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Issues in the House of Commons 1621–1629: Predictors of Civil War Allegiance*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 July 2014

Conrad Russell
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Extract

My past attacks on the use of hindsight as a tool for explaining the parliamentary politics of the 1620s were not based on any desire to evade the task of explaining the English Civil War. They were based on the belief that it was necessary to understand what did happen in the 1620s before it could become possible to use those events to shed light on the English Civil War. The argument was that the search for the causes of the Civil War had impeded any attempt to see the 1620s as they actually were. That was why I attempted to find out what had happened in the 1620s as a task in its own right, before going on to investigate the coming and the causes of the English Civil War.

It is only because I have already attempted both these questions, and provided answers at least to my own satisfaction, that I now feel free to look back again at the 1620s, and attempt to ask the question what issues, and what attitudes, distinguish a future Royalist from a future Parliamentarian during those years. This is, of course, a very different question from asking what were the key issues of the 1620s. Very often, the issues that transpire to be the best predictors of Civil War allegiance were, at the time, low-priority and poorly reported issues. Attempts to investigate them are not meant to endow them with an importance they did not necessarily possess at the time, nor to suggest any inevitability about the division of England along the lines they suggest. The Civil War was only one of many ways in which the English body politic might have been divided: under a different king, for example, quite different disagreements might have been forced to the surface as the agenda developed. Yet, once it is granted this is not the only way Englishmen might have been divided, it is still worth asking whether the division that actually surfaced corresponds to any visible division in the politics of the 1620s. None of this is an attempt to reopen the debate on “revisionism” in the 1620s. That debate has now acquired a half life of its own, and this article is not intended to take any part in it. It is, though, inevitably informed by thirteen years' work on the politics of the Long Parliament, and so incorporates perceptions of how different the 1620s were from the 1640s, which no other programme of work could have made equally intense.

Type
Research Article
Information
Albion , Volume 23 , Issue 1 , Spring 1991 , pp. 23 - 39
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference on British Studies 1991

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Footnotes

*

An earlier version of this paper was delivered to the Pacific Coast Conference on British Studies at the Huntington Library in April 1990. I would like to thank members of the conference for their helpful comments.

References

1 “Parliamentary History in Perspective 1604–1629,” History 61 (1976): 1–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Parliaments and English Politics 1621–1629 (Oxford, 1979)Google Scholar.

2 The Causes of the English Civil War (Oxford, 1990)Google Scholar and The Fall of the British Monarchies 1637–1642 (Oxford, 1991)Google Scholar.

3 For a summary of my responses to that debate, see the introduction to my Unrevolutionary England (London, 1990)Google Scholar.

4 Prest, Wilfrid, The Rise of the Barristers (Oxford, 1986), p. 278Google Scholar.

5 Lords' Journal, 4: 104, 5: 62Google Scholar.

6 Cope, Esther S., The Life of a Public Man: Edward, First Baron Montagu of Boughton (Philadelphia, 1981)Google Scholar.

7 Commons' Debates in 1621, ed. Notestein, Wallace, Relf, F. H., and Simpson, Hartley, 7 vols. (New Haven, 1935), 3: 169, 5: 25 and 272, 6: 31 [hereafter cited as 1621 Debates[Google Scholar.

8 Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, 1634–1635, 67: no. 15Google Scholar.

9 1621 Debates, 3: 53, 6: 326, 2: 484Google Scholar.

10 Proceedings in Parliament 1628, ed. Johnson, Robert C., Keeler, Mary Frear, Cole, Maija Jansson, and Bidwell, William B., 4 vols. (New Haven, 1977–1983), 2: 543 [hereafter cited as 1628 Debates]Google Scholar. The Private Journals of the Long Parliament, ed. Coates, Willson H., Young, Anne Steele, and Snow, Vernon F., 2 vols. (New Haven, 1982), 1: 216, 221Google Scholar.

11 1628 Debates 2: 484Google Scholar; Bankes, G., Corfe Castle (1853), pp. 154–56Google Scholar.

12 1628 Debates 2: 365Google Scholar; Debates in the House of Commons in 1625, ed. Gardiner, S. R., Camden Society, n.s. 6 (1873), p. 112 [hereafter cited as 1625 Debates]Google Scholar.

13 1621 Debates, 3: 97Google Scholar; The Journal of Sir Symonds D'Ewes, ed. Coates, Willson H. (New Haven, 1942), pp. 246–47Google Scholar.

