Page images
PDF
EPUB

CHAPTER III.

THE GREAT CIVIL WAR.

tution

by the

1. NOTHING is more remarkable in the history of the Eng- Continuity of developlish constitution than the persistent continuity of its devel- ment of the English opment, through which all of the changes and innovations constidemanded by the wants of a great and growing nationality have been gradually brought about without any open break with the past. The nearest approach to an exception to this as affected general rule is to be found in the revolutionary period, which revolutionbegins with the meeting of the Long Parliament and ends ary epoch; with the Restoration, the period of upheaval during which the social, political, and religious forces that abide in the England of to-day broke the spell of custom and tradition by which the medieval church, the medieval monarchy, and the dying feudalism had so long enthralled the minds of men. True it is that when Puritanism laid down the sword, the republican régime which had been set up in its name gave way to a restoration of the monarchical system, not, however, in the monarchy form in which it had been overthrown, but as purified and in the form remodelled by the drastic and enduring legislation enacted it was overduring the first ten months of the Long Parliament.1 And apart from the permanent legal changes thus brought about by positive legislation must also be estimated the ultimate ultimate effects of many new ideas then germinated, which, after hav- new ideas ing been for a time put aside, have ripened at last into some during of the most important reforms of modern times. It is thus upheaval; possible to trace to this period of upheaval, characterized by a freedom of thought never before known, not only the beginnings of the great parties which have ever since dominated. the political and religious life of England, but also the germs

[ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

not restored

in which

thrown;

effect of

germinated

period of

Puritan

spirit lived

of religious toleration, of electoral reform, of the cabinet system, of modern taxation, as well as the transition from the ancient to the modern military system. Only the outward forms of the work of Puritanism perished at the moment of its apparent overthrow.1 While Cromwell and his republic passed away, the indomitable spirit of civil and religious liberty that culminated in them has lived on as the advancing and reforming force in English society which expressed itself first in the revolution of 1688, and finally in that whose outcome was the Reform Bill of 1832. It is, therefore, from this period of transition from the old to the new, during which the beginnings continuity of England's political life was for a moment suspended, not broken off, that we can begin to trace the beginnings of the constitution in its modern form.

on as the

advancing

force in

English society;

of the modern constitution.

Conserv

ative basis

the war

began;

2. At the beginning of the conflict the parliamentary party upon which had no idea either of deposing the king, or of bringing him to justice for his misdeeds. When Essex was appointed commander, each member of the house swore to die "in this cause for the safety of the king's person," and when the new general quitted London, he was commanded to follow the king "and by battle or other way rescue him from his perfidious councillors and restore him to parliament," 2 and in the covenant with the Scots the houses swore "to uphold the person of the king and his authority." The theory was thus recognized at Westminster that the king was still a factor in the constitution, although separated from his parliament by evil councillors. Out of this anomalous condition of things arose the legal fic"the king in tion that "the king in parliament waged war against the king parliament waged war in the royalist camp." To supply the vacuum thus created by against the the king's absence, the executive power was for the time being put in the hands of a joint parliamentary Committee of Safety, and in November, 1643, the houses authorized the use of a new great seal, which was intrusted to six commissioners named by themselves. Each party did all in its power to give to its

king in the royalist camp;"

1 "The history of English progress since the Restoration, on its moral and spiritual sides, has been the history of Puritanism."-Green, Hist. of the Eng. People, vol. iii. p. 322.

2 Commons' Journals, vol. v. p. 208 et seq.

8 This committee, appointed July 4,

1642, was composed of five lords and fifteen commons, among whom were Pym, Hampden, Holles, and Marten. Lords' Journals, vol. v. p. 178; Commons' Journals, vol. ii. p. 651.

4 Lords' Journals, vol. vi. pp. 305, 318. In 1649 the commons, after assuming supreme authority, ordered a new seal

not a war

proceedings constitutional form, in order to prevent anything like social disruption. While the bulk of the nobility and the war gentry ranged themselves on the side of the king, and the of classes; bulk of the townsmen and yeomen on that of the parliament, the exceptions on each side were great enough to prevent a degeneration of the conflict into such a war of classes as distinguished the French Revolution. On December 22, 1643, Charles summoned all the members of either house who had left Westminster, or who were ready to leave it on promise of relations of pardon, to meet him in January at Oxford; and not until March the two 9, 1644, did the houses at Westminster refuse to recognize to each their rivals at Oxford as in any sense members of parliament, in reply to which the Oxford body promptly declared that those who sat at Westminster were guilty of treason.1

parliaments

other.

without

As both parties were compelled to equip and maintain armies Taxation in the field, the question of ways and means at once became the royal paramount. After the system of voluntary contributions to assent; which both resorted in the beginning broke down, it became necessary for each to employ legal methods of taxation.2 How to impose such a tax without the royal assent was the troublesome problem at Westminster. At last necessity put aside all constitutional scruples, and taxes were levied by the houses by way of ordinance, after the sums received from the voluntary gifts or loans had been exhausted. In November, 1642, parliamenan ordinance directed the assessment of all persons in London tary ordi and Westminster who had hitherto refused to contribute vol- 1642 and 1645 untarily; on the 8th of December of the same year another 3 extended the demand to the whole country; and in March, 1645, a still more comprehensive ordinance was passed, providing assessments for the armies, for which the counties were to be responsible. In these parliamentary ordinances, contained which were departures from the old Tudor subsidy, we find the of the mod germs of the fiscal system of modern times. Instead of de- ern fiscal manding a yearly or half-yearly tax on the old plan, the houses resorted to monthly assessments, which were apportioned be

made with the inscription, "In the first year of freedom, by God's blessing restored, 1648."

