Absolutism and Constitutionalism Flashcards
When a state has a monopoly over the instruments of justice and the use of force in a country.
Sovereignty
A system where a monarch wields supreme power and claims to have to answer only to God.
Absolutism
A balance between governmental powers and the rights of a government’s subjects.
Constitutionalism
The belief that a King is God’s chosen instrument on Earth and answerable to God alone
Divine Right of Kings.
A French monarch strongly influenced by a certain Cardinal, who led his nation through the Thirty Years War.
Louis XIII
The aforementioned Cardinal who dominated Louis XIII’s royal council and helped consolidate royal power. Also founded the Academie Francaise.
Cardinal Richelieu
The embodiment of French absolutism, and longest-serving European monarch, who revoked the Edict of Nantes
Louis XIV (The Sun King)
The last Tudor monarch of England, successor to Elizabeth I.
James I
One branch of England’s bicameral parliament that controlled taxation and was originally filled with knights and burgesses.
House of Commons
A clandestine collusion conjured up by a cadre of Catholics led by Guy Fawkes to blow up Parliament
Gunpowder Plot
The son of James I whose supposed sympathies to Catholicism and baiting of the House of Commons led to his being overthrown from the English throne.
Charles I
Thought not the Magna Carta, this document set out to define the rights of English subjects, such as Parliament’s authority to tax.
Petition of Right (1628)
The Parliament that served between 1640 and 1660 and did much to limit Charles I’s power.
Long Parliament
A list of grievances presented to Charles I from the English parliament in 1641
Grand Remonstrance
A conflict between Parliamentary and Royalist forces that ended with a victory for the Parliamentarians.
English Civil War
Another name for the period between Charles I’s execution and Charles II’s ascension to the throne.
Interregnum
Leader of the Parliamentary forces and Lord Protector of England.
Oliver Cromwell
A name given to the ostensibly republican government of Cromwell.
Protectorate
The site of a Cromwell-ordered massacre of rebelling Irish Catholics.
Drogheda
Laws requiring that English goods be transported on English ships.
Navigation Acts
The return of a king to the Throne of England and the period shortly thereafter.
The Restoration
The King who was restored.
Charles II
A law passed by Parliament in place of the Declaration of Indulgence requiring public office holders to swear an oath of loyalty to the Anglican Church.
Test Act
The successor to Charles II. (Hint: NOT Charles III.)
James II
