stuarts 3- restoration Flashcards
crown is weak
financial
eyes alert to corruption
military wesakness
crown is weak - financial restoration
- Supposed to have an ordinary revenue of 1.2m gets 800k
- This is less in real terms that in 1510, and has to cover new expenses like a standing army and navy which in 1684 cost 267 and 481k for the year respectively.
- Debt an enduring problem, not just because of Charles II’s extravagance, in 1665 it was 1.25m, by 1670 3m and even with Danby’s cutbacks it remained at 2.4m in 1679.
eyes alert to corruption 0restoration crown weak
Age old expedients like granting crown lands to courtiers, was condemned by MPs in 1663.
- Parliamentary commissions into corruption: like the Covid enquiry today, anything so probing is likely to de-legitimise the subject.
military weakness- restoration king
Musters are not working
- Parliamentary suspicion of standing armies: it results in, or is sufficiently widespread to be used as an excuse for, Danby’s downfall.
- Permanent force of 3-4k, Scotland 2.7k, Ireland 7.5k
- Interregnum force was 60k, Louis XIV 100k
Charles ii character
- vigorous revival of touching for the king’s evil
- Bishop Burnet: King “had a strange command of himself… greatest art of concealing himself of any man alive, so that those about him cannot tell when he is ill or well pleased.” Says that this doesn’t earn Charles any “real affection.”
faction in restoration
Clarendon powerful
cabal fight for power
Danby
Clarendon powerful- restoration
1661-1667
Earl of Britstol tries to impeach him, Sir Henry Bennet and his followers undermine Clarendon’s parliamentary programme.
Miller
miller- Clarendon
argues that the replacement of the loyal, harmonious Clarendonians with the disparate mix of oppositionists, whose loyalty could never be assured and many of whom were especially released from gaol as Republicans for their appointment, marked the downfall of C2.
cabal fight for power- restoration
1668- 1672
the mercurial Buckingham brings out the worst in Charles – encourages frentic pleasure seeking.
Danby - restoration
1673-79
- Use of gifts, pensions etc to ensure support in Court, Council and Parliament.
- 1677: Andrew Morrell: once elected, MPs “list themselves straightaway into some court faction” which can be differentiated by their “coats and badges.”
popular politics- whig v tory
Terrence ball
knights
- Divides go all the way down the social hierarchy.
- Tories associated with the crown but never won popular support because they were constitutionally anti-populist: one pamphlet reads: “each cobbler’s a statesman grown, and the bold rabble convert each alehouse board to a council table.”
terrance ball on party restoration
party’ not just a new word for faction, it represents a conceptual change in its nature.
knights on parties
“party alleigance was ideologically driven, increasingly well organised along bipartisan lines and went beyond local loyalties, personal connections and social deference.”
insecurity of regime
- opp
- lack of royalists
- lack of control
-irreperable
insecurity of regime lack of royalists and divisions
Tim Harris describes it: “Constitutionally, it was as if the last nineteen years had never happened.”
- only 40% of JPs were ex-royalists
- Tapsell: the Tory-Whig division bespeaks a “fundemental disagreement about the Restoration itself.”
- Despite the Act of Indemnity and Oblivion, the country was still divided. In 1670 a man accused of being a conventicle objected to the foreman of the jury on the grounds he had fought for the king and thus it was unfair.
opp- inseercuty restoration
Archbishop Shelden’s tirades about lack of enforcement should be seen in light of the above.
- Rebellion in London in 1661 (Venner uprising), in Yorkshire and Ireland 1663; Scotland 1666 and 1679.
- Seaward: “state on probation”
lack of control and fall social order
- Censorship had collapsed with Star Chamber in 1641
- Landowners had less wealth, purchasing power and social capital
irreperable- restoration
- Kishlansky argues the former state of mutuality and consensus was irrecoverable.
regime alienated its support
Clarendon’s fall can be viewed as a product of the Cavaliers’ perception he had betrayed them
- Speedy disbandment of the NMA and benefits for injured soldiers asked awkward for the questions re their slow process
- Crown fails to offer compensation for its supporters who were victims of parliamentary exactions or confiscation
- high-profile parliamentarians given roles over loyal royalists: Duke of Albemarte captain-general of the army; Earl of Manchester Lord Chamberlain; Lord Ashley COE.
