British History

LECTURE TWELVE

COMMONWEALTH, PROTECTORATE, AND RESTORATION

I Things students should remember about the period from 1649 to 1660.

A. By 1649, the radical element in the army had executed the king, abolished the monarchy, eliminated the House of Lords, and curtailed the power of the established church.

B. In 1649, this meant the end of censorship of the press and the spread of radical ideas. Men and women united to discuss democratic ideas about religious toleration, political representation, economic reforms, educational expansion, and legal justice. For the fourth sorts of people these were the freest days in all English history.⁽¹⁾

C. For the "Nation," these were days followed by years of social anarchy. Few capitalists or landlords had wished to abolish the old order.

D. From 1649 to 1660, the capitalists and landlords reconciled with the Grandees in Army and Charles II.

E. From 1660 to 1668, Parliament restored the monarchy, the House of Lords, and the Anglican Church. Parliament did not restore the prerogative courts of Star Chamber, High Commission, or the Council of the North. In the end Parliament AUTHORED a settlement.

II From 1649 to 1653, the Commonwealth saved the revolution and the Rump tried to write a constitution.

A. In 1649, there were only 78 House of Commons members left to protect the revolution from many enemies. Historians call this the period of the "Rump." The Rump declared England a Commonwealth and prepared to fight new enemies within and without. This parliament faced the following problems:

1. The majority of the English men and women wanted monarchy and hated the new government. The "natural" leaders in the countryside, particularly the justices of the peace, resisted Commonwealth commands.

2. Anglicans and Catholics hated the Commonwealth.

3. The "True Levellers" (Diggers), the millenarians, and Independents within the army wanted the revolution to go further. They hated the tithes and wanted greater economic and political democracy.

4. The Irish Catholics, the Scottish Presbyterians, and the Virginia Royalists rebelled against the Commonwealth. The Irish, Scots, and Virginians proclaimed Charles II King of England. Part of the English fleet went over to Charles II and his major lieutenant, Prince Rupert.

5. France and Spain recognized Charles II as King of England.

B. From 1649 to 1653, Parliament and the Commonwealth defeated most of their enemies.

1. The Rump Parliament and its Council of State arrested the leading Leveller leaders Lilburne, Walwyn, Overton, and Prince. The Rump charged them with spreading mutiny within the army while a war against Ireland and Scotland raged. The Grandees in the Army supported the Rump. The rank and file of the army supported Parliament because the government paid their arrears of wages and because many believed in fighting the Irish and Scots.

2. In September 1649, the Rump passed a bill restricting liberty of the press. By 1655, Cromwell made government censorship effective. The Rump encouraged government newspapers.

3. The Rump supported the collection of tithes. It passed measures to stop the religious activities of Ranters, Baptists, Quakers, Grindletonians, and Muggletonians. It enforced observance of the Sabbath, suppressed sins of swearing, and prescribed death sentences for those found guilty of adultery, fornication, and incest.

4. The Rump sent the army to fight against Charles II and the Irish Catholics. The English capitalists and landlords supported the Rump when it sent an army to put down the Irish Rebellion. Cromwell and his Ironsides crushed and slaughtered the Irish at Drogheda and Wrexford. Two thirds of Irish land changed hands. The Rump directed the transplantation of thousands of Irish to infertile wildernesses west of Shannon and elsewhere. Parliament sent more thousands to the colonies. Cromwell's armies subdued Ireland as never before.

5. After the Rump defeated the Irish, it turned to the Scots. At the battle of Dunbar (1650), Cromwell's army killed 3,000 Scots and took ten thousand prisoners. The army took Edinburgh and Charles II fled. The Rump united England, Ireland, and Scotland as never before.

6. To pay for its wars the Rump confiscated Royalist lands, collected taxes, and passed Navigation Act. The Navigation Act gave English shipping a monopoly on colonial trade. The Dutch resisted English intrusion and the Rump fought back by doubling the size of the navy, defeating the King's navy, and bringing Virginia and Barbados into the Commonwealth. They defeated the Dutch and forced the Netherlanders to respect the Navigation Act and the Commonwealth government.

C. By 1653, the Rump had saved the revolution. However, the army, the Levellers, the true Levellers, the Catholics, the Anglicans, the Presbyterians all hated the Rump. The army now replaced it with a Protectorate.

III From 1653 to 1654, The Protector, Oliver Cromwell, saved the revolution and the Barebones Parliament tried to write a constitution.

A. The army hated the Rump because it did not write a new constitution. The Independents in the army hated the Rump because it did not abolish the tithes. "True Levellers" and all dissenting groups hated the Rump because it persecuted their faiths. Presbyterians and Catholics hated the Rump because it failed to unify England around one faith. Cromwell and the army dismissed the Rump on 20 April 1653.

B. The Barebones Parliament replaced the Rump. It was a nominated Parliament.⁽²⁾ Barebones contained 138 selected men (126 from England, 6 from Ireland, and 6 from Scotland) known for honesty. Cromwell and the army called Barebones to write a constitution. Instead, these men called themselves a Parliament and continued to pass legislation. Barebones continued the war and passed a bill uniting England, Ireland, and Scotland. It passed a relief bill for creditors and poor prisoners and attempted to find a substitution for the tithes. Barebones Parliament, however, lasted less than nine months. It was hated most because it threatened to remove power over the clergy from lay patrons to the state. Religious conservatives walked out of the assembly. In the end Cromwell and the Army dispersed Barebones and this second attempt to write a constitution failed.

