issues. But the characters of the Whig and Tory parties were changing.

The
Whigs were becoming a party of government, an aristocratic, Courtinclined,
set of managers; the sort of politicians who were deeply involved
in the institutions and financing behind the wars: in short, the sort of men
who propped up Walpole and his administration. The Tories were more
ambiguous: many retained a residual loyalty to James II, the rightful king,
and his heirs even while recognizing William as the de facto king; in
parliament Tories accepted the leadership of Edward Harley and supported
the Country protests against placemen and standing armies - it is often
claimed that the 1690s saw the Tories being educated in the ways of party
and opposition. Doubt over their loyalty to William was always a weak
spot for the Tories. The Junto Whigs took advantage of the 1696 assassination
plot against William to subscribe an Association affirming that
William was "rightful and lawful king," and when 100 MPs and 26 Lords
refused to sign they were tarred as Jacobites. Under James's daughter
Queen Anne, the Tories seemed a coherent party, campaigning on "the
church in danger" slogan, legislating against Occasional Conformity and
dissenting academies, and lobbying for office and place: this was decidedly
not Country party behavior.
Hanoverian party politics manage to be very clear cut and quite baffling.
Since Tories had no chance of office, the labels of Whig and Tory could be
almost meaningless, to the point that anyone who voted with the government
after 1714 tended to be classified as a Whig. This convinces many
scholars that Whig-Tory divisions had in reality given way to a CourtCountry split. One view is that both parties had Court and Country wings
under Anne, but after 1714 the Tories were solely a Country party. It then
became the task of Court Whigs to prevent the Country wings of the Tory
and Whig parties from forming an alliance, which was done by smearing
the Tories as Jacobites. Yet, "despite such impediments, by 1760 Court and
Country had effectively replaced tory and whig."26 On the other hand, it is
still worth asking what Hanoverian Whigs and Tories actually believed in.
The Whigs had very little connection with the pro-Dissent, liberal principles
of their predecessors: they were in cahoots with the Church of England
and her bishops, and in 1711 had even backed the Occasional Conformity
Bill to gain dissident Tory help against the peace policy; they were no
friends to wide electorates, frequent elections, or even freedom of expression.
Although the Tories still bore the stigma of Jacobitism, there was an
organized Tory party in the constituencies and at Westminster led by astute
politicians such as Sir John Cotton and Sir William Wyndham.27 Yet it is
doubtful whether they could realistically expect to be taken into government;
Walpole had spent too long persuading himself and his royal masters