- Stop on the Exchequer.
plots - restoration
- upper clases
- print and radical groups
- coroners
plots- upper class restoration
evidence that Monmouth, Russell, Essex, Lord Grey and the Scottish Earl of Argyll were planning a joint uprising in 1682
- Rye House Plot sees the arrest of Whig leaders including Essex, Russell, Sidney, Hampden and Howard of Escrick
threat restoration- radicals and pint
- Quakers exhibit radical social positions: one claimed the nobility founded on nothing but “fraud, deceit and deception.”
- Growth of print: Marprelate tracts run to 15 or 16 tracts; 128 debate the 1688 revolution
- Knights: “vaccum of authority resulting from the undermining of traditional authorities such as the crown and the church during the mid-century crisis partly filled by the public.”
commons threat restoration
End of rising food prices sees the rise of those industrialists with less emphasis on feudal obligations and social harmony
Urbanisation, literacy and changing labour structures see, in Hobswbawm’s famous phrase: “collective bargaining riot.”
Econ restroation
- English cloth trade suffers as Colbert places tariffs on English cloth in 1667 at 9x the previous rate.
- Trade deficit of £1.6m with France.
- Colonies like Virginia rebelliing in 1676.
James ii inheritance good
- Smith:
- Earl of Petrborough, February 1685, “everything is happy here… never was a king proclaimed with more applause.”
- Only 57 Whigs elected in the May 1685 Parliament
- Tory revolt unlikely, even if antagonised, due to natural deference to monarchy (Smith).
- Kenyon
smith on James ii inheritance
“few monarchs have inherited such an apparently strong position as James II.”
Kenyon inheritance good
described James as the first monarch since Henry VIII free of financial worries
popular support seen James ii
Parliament allowed the standing army to be increased to 20k.
- As late as August 27 1688, Sunderland could observe “there never was in England less thought of rebellion.” - Jeremy Black and Johnathan Israel argue regime so secure only a foreign invasion could have unseated James.
limited support for James-
thus drastic actions :
- As late as August 27 1688, Sunderland could observe “there never was in England less thought of rebellion.” - Jeremy Black and Johnathan Israel argue regime so secure only a foreign invasion could have unseated James.
Harris
speck
Harris - popular support limited James ii
- William, constitutionally cautious, would only have invaded with a good chance of success and thus popular acceptance.
- “the truth is that James’ regime had begun to collapse even before the famous 7 sent their invitation to William.”
speck- jamesi i
Reluctant Revolutionaries to argue ‘In 1685 the loyalty of [James’] subjects contributed to the king’s successful crushing of [Monmouth’s] rebellion. In 1688 the alienation of his subjects helped the cause of the Revolution.’
James absolutist- no
Promised at his accession to rule within the lawful boundaries.
James absolutist
- letter fr ambasador
- legal system
- firing on religion
European soveriegns
speck
letter fr ambassador- absolutism
- 2 days later he said to the French Ambassador: I hope “to put off the assembling of parliament or maintain myself by other means which appear more convenient for me.”
legal absoltis James and rights
Magdalen, Oxford confrontation – deprivation of their fellowships associated with a wider attack on property rights.
Godden vs Hales case, June 1686, pushed the judges into accepting his dispensary power for the Test and Corporation Acts.
firing- absolutism
- When LT Rochester publically said he would never become a Catholic he was fired.
jones on James absolutism
James’ political efforts were designed to emulate European sovereigns ‘by making himself independent of his subjects.’ec
speck on James absolutism
that ‘[James’] whole autocratic temperament was inimical to the role of a limited monarch.’
popishness and reaction
- Virtually whole court and council Catholic
- Tories naturally loyal to the crown and the COE: James makes them choose between them, and the Homily on Obedience ultimately made it an easy decision.
- 1686: Anglican magistrates like the Lord Mayor of Bristol tries preventing the celebration of the mass; Lord Mayor of London tries to stop the erection of a Catholic chapel in London
James religious measures
protests from parliament
religious tolerance
scotland
pres
James ii protests parliament religion
November 1685, protests from Commons and Lords about his dispensations to 90 Catholic officers to join the army.
James religious tolerate
November 1686, licensing office for certificates of dispensation from penal laws for dissenters
- February 1687, proclamation granting freedom of private worship to Catholics and Quakers, not dissenters
- June 1687, Declaration of Indulgence allowing complete tolerance for Catholics and private worship for presbyterians.
scot- James ii religon
- Presbyterians quickly gained prominence and in west Scotland they derailled the established church which began to lose control: quickly seen as a premonition of England
ireland- james ii religion
- Equally, in Ireland, by September 1686, Catholics constituted 67% of army privates and 40% officers. Established church and schools deprived of funds, judges and privy councillors replaced with Catholics.
