28 October 1647
Putney Debates

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The Putney Debates begin, held in the parish church at Putney, outside London. These meetings of the Army Council – which includes the army's leaders such as Oliver Cromwell and Henry Ireton and ordinary soldiers such as Thomas Rainsborough and Edward Sexby – debate the central question of whether to continue seeking a negotiated settlement with Charles I. Representatives of the Levellers, called agitators, also argue for their Agreement of the People, a revolutionary alternative that specifies an almost universal manhood suffrage. Cromwell and Ireton reject these ideas, saying that they undermine the security of private property. The debates – a historic clash between privilege and democracy – end on 1 November.

The influence of the Levellers did not end with the English Civil Wars. Check out Tony Benn's provocative article on The legacy of the Levellers.

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[Colonel] Rainsborough: '... for really I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live, as the greatest he; and therefore truly, sir, I think it's clear, that every man that is to live under a government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that government; and I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that government that he hath nor had a voice to put himself under.'

From A Century of Troubles by Stevie Davies (Channel 4 Books)

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