Conclusion: the maintenance of political stability Flashcards
What ensured that there were more direct links between the central and county authorities?
Institutions and the ubiquitous JPs and newly created lords lieutenant
What was the impact of the development of central and local administration?
Instrumental in producing a political and social structure that made government more effective and reduced the likelihood of provincial disturbances
What did most people do?
Sought stability and never considered challenging the authorities
What did those in authority stress?
The need for people to know their place and to keep it
What was Elizabethan society obsessed with?
Maintaining order and security
Why were social relations upheld and stability maintained?
By being good neighbours, by resolving personal problems privately, and by behaving responsibility
What appears to have occurred?
A ‘reformation of manners’ in which people tried to control their behaviour for the good of their people, seeking compromise
Who ensured that local order was upheld and what did they do?
Yeomen and husbandmen
Bound over potential troublemakers and inculcated a moral obligation to obey the law
What might individuals consider and what might they consider as a last resort?
Litigation
Civil disobedience
How was the imposition of order achieved and the maintenance of stability?
By magistrates and manorial courts
The ordinary, ‘middling’ people, who became parish officers, constables, and bailiffs
By the end of the period what had widened and why?
The gulf between rich and poor, and between governors and governed
Prosperous people had little in common with others, often having their property and having an interest in upholding the social mores
What would the rich not do under any circumstances?
Lead or join popular disturbances
What did the increase in town charters and the explosion in local government offices lead to?
Towns acquiring greater responsibility for their welfare
Local people sought to remedy their problems and selected their own citizens to manage the administration
By the end of Elizabeth’s reign, what were yeomen and craftsmen doing?
Serving as constables, churchwardens, watchmen and overseers of the poor
As keepers of the gaols, houses of correction, and customs houses
Assumed a collective responsibility for maintaining order