1 Rushworth, vol. v. p. 565.

2 See Dowell, Hist. of Taxation, vol.

ii. p. 3.

8 Rushworth, vol. v. p. 71.
4 D'Ewes' Diary; Lords' Journals,
vol. v. p. 482.

Lords' Journals, vol. vii. p. 293.

nances of

the germs

system;

origin of

the excise;

tween the counties and towns named in the ordinance upon the basis of the highest returns ever made by them for a subsidy, the assessment of the taxpayers, who were more justly rated than ever before, and the collection of the tax being left to the local authorities.1 As a supplement to these assessments, a new tax called the excise, which had long existed on the continent, was for the first time introduced into England in the form in which it was employed by the Dutch.2 By an ordinance passed in July, 1643,3 an excise or new impost was imposed upon a variety of articles of consumption, including ale, beer, cider, and strong waters. While the houses at Westminster thus imposed taxes to carry on war against the king royal taxa- without his consent, he did not hesitate at first to levy them on the country around Oxford without parliamentary sanction. Not until February, 1644, were privy seals for a loan authorized by the Oxford parliament, which afterwards granted an excise upon the Westminster model.5

the ordinance of 1643;

tion at Oxford.

Constitutional

theory of

the houses

embarrassed military operations;

Essex

shrank

3. The constitutional theory that the houses were making war only upon the evil councillors who surrounded the king, in order to rescue him from their hands, for a long time embarrassed military operations by making undesirable a positive triumph which would bring the conservative leaders of the Revolution face to face with a problem they were unprepared to meet. Essex was unwilling to consent to an actual or virtual depofrom a deci- sition of the king, and while he held the chief command, he sive stroke; shrank from any decisive stroke which would make such a result inevitable. His policy seems to have been to force Charles to a peaceful understanding through an exhaustion of his resources. Under such conditions it is not to be wondered at that the first engagement at Edgehill was indecisive, at Edgehill; and that throughout the winter the fortunes of war went steadily against the popular cause. As a stern opponent of Essex' Hampden; vacillating policy, the heroic Hampden passed from the parlia

first

encounter

energy of

1. . . "The result being not any increase in the amount paid to the treasury, for that was fixed, but the more equitable adjustment of the burden of the tax as regards the various taxpayers in every particular county or town." -Dowell, Hist. of Taxation, vol. ii. P. 5.

2 The proposal was made by Pym, "the father of the excise." His first

motion to impose it, however, was rejected, after being denounced as “an unjust, scandalous, and destructive project." Cf. D'Ewes' Diary.

8 Lords' Journals, vol. vi. p. 145; Ordinance E., 61, 28.

4 Warburton, vol. ii. p. 69.

5 Rushworth, vol. v. p. 580; Clarendon, vol. vii. p. 396.

midland

counties;

resolved

upon an

ment to a military command, in which he manifested from the beginning his characteristic energy. Largely through his influence, backed by that of his cousin, Oliver Cromwell, were brought into shape the associations of the midland and eastern aided in organizing counties which united in raising an army to be maintained by associa a common fund, the command of which as a subsidiary force tions of the was given by Essex to Lord Manchester as major-general.1 and eastern But in the midst of his usefulness Hampden, while striving to check a raid of Rupert's, was mortally wounded near his own home on the 18th of June, 1643, and a few days thereafter he died June, died. Disaster then followed disaster, until the surrender of 1643; Bristol to Rupert gave to Charles the mastery of the west. The first turn in the tide came when Essex, in September, succeeded in raising the siege of Gloucester, which still held out as the only obstacle to communications between the king's forces in Bristol and those in the north. At this stage of the struggle it was that Pym, bereft of Hampden, resolved to turn Pym the fortunes of war through an alliance with the Scots. When the time for negotiation came, the fact appeared, as Baillie alliance wrote, that "the English were for a civil league, we for a reli- Scots; gious covenant." The price which the Scots demanded for military aid was "unity of religion," which meant in plain terms the adoption of the presbyterian system by the Church who of England. Opposed as Pym was to such a result, he finally adoption acquiesced in it as a political necessity, and after many amend- of pres ments the Covenant as assented to by the Scots was sworn to system; by the commons in St. Margaret's church on the 25th of Sep- Covenant tember, and on the 15th of October it was accepted by the by the little group of peers that still remained at Westminster.2 The September leading purpose of this compact was to "bring the churches 25 of God in the three kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and uniformity of religion, confession of faith, form of church government, direction for worship, and catechizing," and "to extirpate popery, prelacy, superstition, schism, and profaneness." Before the adoption of the Covenant it was submitted submitfor consideration and amendment to the Westminster Assem- the Westbly of Divines, an ecclesiastical body created by the two houses, Assembly

1 At the request of the houses. Commons' Journals, vol. iii. p. 199; Lords' Journals, vol. vi. p. 174.

2 Cf. Gardiner, Hist. of the Great Civil War, vol. i. pp. 229, 232, 235, 244.

with the

demanded

byterian

sworn to

commons,

its leading

purpose;

ted to minster

« ՆախորդըՇարունակել »