Harley's Dozen

Harley's Dozen were twelve new peerages created in December 1711 by the British Tory government of Robert Harley which was struggling to gain a majority in the Whig-dominated House of Lords. This came at a time when the government were negotiating peace terms to end the ongoing War of the Spanish Succession, which were unlikely to pass the Lords where opposition Whigs and some Tories had joined to block them under the slogan "No Peace Without Spain".