The Chair did not altogether succeed in clearing itself of Court influence until the close of the seventeenth century, when the memorable and decisive conflict between the Crown and the Commons took place over the Speakership. The refusal of Charles II., in 1678-9, to approve of Sir Edward Seymour, the Commons' choice, aroused the most intense resentment in the breast of every member of the House, and was the subject of many heated debates. Though the popular assembly had eventually to bow to the royal will, the election of the King's original candidate was not pressed, and the Commons may be said to have gained a moral victory. From that day to this no sovereign has interfered in the election of a Speaker, nor since then has the Chair ever been filled by a royal nominee. As a result of this great constitutional struggle between King and Parliament, the Speaker gained complete independence of the royal will, but he had still to acquire that independence of Party to which he did not practically attain until after the Reform Act of 1832. From being the creature of the Crown, the Speaker developed into the slave of the Ministry, thus merely exchanging one form of servitude for another. He was an active partisan, and, in some instances, openly amenable to corruption. Sir John Trevor, the first Speaker to whom was given (by a statute of William III.) the title of "first Commoner of the realm," an able but unscrupulous man who began life in humble circumstances as a lawyer's clerk, was actually found guilty of receiving bribes, and forced to pronounce his own sentence. "Resolved," he read from the Chair on March 12, 1695, "that Sir John Trevor, Speaker of this House, for receiving a gratuity of 1000 guineas from the City of London, after the passing of the Orphans Bill, is guilty of a high crime and misdemeanour." This resolution was carried unanimously, and on the following day, when Sir John should have been in his place to put to the vote the question of his own expulsion, he wisely feigned sickness, and was never more seen within the precincts of the House.[188] [188] After his dismissal from the House of Commons, Sir John Trevor lived quietly at home and amassed money. His miserly habits became notorious. Once when he was dining alone and drinking a bottle of wine, a cousin was introduced by a side door. "You rascal," said Trevor to his servant; "how dare you bring this gentleman up the back stairs? Take him instantly down the back stairs and bring him up the _front_ stairs!" In vain did the cousin remonstrate. While he was being ceremoniously conveyed down one staircase and up the other his host cleared the dinner table, and he returned to find the bottles and glasses replaced by books and papers. Campbell's "Lives of the Chancellors," vol. v. pp. 59-60.