14 1621 Debates, 4: 197, 3: 236Google Scholar.

15 lbid., 2: 113, 146–47, 3: 42, 68–69.

16 Ibid., 5: 282 and other refs.; C.J. 1: 539.

17 1621 Debates, 6: 234, 223Google Scholar; C.J. 1: 657.

18 1621 Debates, 6: 219Google Scholar.

19 Rushworth, J., Trial of Strafford (1682), p. 703Google Scholar.

20 1621 Debates 3: 29, 5: 340, 3: 56Google Scholar.

21 Ibid. 5: 30, 2: 303, 3: 57.

22 Ibid. 3: 163.

23 Ibid. 3: 122–27. On Mallory's religious sympathies, see Keeler, M. F., Members of the Long Parliament, American Philosophical Society, vol. 36 (Philadelphia, 1954), pp. 265–66Google Scholar.

24 1621 Debates, 5: 140Google Scholar.

25 C.J., 1: 548, 532.

26 C.J., 1: 647; 1621 Debates, 4: 441, 3: 459Google Scholar.

27 Ibid., 2: 445, 6: 196.

28 The likeliest exception is Sir Edward Sackville, who seems to have wanted to send a force to the Palatinate, in the hope that the threat of war would lead to peace (1621 Debates, 5: 217, 6: 201, 4: 443Google Scholar). I am grateful to Dr. David Smith for a helpful discussion of this question. See also Reeve, L. J., Charles I and the Road to Personal Rule (Cambridge, 1989), p. 185nCrossRefGoogle Scholar. Dorset was named by Coloma in 1629 as a friend of Spain.

29 1621 Debates 6: 326, 3: 473, 2: 459, 4: 445Google Scholar.

30 Ibid., 3: 455–56. The bill of certioraris was designed to protect local jurisdictions against the calling of cases to central courts.

31 Cogswell, Thomas, The Blessed Revolution: English Politics and the Coming of War 1621–1624 (Cambridge, 1989), p. 299Google Scholar. The sermon he is discussing was preached in the godly enclave of Boston (Lines.), where opinions on view usually represented something rather narrower than “the realm.”

32 On the earlier and later existence of such a body of opinion, see Croft, Pauline, “Trading with the Enemy 1584–1604,” Historical Journal 32, 2 (1989): 281–302CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Loomie, A. J., “The Spanish Faction at the Court of Charles I, 1630–38,” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 54, 139 (1986): 37–49CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Sir Thomas Wentworth, who was described by the Spanish Ambassador as behaving “as if he were born in Old Castile” (Loomie, , “The Spanish Faction,” p. 42Google Scholar), kept out of the key debates of 1624: Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, p. 145Google Scholar. He is unlikely to have been the only pro-Spaniard who did so.

33 Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics 1621–1629, p. xxiGoogle Scholar. ProfessorCogswell, (The Blessed Revolution, pp. 176–77)Google Scholar seems to me to have glossed over the textual difficulties in reading this speech, and to have shown insufficient sensitivity to the speaking style of a member facing a strong hostile current of opinion. See Diary of Sir Thomas Jervoise (Yale Transcript) March 1, C.J., 1: 722, and British Library, Add. MS 46,191, f. 28v. In the version of Nathaniel Rich, who had a good political eye for supporters and opponents of war, Seymour seems to be expressing much more enthusiasm for attacks on English recusants than he is for any prospect of war.

34 Cogswell, , The Blessed Revolution, p. 179Google Scholar. His point is, of course, correct, but I remain unable to read these debates without seeing in many speakers a reluctance that goes a great deal deeper than this.

35 1625 Debates, pp. 30–33. Eliot, John Sir, Negotium Posteriorum, Or An Apology for Socrates, ed. Grosart, A. B., 2 vols. (1881), 1: 75Google Scholar. The reaction of Rudyerd seems a good guide to the significance of Seymour's motion. Blocking a move for war by moving for an inadequate grant of subsidy, and concealing obstruction under the guise of helpfulness, was a shrewd strategy, and it was the one that Seymour had followed in 1621.

36 Bodleian MS Tanner 392, ff. 13–14. Keeler, , Members of the Long Parliament, p. 353Google Scholar.

37 See Cogswell, , The Blessed Revolution, pp. 184–87Google Scholar, and sources there cited. In the debates of 5 March, unlike those of 1 March, we do not disagree about what the sources say. It is the interpretation that is in question. I am not claiming that all those who supported Alford on 5 March were opponents of war. I am claiming that, precisely because this was not the case, the opponents of war saw this as their best chance of winning a majority in a deeply divided House.

