While France witnessed the rise of Absolutism in the 1600s, England would develop a parliamentary system of government limiting the power of the king. The foundation for the development of constitutionalism in England was established in the Middle Ages. The Magna Carta (1215) limited royal power by stating that the king could not tax without the consent of the Grand Council (consisting of the nobility and the high clergy). The Grand Council later evolved into the Parliament, which alone levied taxes. By the 1300s, the Parliament or the Grand Council included middle-class representation. Because the enlarged council served as a model for England’s future legislature, it is often called the Model Parliament. By the fourteenth century, Parliament had compelled English monarchs to accept guidelines on the question of taxes as well as other issues. In the fifteenth century, after the War of Roses (1455-1485), Henry Tudor established the Tudor Dynasty following the defeat of Richard III of the House of York in 1485, becoming Henry VII (b. 1457, ruled 1485-1509) after he married Elizabeth of York and was crowned King.
After the death of Henry VII, Henry VIII (b. 1491, ruled 1509-1547) and Elizabeth (b. 1533, ruled 1558-1603) strengthened the power of the Tudor monarchy by governing intelligently and following a popular foreign policy. The Tudors were successful because they skillfully mastered Parliament by outwardly consulting it, but actually dominating the legislature. They also aided the middle class by providing law and order and encouraging trade. In 1603, the Tudor dynasty ended when Elizabeth died childless. Her cousin King James Stuart of Scotland (James VI) ascended to the throne.
James I (b. 1556, ruled 1603-1625) created resentment and hostility by telling Parliament at their first session that his power could not be challenged. Although the king had the power to summon and dismiss the Parliament, he needed its support to raise money for additional revenue that was beyond his ordinary expenses. Parliament refused to grant him additional revenue. James I squandered his revenue on an extravagant lifestyle at the court and was unable to live within the fixed and customary level of the crown. From 1610-1611, James I and Parliament were involved in continuous debates on how to finance the government.
In religious matters, the Puritans (a Calvinist sect) viewed James I as the enemy. They wanted to purify the Anglican church of all traces of Catholicism. In 1604, when they petitioned James I to reform the Church of England, James refused to make any changes. James I presided at the Hampton Court Conference (1604). The goal of the conference was to examine the different versions of the English Bible, which had been translated from the original Hebrew and Greek. From this conference, originated the movement from which came the authorized King James Version of the Bible, the first edition of which appeared in 1611. James I also followed an unpopular foreign policy of friendship with Catholic Spain.
Like his father James I, Charles I (b. 1600, ruled 1625-1649) wanted to rule by the Divine Right. Yet Charles was more politically inept than his father, running into friction with Parliament when they refused to grant him a lifetime of custom duties, instead granting him a one-year period. Charles used his wife’s dowry to fight a war against Spain, which was a failure. However, when he needed additional money for his military expedition against Spain, he requested a forced loan from his wealthier subjects. Several members of the gentry refused to vote for the loans and Charles threw them into jail. In 1628, Parliament again declined to give Charles additional resources unless he signed the Petition of Rights, which forbade the king to do the following:
Charles ended up signing the petition in order to get his funds. Charles ruled without the Parliament for eleven years (1629-1640).
In 1637, Charles tried to impose Anglican practices on Calvinist Scotland. They revolted and Charles was forced to call upon Parliament, referred to as the Short Parliament because it lasted only three weeks, to raise money for the war against the Scots. They turned down his request unless Charles addressed their grievances. The Scots defeated Charles’ army and invaded northern England. The Scots demanded money in order to leave Scotland. Thus, in 1640, Charles again appealed to the Parliament for money. This Parliament, known as the Long Parliament because it lasted 20 years, managed to pass laws limiting the power of the king. The king was compelled to summon Parliament every three years and could not dissolve Parliament without its consent. Parliament also impeached Charles’ chief advisors, supporting what was known as the Grand Remonstrance, a list of 204 Parliamentary grievances from the past decades. In 1642, Charles I charged five Parliament members with high treason and tried to arrest them. When Parliament refused to hand the members over, the king decided to personally arrest them. The five members fled, having received information in advance. Parliament then demanded sole command of the military forces. Charles refused and in August he fled London to Nottingham to recruit and gather his army, declaring war against Parliament. The English Civil War had begun.
