William exercised for the first time his right of veto. That such first employment of it should have been on a matter touching his own interests, and at the same time affecting the independence of the judicial bench, was unfortunate; but it is impossible to complain of his exerting his constitutional authority in this case to arrest a measure of such a kind as would not, even in our more advanced days, be introduced without the express assent of the Crown. The "event" of the year 1691 was undoubtedly the political intrigue, the discovery of which led to the dismissal and disgrace of Marlborough. That indefatigable plotter, who was still holding active communication with St. Germains, undertook to move an address in the House of Lords requesting that all foreigners might be dismissed from the service of the Crown. It was said and believed that his object in doing this was to inflame the national and professional jealousies of the country and the army against the Dutch officers in William's service, so that in the event of William declining to act upon the advice of his Parliament, he would find both the people and the soldiery prepared to support him in an ulterior design of deposing the King and placing Anne upon the throne, with himself as mayor of the palace. The plot, however, if plot there was, fell through; and assuming it to have been really conceived, the natural resentment with which it inspired William would of course sufficiently account for the disgrace and dismissal of Marlborough which followed immediately afterwards.[14] The attempt of the half-lunatic, half-villain Fuller to repeat the exploits of Oates, with a trumped-up and promptly disproved charge of conspiracy against many prominent personages, inspired doubts in the public mind as to whether there had ever been any Scotch plot at all.