The trend of challenge to Royal policies and authority in Early Stuart England (1603-49) was significant because it resulted in the Civil War and the overthrow of monarchical government.
This trend was influenced by political, social and economic forces. The political forces were mainly over the debate between absolutism and constitutionalism. Social forces involved a conflict within the Church of England between Arminianism/Laudianism and Puritanism. Underlying the political and social forces were economic forces which have been subject to considerable debate among historians.
The traditional interpretation of why the Civil War eventuated in England in 1642 is that there was a growing challenge by Parliament, especially the House of Commons
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The Commons stated its intention to be more outspoken in future. James I reminded them of ‘the Divine Right of Kings’ to govern. An axiom of English constitutionalism was the supremacy of law, whereas James had come from Scotland where arbitrary jurisdictions were the rule. James pronounced that parliament had no right at all except by the divinely ordained grace of the monarch. The Commons replied if he thought that was the case in England, then he had been “misinformed”. Obviously there was a tension building. This came to a head in 1610 with Salisbury’s attempt to deal with Royal debt by a comprehensive change to modernise the whole system of tax collection (known as the “Great Contract”) which was fiercely opposed by Parliament. Those in Parliament feared proposed property taxes which if accurately assessed would be harder to avoid or pass on to the lower classes. They were determined to oppose any Royal policy that would affect their situation and the whole proposal was defeated. The next “Addled” parliament of 1614 was so troubled that no laws at all were passed, nor did it vote any taxes. There was a tidal wave of criticism of Royal policies. James I confided to the Spanish Ambassador that the Commons was ‘a body without a
Before the Civil War era, the Federal Government was conjoined to be known as the Union. The Union consisted of twenty Free states and five Border States but all history comes to an end at one point. A year later the Union broke apart bringing in the Civil War due to important causes as well. These causes would be weak presidential leadership, the Dredd Scott decision, the Kansas- Nebraska Act and slavery. While all played an important, three successfully cause the union to break apart.
During the early seventeenth century, both England and France experienced a sever increase in the absolutism of each respective monarchy. In England, rulers like James I and Charles I took absolute control of how government was ran and did not recognize parliamentary sovereignty in the decision- making process, and, almost identically, in France, a series of monarchs beginning with Louis XIV controlled their government. Additionally, there were economic problems such as taxation without parliamentary consult in England and the devastation of large debts and famines in France. All of these factors played major roles leading up revolutions in these two countries that would forever change how they governed their people.
The civil war was an ugly fight between the North, which was called the Union, they were against slavery, and the South who were called the Confederacy, they were for slavery.
The Civil War often called the “first modern war” was a fundamental event in the American history. The Civil War resolved an essential issue that was not addressed by the revolution; whether slaves were included in the rights of Declaration of Independence which claimed that “all men were created equal”, or not. Although the war started with the purpose of preserving the Union, it ended up with termination of slavery in the United States. No one expected that the war would last for four years, as a result, both sides of the war, the Union and Confederate States, were not ready for the war. There was the issue of distributing food and weapons, and supplies to soldiers, as well as disease and lack of medical equipment. Although President Lincoln
It’s April 12th, 1861 and the Civil war has begun. The Union States (north) and the States of the Confederacy (south) are going against each other. The south is for not banning slavery and the north is for banning slavery. The civil war begun April 12th, 1861 and ended on May 13th, 1865. The civil war ended slavery, was the birth of feminism. It was also a new birth of freedom to the US.
Before the civil war began slaves in the United States had neither rights nor liberties. This would be particularly true in most southern states. The movement of the civil rights began slightly before the civil war had ended. Written by President Lincoln the Emancipation Proclamation was a small but undoubtable first important step, towards giving African American slaves freedom. Aimed towards the states that seceded from the union and which still contained slavery, this document was meant to free those slaves. And in turn allow them to enroll in the union army. With this added strength to the union, the south had no choice but to surrender. Although slavery did not completely end, it did give them the liberty to fight towards the common goal of freedom.
Between parliament and king Charles, Charles was the most responsible for the English civil war. This was for many reasons, but mainly because Parliament and King Charles disagreed over money, power and religion. The main disagreement between parliament and King Charles was over money. Charles was extravagant and spent money on luxuries and had to sell valuable land to get money.
There was a variety of reasons why civil war broke out in 1642, Long term causes included Charles’ belief in the divine right of kings, Charles’ decision to not call parliament for 12 years, Introduction of unpopular taxes and the fact that Charles was married to a catholic. There were also short term causes for the civil war, these included Parliament making controversial decisions in 1642, Charles trying to arrest 5 MP’s and Charles’ need for money after losing to the Scots. I strongly agree that it was Charles’ personality that lead to the start of the civil war and his execution in 1949. The long term causes made parliament and to some extent the people distrust Charles, the short term causes happened as a result of these short term causes but these made parliament and some people take action.
Modern historians still argue upon the causes of the English revolution. (The English Civil War). The people, in 1642, did not expect this event so soon. However, if we look down and combine all the facts and the evidence, the reasons will be exposed.
One example is when the king dissolved Parliament for 11 years. With the king as absolute power, many people didn’t like his changes to the country, especially his changes to religion and taxes (Why did civil war break out in 1642?). Secondly, he imposed ship money which was a tax that was intended to improve the navy in times of war. They usually were paid by coastal counties only, but in 1635, the king demanded it from inland counties as well. This upset many people, because at the time, the country wasn’t even at war (Why did civil war break out in 1642?).
Therefore, the Scottish rebellion clearly had a huge impact on Charles’s rule. His authority and royal prerogative was diminished when he was forced to call a Parliament that listed grievances against him. An allegiance was forged between the English Parliamentarians and Scottish Covenanters who were both strongly anti-papist and anti-Catholic which alienated Charles. Conrad Russell believes that we cannot say the civil war was a result of long-term causes, rather it was the result of a short-term failure to solve a political crisis and he places emphasis on the idea that it was the closely intertwined nature of the Three Kingdoms that led to civil war. Russell states ‘there are more senses than
It wasn’t only the King that Parliament had issues with. The Duke of Buckingham, an advisor for Charles, was not well liked by Parliament. Buckingham was the leader of a fleet to Cadiz which ended in his troops raiding the royal wine cellars, getting drunk, and calling off the attack. With the threat of Buckingham 's
England’s lengthy history of hereditary monarchs and abusive absolutists has led to the system of constitutionalism in 17th century English government. The encouragement of these absolutism practices triggered the need to search for a new way to govern. The reigns of the Stuart monarchy led to the shift from absolutism to constitutionalism during 17th century England. After witnessing the success of Louis XIV's of France establishment of absolutism, England would soon see that James I, and his son Charles I, will fail at establishing absolutism in England and see a constitutional government established.
In 17th century, series of rebellions and civil wars occurred, known famously as the English Revolution. These events occurred primarily as the result of a power struggle between Parliament and the king. The revolutions served to decide how the power would be distributed in the English government.
Between the years 1529-1588 and in the Tudor era, Britain saw perhaps the biggest changes in its political and religious structure in its history. It changed from Catholicism to Protestantism, then back and back again. It also saw major changes in who ran the country, with more involvement from parliament. Different chief ministers (including Thomas Cromwell) had different impacts on Britain and the monarch, and the influence of them will be assessed in this essay.