Charles I Personal Rule 1629-40 Flashcards
How much debt was Charles in by 1629?
£2m
What were his foreign policies?
Treaty of Susa - 1629
He made peace with France because he wanted to reduce spending on money he did not already have
He couldn’t play apart in the 30YW because it was embarrassed internationally before.
Treaty of Madrid - 1630
Made peace with Spain
Cut more expenditure
Puritans felt the protestant cause was deserted
What domestic policies did Charles do?
Book of Rates -
Enforced collecting custom duties
Income increased by £435k
Did it w/o consent
Recusants -
He wanted to collect recusants and quadrupled revenue to £26,866
Alienated the Catholics - his wife being Catholic didn’t help.
What was the Distraint of Knighthood?
He found old laws to get money
Fined anyone holding >£40/year worth of land who wasn’t a knight in the prev. coronation
Made £170k
What was the negative to the Distraint of Knighthood?
It was an old law that had not been enforced in a long time and this caused resentment.
What did Charles do in regards to monopolies?
Sold monopolies
Act in 1624 forbade the sale of monopolies to individuals but not companies
Crown gained £30k
What trial was there with Catholic in regards to monopolies? What did this make the courtiers?
Trial about soap
Enriched the courtiers who bypassed laws
What did Charles do with wardships?
Made money increase by a 1/3 to £75k
What was a benefit and con to wardships?
Found a simple way to get short and long term financial solution
Exploited the estates held by the heirs
What did Charles do regarding maps borders?
Tried to find old maps and documents to find laws that weren’t apart of the royal forest
Charged houses not inside boundaries
What was the result of the maps?
Gained some money but overall was little - mostly from one Lord @ 20k
Very weak because of the major resentment caused - could lose the dressing room
What did Charles do with boundaries?
Imposed fines for breaches from old laws of buildings outside of London
Considered illegal enclosures
Why was this unfair?
Seen as a tax on population growth
What was the crown land rents?
Fined tenants and increased crown land rents who did not document correctly
How did the crown land rents cause resentment?
Angered landowners who were supportive of the crown
Landowners didn’t need to document because it was a open secret type thing.
What was the ship money tax? What did Charles do with it?
Old tax paid by coastal areas to build ships and secure trade
It was an emergency tax but Charles extended inland
What was the pros and cons to the ship money tax?
It raised £200k between 1635-8
It was very unpopular and unwarranted because it was not a permanent tax and it targeted the working class
What was the John Hampden Case 1637?
Trial where they questioned the legitimacy of the tax
The King won 7-5 so it reinforced the legitimacy of the tax being questioned.
John Hampden refused to pay ship money
He had a lawyer who was apart of the Puritan gentry
How many people paid the ship money tax by 1639?
1/5
98% of expected revenue by 1636
What was the positive to the JH case 1637?
Charles continued to collect taxes
What was a negative to the JH case 1637?
Reactions were hostile because of the gentry and it encouraged the questioning of the legitimacy of the tax.
Who spoke against the ship money?
Lord Saye and Sele
How did Charles manage his financial policy during Personal Rule? Limits MPS
He had to pawn one of the crown jewels
He failed to pay one creditor and became bankrupt - Charles had a very bad credit score
He made the City of London very reluctant to assist him in lending money - only gave £20k
Charles spent large sums of money especially on the arts eg Gonzaga Dukes of Mantua in 1627 for £18k
He alienated many people for activities such as the ship money tax in 1637, which led to the John Hampden case; the boundaries and use of old laws to gain money alienated his allies of the gentry even if it gave him a decent chunk of the debt to pay back.
He increased the income of the Book of Rates that was done without parliamentary consent
How did Charles manage his financial policy during Personal Rule? Successes MPS
He had commissions to investigate the excessive spending and regular audits to pick up frauds
He stopped selling crown lands because this reduced the crown income - he had to already sell £600k worth of land already
By the mid 1630s the debt decreased to £1m which was the same amount that James left him with
Income exceeded the expenditure and he was actually successful at balancing the books
Charles’ subjects were not pleased that the debt was down because they were worried that he would never call Parliament - they actually want him to fail, which shows that because he is not respecting his subjects much, they want him to fail by doing a bad job
He made £170k in the Distraint of the Knights; he quadrupled revenue to just under £27k with recusants
The crown gained £30k via monopolies.
