A Parliamentary Killing

The people

The middle to late 17th century was a period of huge upheaval in England. The moral authority of the king was being questioned — the very heart of the country and its religion.

The tumult of the period, the striving for a better world and the disappointments of failed new orders can be seen in Milton's Paradise Lost (1663), one of the most important pieces of English literature, with its story of the fall of man, the loss of paradise, and Satan's battle for heaven:

'Of Man's First Disobedience, and the
Fruit of that Forbidden Tree, whose mortal taste
Brought Death into the World, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden, till one greater Man
Restore us, and regain the blissful Seat.'

Charles II whipped up hostility with his leaning to Roman Catholicism, encapsulated in his Declaration of Indulgence, which called for religious tolerance. Dislike of catholicism was on the rise, but Charles' secret treaty with France, together with his brother James (later to become King James II), was inflammatory indeed. He undertook to ally with France against Holland for an annual payment from Louis XIV of £200,000 and he also agreed that he and his brother would become Catholic.

Charles married the Catholic Mary of Modena in 1673 but further attempts to lift the restrictions on Catholics and other dissenters were answered by parliament passing the Test Act of 1673. This banned Roman Catholics from sitting in parliament or taking government office. There were then attempts to prevent James following his brother to the throne or to limit his powers if he succeeded in taking the crown.

Catholicism was discredited when Titus Oates produced a fake account of a plot to kill the king being hatched by men of the Pope.

The division saw the growth of political parties still recognisable today: the Whigs wanted James stopped and the Tories wanted the rights to succession to remain unchanged.

Charles II became known as the Merry Monarch because of his patronage of the arts and the licentious atmosphere of his court. He had affairs with Barbara Villiers and Nell Gwyn as well as many others, fathering several children.

Something of the general attitude to parliament can be seen in the diary of Samuel Pepys (1633-1703):

'7 February (1660). Boys do now cry 'Kiss my Parliament!' instead of 'Kiss my arse!' so great and general contempt is the Rump come to among all men, good and bad.'

Pepys also reported two of the biggest disasters of the time, the plague and the Fire of London:

'12 August (1665). The people die so, that now it seems they are fain to carry the dead to be buried by daylight, the nights not sufficing to do it in. And my Lord Mayor commands people to be within at 9 at night, all (as they say) that the sick may have liberty to go abroad for ayre.'

'2 September (1666). Lord's Day ... Jane called us up, about three in the morning, to tell us of a great fire they saw in the City. So I rose, and slipped on my nightgown and went to her window, and thought it to be on the back side of Markelane at the furthest; but being unused to such fires as fallowed, I thought it far enough off, and so went to bed again and to sleep. About 7 rose again to dress myself ... By and by Jane comes and tells me that she hears that above 300 houses have been burned down tonight ...'

The fire further inflamed anti-Catholic feeling, blamed by some on a Catholic conspiracy. The fire did, however, destroy much of the poor housing in London which had been one of the root causes for the spread of the plague.

In the corridors of power, the Tories won and Charles took total political control in 1681. There came the revelation of a Catholic plot (the Rye House Plot 1683) to assassinate the king and his brother.

Charles' deathbed conversion to catholicism ushered in a period of intense religious debate that would provoke the second English revolution in less than a century.

Monmouth was a Protestant and thought the English people would support him in a rebellion against his uncle. In June 1685, he crossed the Channel from Holland and landed at Lyme Regis, in the south-west of England. Hundreds of country folk joined him to march on London in order to claim the throne.

James II and Parliament declared him a traitor and an outlaw with a £5000 reward offered, dead or alive. The king's army shot down hundreds of rebel peasant followers in Sedgmoor in Somerset. Monmouth escaped but was taken prisoner soon afterwards and executed.

With calls for a new constitution becoming deafening. English philosopher John Locke (1632-1704) became one of the supporters of the contender for the throne, William of Orange from the Netherlands. William was the grandson of Charles I and husband of James II's daughter Mary.

In 1688 the Glorious Revolution saw seven British nobles invite William to invade. James escaped to France, only to make an unsuccessful attempt to win back his kingdom in the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. William III and Mary ruled together until her death in 1694, after which William found his position increasingly difficult. There was, however, stability, more freedom for the press (1695), the Bank of England was set up (1694), the standing army's control passed to parliament (1698).

In the wake of this, parliament passed the ground-breaking Bill of Rights (An Act Declaring the Rights and Liberties of the Subject and settling the Succession of the Crown) of 1689 which:

1. Prevents the king making laws without parliament.

2. Outlaws church and other royal courts of law.

3. Outlaws raising taxes without parliament's consent.

4. Ensures that the election of members of parliament is free.

5. Ensures freedom of speech in parliament.

6. Bans excessive, cruel or unusual punishments.

7. Ensures that courts must have free juries, even in high treason cases.

8. Prevents anyone being punished before conviction and trial.

9. Ensures that parliaments must be held frequently.

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