Addled Parliament
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The Parliament of 1614 was the second Parliament of England of the reign of James VI and I and sat between 5 April and 7 June 1614. Lasting only two months and two days, it saw no bills pass and was not even regarded as a parliament by its contemporaries. However, for its failure it has been known to posterity as the Addled Parliament.[a]
James had struggled with debt ever since he came to the English throne. The failure of the
The parliament got off to a bad start, with poor choices made for the king's representatives in Parliament. Rumours of conspiracies to manage Parliament (the "undertaking") or to pack it with easily-controlled members, though not based in fact, spread quickly. The spreading of that rumour and the ultimate failure of Parliament have been generally attributed to the scheming of the
James grew impatient with the parliamentary proceedings. He issued an ultimatum to Parliament, which treated it irreverently. Insult was added to injury by belligerent and supposedly-threatening attacks on him from the Commons. On the advice of Northampton, James dissolved Parliament on 7 June and had four
Background
James VI and I (1566–1625) ascended to the
During the Blessed Parliament, Parliament's own aims saw similar disappointment; James rebuffed the proposed institution of Puritan ecclesiastical reforms,
After this, James was not keen to call another Parliament.
Parliament
Preparations
The Privy Council as a whole was not optimistic about the upcoming parliament. Two of the king's closest advisors were unavailable: Salisbury was dead and the 74-year-old Northampton was ill.
MPs later accused James of trying to
Opening and conspiracies
Parliament opened on 5 April 1614.
Suspicions only compounded as Parliament proceeded, with the revelation that the king had corresponded with influential subjects in the hopes of securing the election of the sympathetic.[43] The House of Commons was divided between those who accepted the conspiracy and those who rejected it.[11] The Commons thus immediately set about investigating the preceding elections for signs of misconduct.[46] Though little beyond this was established, it was found that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Sir Thomas Parry, had swayed the election in Stockbridge. For a brief period, this investigation dominated the Commons: Parry was suspended from the House and, passingly, from his Chancellorship. For many in Parliament, this seemed evidence enough that the king's officials had attempted to pack Parliament.[11][46][47] Simultaneously, a committee to inquire into the alleged undertaking was launched, though this proved less fruitful. The committee's chairman returned on 2 May; he spoke confusingly, but concluded against the existence of any undertaking. However, parliamentary provocateur John Hoskins demanded further investigation, which the House accepted.[48] On 14 May, the inquiry ended; after six weeks of Parliament, rumours of an undertaking had conclusively been dismissed.[11][48] However, by the end of this controversy, resentment against the undertakers had evaporated. Neville was never suspended for his part, but rather ultimately met with commendation of Parliament. His advice was seen as part of an effort to allow the king to remedy their grievances. The packers, on the other hand, never gained the sympathy of Parliament, with their efforts invariably seen as attempts to undermine the parliamentary process.[49]
Controversy over impositions
My Lords, I think it a dangerous thing for us to confer with them about the point of impositions. For it is a Noli me tangere, and none that have either taken the Oath of Supremacy or Allegiance may do it with a good conscience, for in the Oath of Allegiance we are sworn to maintain the privileges of the Crown, and in this conference we should not confer about a flower, but strike at the root of the Imperial Crown, and therefore in my opinion it is neither fit to confer with them nor give them a meeting.
The dispute over the alleged packing and undertaking split the House, but it was not this that would cause the parliament's ultimate failure.[51] As early as 19 April, letter writer John Chamberlain communicated that "the great clamor against undertakers [was] well quieted",[52] and the Commons were occupied with a familiar controversy: impositions.[11][52] Parliament adjourned on 20 April for Easter, reconvening on 2 May.[11] Two days later on 4 May, the king delivered a speech to the Commons, ardent in its defence of the legality of impositions, a fact the king's judges had apparently assured him of beyond any doubt.[46] At the end he added portentously that, if he did not receive supply soon, the Commons "must not look for more Parliaments in haste".[53] However, at the same time, the Commons were united and unflinching in their belief that impositions threatened property law, and that, over impositions, "the liberty of the kingdom is in question."[29] James was so irritated by one such speech, given by MP Thomas Wentworth, that he had Wentworth imprisoned shortly after Parliament ended.[54] As parliamentary historian Conrad Russell judged it, "both sides were so firmly convinced that they were legally in the right that they never fully absorbed that the other party thought differently."[29] Any understanding between the two sides was further hampered by the fact that the Commons continued to disregard the king's financial troubles, which discouraged the king from giving up such a valuable source of income as impositions.[29]
On 21 May, the Commons asked the Lords for a conference on impositions, anticipating their backing in petitioning the king. After five days of debate, the Lords returned with their formal refusal of such a conference, meeting with the astonishment of many.[11] The Lords had voted 39 to 30 against it, carried by the near unanimity of the Lords Spiritual against this conference.[h][54] Bishop Richard Neile, who was one of the most vocal opponents of the conference,[55] added insult to injury with a sharp speech condemning the petitioners.[46] The remarks made in this speech, known as the "Noli me tangere speech", have been described by one historian as "the most dangerous words used in the reign [of James I] by any politician."[56] The Commons refused to conduct any more business until Neile had been punished for this affront.[11] Crewe's feeble attempts to argue that parliamentary business must go on revealed his impotence in the face of the angered body.[34] Though the Commons received a tearful apology and retraction from the Bishop on 30 May, they were unsatisfied and doubled down on their demands of disciplinary action.[57] By the end of May, as historian Thomas L. Moir put it, "the temper of the Commons had reached a fever pitch"[58] and leadership had broken down in this intractable atmosphere.[59] No punishment for Neile, however, ever materialised, and the king grew impatient with Parliament.[11]
James grows impatient
Parliament was adjourned on 1 June for
However, James was in no position to give up such a source of income.