38 For Wardour's speech on the afternoon of 1 March, see Diary of Sir William Spring (Yale Transcript), March 1, and C.J., 1: 676. The motion to renew the declaration of 4 June 1621 sounds like explicit support for war (See 1621 Debates, 5: 203–04Google Scholar for the text of that Declaration).

39 On the complaints against the Bishop of Bangor, Cambridge University Library, MS 12–20, f. 133, and 1628 Debates, 3: 436, 438Google Scholar. For his nickname, see Hill, Christopher, A Tinker and a Poor Man (New York, 1988), p. 163Google Scholar.

40 Rous, Francis, Oil of Scorpions (1622)Google Scholar. This work threatens the kingdom with God's punishment for the following “provoking sins”: swearing and blasphemy, drunkenness, unthankfulness, deceitfulness of trade, “unnatural filthinesse,” declination to profaneness, backsliding to idolatry, and monstrousness of apparel. It is worth noting, in the light of later events, that Rous was already a believer in religious correspondency between England and Scotland, celebrating “the union of the whole under one king of the same religion” (p. 36).

41 Rous's, Testis Veritatis (1626)Google Scholar is largely an assault on Arminianism. It is interesting that in 1622 he does not yet appear to have seen this attack as necessary.

42 See Tyacke, Nicholas, Anti-Calvinists (Oxford, 1987), pp. 125–63Google Scholar.

43 Rushworth, J., Historical Collections 31 (1691), pp. 425–28Google Scholar. The key passage in this speech is the one that defends bishops Juxon and Duppa against the charge of idolatry. Dering was not an Arminian, but clearly did not believe that Arminians were ipso facto beyond the pale.

44 B. L., Microfilm 319, Alnwick Castle MS 106. These were written after the Restoration.

45 Eales, Jacqueline, Puritans and Roundheads: The Harleys of Brampton Bryan and the Outbreak of the English Civil War (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 68–69, 91–92Google Scholar, and passim.

46 For Bankes, see Bankes of Kingston Lacey MSS, Gospel Commentaries, which shows a strong admiration for Lancelot Andrewes. For Herbert, see Eales, , Puritans and Roundheads, pp. 39–40Google Scholar.

47 C.U.L., MS 12–22, f. 18 (1626), when the Speaker remarked that the House had not sat on Ascension Day since 1614.

48 1625 Debates, pp. 26, 28–29.

49 C.U.L., MS 12–21, f. 183; Diary of Sir Richard Grosvenor, Trinity College Dublin MS E 5.17, p. 59; Eales, , Puritans and Roundheads, p. 47Google Scholar.

50 1621 Debates, 2: 82 and n., 4: 52, 34 and nGoogle Scholar.

51 1621 Debates, 5: 376Google Scholar.

52 162l Debates, 5: 353, 3: 105 and nGoogle Scholar.

53 1628 Debates 3: 430–32, 435–37, 438–39, 440–41 and 442Google Scholar. Coryton's reservation (p. 436) about “enlarging the secular arm” is worth noting. See also C.U.L., MS 12–20, f. 85, where there is a similar line-up. On this occasion, there is one highly interesting exception: Sir John Finch supported the bill. Finch may have been speaking as a common lawyer, or this may be an occasion for remembering Peter Clark's evidence on the “Puritan” background of the Finch family. Clark, Peter, English Provincial Society from the Reformation to the Revolution: Religion, Politics and Society in Kent 1500–1640 (Hassocks, 1977), pp. 336, 294, 175Google Scholar, and other refs.

54 C.U.L., MS 12–20, ff. 57–58.

55 1625 Debates, pp. 36–37, C.J., 1: 811.

56 1628 Debates, 4: 131Google Scholar.

57 H.M.C, House of Lords, MSS 11: 205.

58 For the evidence on which this judgment rests, see my Fall of the British Monarchies 1637–1642, chs. 4–6.

59 This case is argued more fully in my Causes of the English Civil War, ch. 4.

60 On this, see Guy, J. A., “The Origins of the Petition of Right Reconsidered,” Historical Journal 25 (1982): 280–312CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

61 I owe this vital point to Professor Anthony Fletcher. Among the many issues to which it is relevant is that of attitudes to war in 1624.