IV From 1654 to 1658 Cromwell and the Army saved the revolution and tried to write another constitution.

A. The army officers drew up a written constitution called, The Instrument of the People. By its terms, Parliament would choose a Lord Protector for life. A limited electorate was to choose a Parliament after three years. Parliament was to have 460 members, sixty each from Scotland and Ireland. The Protector had a veto power but Parliament could override it with a simple majority. Parliament was to supply revenue for a standing army of 30,000 soldiers, for a navy, and for other expenses of government. The constitution guaranteed religious liberty for all except those who believed in a return to a church governed by bishops or Catholics.

B. When the new Parliament met, half its members were Royalists. The civilian members were critical of the army's constitution and refused to ratify the Instrument. Members wanted one religious institution and greater control over the army and navy. They wanted to limit the power of the Protector between sessions. They mainly feared the power of the army to interfere with parliamentary freedom. Cromwell dismissed this Parliament in 1655. It too, however, passed legislation for road maintenance, control of wages and prices, and made hospitals available for the aged and infirmed.

C. Between his first and second Parliaments, Cromwell made peace with the Dutch in 1654. He signed a series of commercial treaties with other European powers, made friends with the French, and continued to sweep the royalists and Spanish off the seas. Cromwell strengthened England's East India Company and in the war with Spain captured Jamaica for England. He encouraged religious toleration throughout the country.

D. A Royalist uprising in 1655 led Cromwell to divide England into eleven districts ruled over by major-generals. Cromwell called a second Parliament in 1656. He excluded over one hundred members hoping to get a constitution ratified. He ended the rule of the major-generals in 1657 and accepted a parliamentary constitution, The Humble Petition and Advice. It enhanced parliament's power over the army. It erected a two-chamber parliament. The second house was to be hereditary. It set stricter limits on religious toleration and offered Cromwell a crown. Cromwell would not accept the crown. Before parliament could revise the new constitution, army opposition grew to the Humble Petition. Cromwell dissolved Parliament. He died in 1658 before he could call another Parliament. England did not have a constitution.

IV Richard Cromwell failed to save the revolution.

A. Before 1658, the English people did not want the Stuarts back. After that date, they changed their minds.

1. From the time of Cromwell's death until the end of 1659, all major political groups failed to find an alternative constitution.

2. The contending groups met first in a parliament called by Richard Cromwell in 1658. This Parliament ended in early 1659 when the rank and file of the army again tried to cause a revolution from below. In May 1659, they took charge and forced Richard to call the Rump Parliament back into being. The Rump refused radical reform and the army again dismissed it and sent Richard Cromwell packing as well. A Committee of Public Safety under Major General Charles Fleetwood took charge. Another part of the army under George Monck declared for a restoration of the Rump. Monck marched south from Scotland, Fleetwood resigned, and the Rump returned again. Monck ordered that all those who were members of Parliament in 1648 return to their seats. On 16 March 1660, the Long Parliament dissolved itself. The Republican experiment ended. In April, parliament men called themselves to meet again as a "Convention Parliament." The Convention invited Charles II to return to England. Paradise was lost.

C. Parliament restored Charles II and monarchy.

1. From Breda, In Holland, Charles II issued a declaration promising that he would pardon all rebels against his father, except for those designated for punishment by Parliament.

2. Parliament was to decide the question of restoration of Royalist lands sold during the past 18 years.

3. Parliament was to pay army wages and arrears. Parliament was to retire the army.

4. Charles promised not to punish those of "tender consciences" (dissenters) if they abided by the laws of England.

5. Parliament agreed to execute ten of those who had taken part in the trial and execution of Charles I. Parliament ordered the bodies of Cromwell, Ireton, and Bradshaw be dug up, hung from gibbets, and later beheaded.

6. Parliament restored crown and church lands to original owners.

7. Parliament granted Charles II a regular income of £1,200,000.

8. Parliament passed an act abolishing feudal tenures. This made all landlords owners of unencumbered private property.

9. Charles II reign began in 1649. Parliament found all Acts passed from 1642 to 1660 illegal because they lacked the king's signature. In the early days of the new reign, Parliament again passed many of these acts including the Cromwellian Navigation Act. When the king returned he was still divine but he lost his prerogative courts, the right to collect taxes without parliament, the right to forced loans, benevolences, and ship money. Charles was an authored monarch. He and his brother James did not approve of this aspect of the Restoration. As early as 1673, another revolution was already on the horizon. In that year, James II, the heir to the throne of England, announced that he was a Catholic.

1. ¹Students interested in this subject should consult Christopher Hill, The World Turned Upside Down. They should also study the works of Gerrard Winstanley. Particularly interesting section of the Bible on the subject of millennialist's predictions are the "Book of Daniel" and "The Revelation of John."

2. ²It was called after a London Baptist named Praise-God Barebones. He was a London leather seller.