Aftermath
The House of Commons is a body without a head. The members give their opinions in a disorderly manner. At their meetings nothing is heard but cries, shouts, and confusion. I am surprised that my ancestors should ever have permitted such an institution to come into existence. I am a stranger, and found it here when I arrived, so that I am obliged to put up with what I cannot get rid of.
James I's remarks to
Following the calamity of this parliament, James became even more determined to avoid the legislative body.
Shortly after the parliament ended, the Privy Council went into talks of calling another, possibly
Historiography
Victorian Whig historian Samuel Rawson Gardiner, in his monumental history of the lead-up to the Civil War, took the view that the parliament of 1614 was primarily concerned with "higher questions" (i.e. those of a constitutional nature) "which, once mooted, can never drop out of sight".[76][77] To this parliament, Gardiner wrote, one can "trace the first dawning of the idea that, in order to preserve the rights of the subject intact, it would be necessary to make some change in the relations between the authority of the Crown and the representatives of the people."[78] Gardiner's judgement of the constitutional import of this assembly has met with the sympathy of some later historians.[79] Moir, in his 1958 monograph on the parliament, held that "the development had begun which led ultimately to parliamentary control of the executive" as early as the exclusion of Parry.[79] Maija Jansson, editor of the 1614 Parliamentary proceedings, wrote in 1988: "[f]ar from being the confused do-nothing assembly of tradition, the English parliament of 1614 addressed thorny constitutional issues and anticipated the concern with procedure and privilege that is evident throughout the sessions of the 1620s."[80]
This hypothesis regarding the Addled Parliament was criticised by the eminent parliamentary historian
The central disagreement of James's reign was about the true [monetary] cost of government, and James’s central failure was his failure to convince the House of Commons he needed as much as in fact he did. From that single failure, all the constitutional troubles of the reign stemmed.[81]
See also
- List of MPs elected to the English parliament in 1614
- James VI and I and the English Parliament
- List of parliaments of England
Notes
- ^ The nickname first appears in the form "addle parliament" in a letter of Reverend Thomas Lorkin to Sir Thomas Puckering, an English correspondent abroad in Madrid, little more than a week after the parliament dissolved. The form "Addled" first appears in the middle of the 19th century. "Addle" is an adjective denoting (of an egg) "rotten" or "putrid" and more generally anything "empty, idle, vain; muddled, confused, unsound". Some sources connect the parliament's nickname to the former definition, the historian J. A. Williamson, for example, noting, "It was called the Addled Parliament, since it had hatched nothing".[1][2]
- ^ In James's original Latinism: "Unus Rex [...] Unus Grex and Una Lex".[6]
- ^ According to Andrew Thrush of The History of Parliament: "Purveyance was the right of the Crown to take up provisions for the royal household at below the market rate, while wardship was the right of the Crown to manage the estates of minors whose lands were held of the king."[5]
- ^ The feudal duty of impositions was an invaluable source of extra-parliamentary income for James, especially as trade expanded in England during his reign. By 1610, they already brought the Crown around £70,000 a year; by the 1630s, they brought in no less than £218,000.[8][9]
- Ulster plantation. The election came out with a Protestant majority of 32. James insisted he was within his royal right in doing this and mocked the parliament's anger at this.[30]
- ^ 61% (281 out of 464) of the members had never sat in Parliament before, a little above the Elizabethan average of 50%, but perfectly reasonable given the decade-long interval between elections.[37]
- ^ According to historian Thomas L. Moir, this aspect of James's speech "displayed one of those flashes of visions which occasionally revealed his intellectual capacity."[39] Rather than demand the institution of new anti-Catholic legislature, James contended that persecution only aided the Catholic cause, and that, as Protestantism was correct, it could reject Catholicism for its own fallacies. Such an ostensibly tolerant doctrine was a novelty in James's time.[39]
- prelates who voted, all but one opposed the conference, namely the old-fashioned Archbishop of York, Tobias Matthew.[54]
- Sir Charles Cornwallis. Gardiner alleges he was not the most historically learned member, and likely misunderstood the insinuation in the reference. Hoskins was also promised the protection of Northampton (and possibly Somerset) if he was to be charged with sedition, and was perhaps encouraged by a £20 bribe.[62] This allegation has been questioned by Peck, who asserts that Hoskyns' misunderstanding of the allusion was "unlikely" given his educational background, and Hoskyns was already a known opponent of Scottish influence. Thus, in her view: "it seems more reasonable to view Hoskyns not as the innocent tool or victim of the pro-Spanish interests, but as a member of the Commons who agreed with the idea of sending home the Scots".[63]
References
- ^ OED, "addle".
