Charles Porter (Lord Chancellor of Ireland)

Sir Charles Porter (c.1630 – 8 December 1696[1]), was a flamboyant and somewhat controversial English-born politician and judge, who nonetheless enjoyed a highly successful career in Ireland.

[5] He attracted the favourable notice of several judges, especially Francis North, 1st Baron Guildford, who became a close friend of Porter and described him as "a man who had the good fortune to be universally loved".

[6] During the last years of Charles II, with Guildford, now Lord Keeper of the Great Seal, at the head of the judiciary, Porter was at the height of his professional success, and entered Parliament as member for Tregony in 1685.

[2] Ever since the Restoration of 1660, there had been great difficulty in finding a suitable Irish Lord Chancellor: Michael Boyle, Archbishop of Armagh, held the office for twenty years simply because no professional judge was prepared to do so.

[2] Porter soon found himself in difficulty on the issue of religion: as his later career would show he was by no means hostile to Roman Catholics, and was indeed in favour of a considerable degree of religious toleration for members of that faith.

[7] However Porter strongly objected to the policy of wholesale replacement of Protestant office-holders by Catholics, and this rapidly undermined his credit with James II.

Porter quarrelled violently with the Duke of Tyrconnel, the effective leader of the Irish Catholics, and soon-to-be Lord Deputy of Ireland.

Tyrconnel, true to his nickname of "Lying Dick Talbot", falsely accused him of taking bribes,[7] and he was dismissed from office early in 1687, much to the regret of the Irish public, which trusted and respected him.

[2] He returned to his practice at the Bar in England, but this did not flourish, and he was said to have been reduced to a condition of near poverty, despite the fortune which his second wife Letitia Coxeter had brought him on their marriage in 1671.

[2] In his capacity as Lord Justice of Ireland he signed the Treaty of Limerick, which gave generous terms of surrender to the defeated Catholic supporters of James II, promising them religious tolerance, security of property and a general pardon.

Being still a member of the House, he attended the hearing in person and secured a favourable verdict, and also the royal pardon, proposed the previous year, for any acts of maladministration he might have committed.

[3] His enemies returned to the attack in 1695 when he was impeached by the Irish House of Commons for high crimes and misdemeanours; the articles, while including a reference to Jacobite sympathies, chiefly concerned his conduct as a judge and listed a series of alleged acts of corruption and abuse of office, as well as the familiar charges of "favouring Papists" and appointing Catholic magistrates.

Capel however denied that he had any part in it, and it has been argued in his defence that stirring up trouble in this way would have done him no favours with the King, who admired Porter, and was resolved not to let either of the warring factions in the Irish government gain pre-eminence.

[8] On the night of his acquittal, Porter became involved in an altercation with Robert Rochfort, the Speaker of the House of Commons and an implacable political opponent, who was evidently furious at the failure of the impeachment.

As regards Neave's role in the impeachment, Capel urged Porter, who was normally a magnanimous man, to forgive and forget, as he had already promised to do in his speech in his own defence.

[13] Porter's strong opinions and his refusal to compromise on his principles made him numerous enemies in the political sphere; yet in private life, according to Lord Guildford, he was universally loved as a man who was witty, generous, hospitable and magnanimous.

His fondness for drink and other forms of pleasure undoubtedly damaged his career, although his hospitality increased his popularity in Dublin: one enemy sourly blamed the failure of his impeachment on his "dinner guests" in the Commons.

The second Earl of Clarendon, who had a very low opinion of the legal profession in general, said that Porter and their mutual friend Roger North were "the only two honest lawyers I ever knew".