The Subscription Controversy of the 1770s, often called the Clerical Petition Controversy to distinguish it from other subscription controversies, was just one aspect of the prolonged struggle between liberals, or Latitudinarians, and conservatives within the Anglican church, and it soon was connected with the similar struggle within the Dissenting denominations. There are no full-length modern studies of the Subscription Controversy, but books dealing with various aspects of eighteenth-century religious history often mention it.1