- ^ OED, "addled".
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Wormald 2014.
- ^ a b Russell 1973, p. 98.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Thrush 2010a.
- ^ a b Croft 2003, p. 59.
- ^ a b Mathew 1967, p. 221.
- ^ a b c d e f Croft 2003, p. 92.
- ^ Russell 1990, p. 39.
- ^ Croft 2003, p. 80.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z Thrush 2010b.
- ^ a b Stewart 2011, p. 251.
- ^ Dietz 1964, pp. 148–149.
- ^ Dietz 1964, p. 149.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 10.
- ^ Croft 2003, p. 84.
- ^ Croft 2003, p. 85.
- ^ Roberts 1985, p. 7.
- ^ Russell 1973, pp. 98–99.
- ^ Cramsie 2002, p. 135.
- ^ Willson 1967, pp. 344–345.
- ^ Stewart 2011, pp. 251–252.
- ^ Duncan & Roberts 1978, p. 489.
- ^ Thrush 2010c.
- ^ a b c Duncan & Roberts 1978, p. 481.
- ^ a b Duncan & Roberts 1978, p. 491.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 52.
- ^ Mathew 1967, pp. 221–222.
- ^ a b c d Croft 2003, p. 93.
- ^ Croft 2003, p. 93, 148.
- ^ a b Moir 1958, p. 53.
- ^ Mathew 1967, pp. 222–223.
- ^ Moir 1958, pp. 41–42.
- ^ a b c Hunneyball 2010.
- ^ Smith 1973, p. 169.
- ^ Willson 1967, p. 345.
- ^ a b Moir 1958, p. 55.
- ^ a b Mondi 2007, p. 153.
- ^ a b Moir 1958, p. 81.
- ^ Mathew 1967, p. 226.
- ^ Moir 1958, pp. 80–82.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 82.
- ^ a b c Willson 1967, p. 346.
- ^ Peck 1981, p. 533: "Northampton was accused by some contemporaries and most later historians of engineering the abrupt dissolution of the Addled Parliament in 1614".
- ^ Peck 1981, p. 535: "Secondly, the one thing that every schoolboy knows about Northampton - that he destroyed the Addled Parliament of 1614 - might be questioned".
- ^ a b c d Willson 1967, p. 347.
- ^ Seddon 2008.
- ^ a b Duncan & Roberts 1978, p. 492.
- ^ Roberts 1985, p. 29.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 117.
- ^ Duncan & Roberts 1978, pp. 496–497.
- ^ a b Duncan & Roberts 1978, p. 497.
- ^ a b c Thrush 2014.
- ^ a b c Mathew 1967, p. 227.
- ^ Moir 1958, pp. 116–117.
- ^ Mathew 1967, p. 228.
- ^ Moir 1958, pp. 130–131.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 132.
- ^ Moir 1958, pp. 132–133.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 136.
- ^ a b Mathew 1967, p. 229.
- ^ a b Moir 1958, p. 140.
- ^ Peck 1981, p. 550.
- ^ a b c d e Willson 1967, p. 348.
- ^ Croft 2003, pp. 93–94.
- ^ Gardiner 1883, p. 251.
- ^ a b c Thrush 2010d.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 146.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 148.
- ^ Mondi 2007, p. 140.
- ^ Dietz 1964, pp. 158–159.
- ^ Croft 2003, p. 94.