The English Civil War concerned religious differences and also centered on whether authority or sovereignty rested in England with the monarchy or the Parliament. It had two phases: Phase I (1642-1646) and Phase II (1646-1649).
The participants in the English Civil War were:
At first, the Cavaliers gained victory until Scotland intervened on the side of Parliament and Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658), a Puritan leader in Parliament, emerged as a leader. Cromwell organized the New Model Army composed of well-paid and disciplined soldiers. In 1644, Cromwell’s Model Army defeated Charles and the Royalists at Marston Moor. In 1646, Charles gave himself up to the Scots, who turned him over to Parliament, which was led by Cromwell.
The victors then quarreled among themselves. The Presbyterian wing of the Puritan movement, supported by the Scots, decided to set up a constitutional monarchy, with Charles at the head and Presbyterianism as the established church. They were opposed by the army – which was more radical than Parliament and wanted a republic – some of whose members, like Cromwell, were Independents who favored some religious toleration for all groups except Catholics and were opposed to Presbyterianism as the established church. To add to the confusion, Parliament refused to pay the troops. Charles took advantage of this situation between Parliament and the army and fled London. In 1647, the Scots allied with Charles, who promised that he would support Presbyterianism in England. In August, 1648, the Scots invaded England but the army, led by Cromwell, defeated them at the Battle of Preston. Charles was captured. The second civil war had made Cromwell the undisputed leader. In 1648, the Rump Parliament was established which removed all Presbyterian members and was under the control of Cromwell. After a formal trial, Charles I was accused of treason and condemned to death. Charles I was beheaded on January 30, 1649. The Civil War was over.
From 1649-1653, the Rump Parliament claimed to have supreme power. The monarchy was abolished and a Commonwealth, a Republican form of government, was established. In 1653, Cromwell expelled the Rump Parliament because the Parliament was lax in paying the troops, had been accused of accepting bribes, and filled vacancies in Parliament by nominations and not by elections. In 1653, Cromwell took the title of Lord Protectorate and established a military dictatorship. He suppressed rebellions in Ireland and Scotland, advanced English trade, and greatly increased English power. However, Cromwell’s rule did not gain popular support as people resented the severe moral code of the Puritans. The Anglicans, who were more numerous than the Puritans, also opposed Cromwell’s policy of intolerance. When Cromwell died in 1658, people were tired of his stern military rule and deposed his son Richard in 1660. Charles II, son of Charles I, was invited to return from exile and accept the throne.
Mindful of his father’s fate, Charles II (b. 1630, ruled 1660-1685) pledged to work with Parliament. He accepted the Parliament’s right to levy taxes and agreed to call Parliament into regular sessions. During his reign, the Cavalier Parliament restored the Church of England as the official church. In 1670, Charles signed a secret treaty with Catholic France in which he received subsidy in return for some vague promise that England may become Catholic. In 1673, Parliament passed the Test Act, which excluded all Catholics from public office. It also tried to pass a law excluding James, Charles’ Catholic brother, from inheriting the throne; it failed. At this time, Parliament was divided into two groups: the Whigs, who wanted a constitutional monarchy under a Protestant king; and the Tories, who supported the king, but feared the restoration of Catholicism. The Whigs, fearful of Charles II’s pro-Catholic tendencies, did what they could to limit his power. In 1679, under the control of the Whigs, the Parliament passed the Habeas Corpus Act. This act prohibited imprisonment without due cause and guaranteed a fair trial.
Upon the death of Charles II in 1685, James II (who reigned from 1685-1688), assumed the throne. As a converted Catholic, James antagonized the Parliament by appointing pro-Catholic ministers to important posts, which angered the Whigs who supported the Church of England. James’ efforts to set up a standing army created fears among the Tories. When the wife of James gave birth to a son, Parliament was fearful that Catholicism would be re-established in England.
In 1688, Parliament secretly offered the English crown to William, the Protestant ruler of Holland, and his wife Mary, the Protestant daughter of James II. They accepted. When William arrived in England, James II fled to France. In 1689, Parliament proclaimed William and Mary the new king and queen of England, under the conditions that they accept the Declaration of Rights, which later was enacted into law as the Bill of Rights. This bloodless overthrow of the previous monarch in 1688 is called the Glorious Revolution because there was such little violence.
The Glorious Revolution had the following effect upon English government: