AP European History
AP European History
Like the so-called religious wars, the English Civil War was both religious and political in nature. The political component involved conflict over sovereignty (ultimate authority) between the new Stuart line of monarchs and the English Parliament. Religiously, Puritans wished to purify the state Anglican Church of what they perceived as the residue of Catholic doctrine and worship, which the Stuarts seemed to endorse. Lasting almost a century (from 1603 to 1689), the conflict ultimately laid the foundations for England’s unique system of government, which combined elements of monarchy, oligarchy (“rule by a few”), and democracy.
Elizabeth I died without an heir, leaving the throne (in 1603) to the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, James I. As a Scottish outsider, James failed to appreciate the important legislative role played by the English Parliament, whom he continually lectured about his divine-right powers and foolishly laid out in a book, The True Law of Free Monarchies (1598). In addition, James antagonized Puritans with the hierarchical structure he retained for the Anglican Church. To control the clergy and religion in general, James believed such an episcopal (“of bishops”) structure was necessary; hence, his saying, “No bishop, no king.” The growing number of Puritans in Parliament preferred a loose church configuration that allowed individual congregations to control local affairs but cooperate through regional governing boards. James’s policies fueled anti-Catholic sentiment, which was only heightened in 1605 when radical Catholics failed to blow up the Parliament, an event known as the Gunpowder Plot.
These issues came to head during the reign of James’s son, Charles I (1625-1649). When Charles demanded revenue, Parliament instead issued the Petition of Right (1628), an assertion of its prerogatives regarding taxation and liberties from arbitrary arrest and imprisonment. This latter issue had arisen due to the Stuarts use of the Star Chamber, a royal court in which standard judicial procedures were ignored in favor of secrecy and arbitrary judgments. Frustrated with Parliament, Charles decided to rule alone from 1629 to 1639, relying on revenues from the royal domain and the use of ship money-in which coastal towns were required to contribute either ships or money for defense. This latter policy had the effect of alienating the growing mercantile elite. Further, Charles’s religious policies, guided by Archbishop of Canterbury William Laud (1573-1645), seemed to Puritans little different than Catholicism. Laud attempted to impose uniformity on the realm in 1640 with a new Book of Common Prayer, causing the Scots, who favored a decentralized church structure, to rise in rebellion.
Now Charles had to call the Parliament back into session in order defend against a Scottish invasion. Rather than grant Charles his requested taxes, the Parliament once again asserted its liberties and placed two of his top officials on trial for treason. When Charles attempted in 1642 to arrest the parliamentary leaders of the Puritan cause, his action misfired and plunged England into civil war. The war between the forces of the king (Cavaliers) and those of Parliament (Roundheads) resulted in the capture of Charles in 1645. This conflict brought the brilliant and zealous leader of Parliament’s New Model Army to the fore – Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658). Not only an outstanding military leader who employed many of the new more flexible tactics, Cromwell was a devout Puritan who believed, along with his men, in religious toleration for all Protestant denominations and a democratic church structure.
When Parliament refused to take action against the captured king, Cromwell surrounded the Parliament and drove out its more moderate members. This new Rump Parliament placed the king under arrest and executed him for treason in 1649. Soon Cromwell had disposed of even the Rump Parliament and named himself Lord Protector under the only written constitution in England’s history, the Instrument of Government (1653). Eventually Cromwell imposed military rule and pursued vigorous policies aimed at reforming English morals (by banning plays, gambling, and the celebration of Christmas, which smacked of Catholic “idolatry”), promoting English commerce via mercantilism, and violently subduing rebellion in Ireland and Scotland. After Cromwell’s death in 1658, the English aristocracy, weary of military rule and Cromwell’s Puritanism, agreed to restore the Stuart monarchy.
With the Restoration of Charles II (1660-1685) as monarch, the same issues of religion and political control quickly reasserted themselves. Though Charles privately inclined toward Catholicism, he hid his sympathies behind a façade of religious tolerance, while appointing Catholics as justices of the peace (local officials). In 1673, Parliament responded with the Test Act, which required all officeholders to take communion in the Church of England. Further, Charles’s pro-French policy ran counter to years of English diplomacy. In fact, Charles had signed in 1670 the secret Treaty of Dover with Louis XIV, in which he gained an annual subsidy from the French king, while agreeing to reintroduce Catholicism in England at the first opportunity. With these funds, Charles was able to rule without Parliament in the last years of his reign.
What caused the end of the Stuart monarchy was the prospect of a Catholic dynasty for the foreseeable future. Charles’s brother, James II (1685-88), ascended to the throne in 1685, despite the division in Parliament between those who supported his legitimate succession (Tories) and those who opposed him (Whigs). James was an avowed Catholic, which might have been tolerable, until his wife gave birth to a male heir in 1688. Faced with the prospect of a Catholic dynasty, Whig members of Parliament invited James’s daughter Mary, a Protestant, and her husband, William of Orange, stadholder of the Netherlands, to invade the nation and claim the throne as co-rulers. The resulting Glorious Revolution proved a success, and William III (1689-1702) and Mary II (1688-1694) agreed to parliamentary sovereignty and recognition of English liberties with the Bill of Rights (1689). In addition, Parliament passed a Toleration Act (1689), which allowed Protestant dissenters to worship but excluded them from public service, and the Act of Succession (1701), which prohibited the English monarchy from ever being held by a Catholic. Finally, to cement ties formally with Scotland, the English Parliament agreed in 1707 to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain. The Glorious Revolution and this series ofacts laid the foundation for Britain’s unique but stable government and commercial dominance in the 18th century.