- ^ Croft 2003, p. 95.
- ^ Croft 2003, p. 100.
- ^ Moir 1958, p. 153.
- ^ Clucas & Davies 2003, p. 1.
- ^ Gardiner 1883, p. 228.
- ^ Gardiner 1883, p. 240.
- ^ a b Russell 1990, p. 31.
- ^ Jansson 1988, p. xiii.
- ^ a b c Clucas & Davies 2003, p. 2.
Sources
- Clucas, Stephen; Davies, Rosalind (2003). "Introduction". In Clucas, Stephen; Davies, Rosalind (eds.). The Crisis of 1614 and The Addled Parliament: Literary and Historical Perspectives (1st ed.). Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7546-0681-9.
- Cramsie, John (2002). Kingship and Crown Finance under James VI and I, 1603–1625. ISBN 978-0-86193-259-7.
- OCLC 938114859.
- Dietz, Frederick C. (1964). English Public Finance, 1558–1641. English Public Finance, 1485–1641. Vol. 2 (2nd ed.). New York: Barnes & Noble, Inc. OCLC 22976184.
- Duncan, Owen; Roberts, Clayton (July 1978). "The Parliamentary Undertaking of 1614". JSTOR 565464.
- Gardiner, Samuel R. (1883). History of England from the Accession of James I to the Outbreak of the Civil War, 1603–1642. Vol. II. 1607–1616. London: Longmans, Green, and Co. OCLC 4088221.
- Hunneyball, Paul (2010). "CREWE, Ranulphe (1559-1646), of Lincoln's Inn, London and Crewe Hall, Barthomley, Cheshire; later of Westminster". In Ferris, John P.; Thrush, Andrew (eds.). The House of Commons, 1604-1629. The History of Parliament. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Jansson, Maija (1988). "Introduction". In Jansson, Maija (ed.). Proceedings in Parliament, 1614 (House of Commons). ISBN 978-0-87169-172-9.
- OCLC 630310478.
- Moir, Thomas L. (1958). The Addled Parliament of 1614. Oxford: Clarendon Press. OCLC 1014344.
- Mondi, Megan (2007). "The Speeches and Self-Fashioning of King James VI and I to the English Parliament, 1604-1624". Constructing the Past. 8 (1): 139–182. OCLC 1058935115.
- "addle, n. and adj.". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. December 2020. Retrieved 3 February 2021. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
- "addled, adj.". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. December 2020. Retrieved 3 February 2021. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
- Peck, Linda Levy (September 1981). "The Earl of Northampton, Merchant Grievances and the Addled Parliament of 1614". S2CID 159485080.
- Roberts, Clayton (1985). Schemes & Undertakings: A Study of English Politics in the Seventeenth Century. Columbus: Ohio State University Press. ISBN 978-0-8142-0377-4.
- ISBN 978-0-333-12400-0.
- ISBN 978-1-85285-025-8.
- Seddon, P. R. (3 January 2008). "Parry, Sir Thomas (1544–1616), administrator". doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/21434. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- Smith, Alan G. R. (1973). "Constitutional Ideas and Parliamentary Developments in England 1603–1625". In Smith, Alan G. R. (ed.). The Reign of James VI and I. London: Macmillan Press. pp. 160–176. OCLC 468638840.
- Stewart, Alan (2011). The Cradle King: A Life of James VI & I. London: Random House. ISBN 978-1-4481-0457-4.
- Thrush, Andrew (2010a). "The Parliament of 1604-1610". In Ferris, John P.; Thrush, Andrew (eds.). The House of Commons, 1604-1629. The History of Parliament. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Thrush, Andrew (2010b). "The Parliament of 1614". In Ferris, John P.; Thrush, Andrew (eds.). The House of Commons, 1604-1629. The History of Parliament. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Thrush, Andrew (2010c). "NEVILLE, Sir Henry I (1564-1615), of Billingbear, Waltham St. Lawrence, Berks. and Tothill Street, Westminster; formerly of Mayfield, Suss.". In Ferris, John P.; Thrush, Andrew (eds.). The House of Commons, 1604-1629. The History of Parliament. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Thrush, Andrew (2010d). "The Parliament of 1621". In Ferris, John P.; Thrush, Andrew (eds.). The House of Commons, 1604-1629. The History of Parliament. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Thrush, Andrew (7 May 2014). "1614: The Beginning of the Crisis of Parliaments". The History of Parliament blog. Archived from the original on 30 March 2020.
- OCLC 395478.
- doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/14592. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
Further reading
- Russell, Conrad (2011). King James VI and I and his English Parliaments. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-820506-7.