fresh attempts to govern the election of the regencies in the towns. Among the means contrived by the stadtholder for effecting this object, he fixed upon that of writing letters to the towns about the time of election, in which he recommended the persons whom he thought the most devoted to his interests. The usage of these letters, thus introduced, after a certain number of years, came to be styled, by the stadtholder’s party, the "right of recommendation”. These arbitrary attempts, however, were resisted by several provinces, and it might have been foreseen, that if the stadtholder sought to over-heap the measure of encroachment, there was still a point beyond which he could not go, without endangering the very existence of his office.
