One this date in History: William & Mary declared joint sovereigns.

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Glorious Revolution 1689, King James II of England, King James II-VII of England and Scotland, Kings and Queens of England, kings and queens of Scotland, Mary II of England, Parliament, William & Mary, William III and Mary II, William III of England

One this date in History: February 13, 1689. William III-II & Mary III declared joint sovereigns of England, Scotland and Ireland.

William III (Dutch: Willem; November 4, 1650 – March 8, 1702), also widely known as William of Orange, was sovereign Prince of Orangefrom birth, Stadtholder of Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Gelderland and Overijssel in the Dutch Republic from 1672 and King of England, Ireland and Scotland from 1689 until his death in 1702. It is a coincidence that his regnal number (III) was the same for both Orange and England. As King of Scotland, he is known as William II. He is sometimes informally known in Northern Ireland and Scotland as “King Billy”.

William inherited the principality of Orange from his father, William II, who died a week before William’s birth. His mother, Mary, was the daughter of King Charles I of England. In 1677, he married his fifteen-year-old first cousin, Mary, the daughter of his maternal uncle James, Duke of York.

Mary II (April 30, 1662 – December 28, 1694) was joint monarch of England, Scotland, and Ireland with her husband and first cousin, William III of Orange, from 1689 until her death. William and Mary, both Protestants, became king and queen regnant following the Glorious Revolution, which resulted in the adoption of the English Bill of Rights and the deposition of her Roman Catholic father, James II-VII. William became sole ruler upon her death in 1694. Popular histories usually refer to their joint reign as that of “William and Mary”.

Mary, born at St James’s Palace in London on 30 April 1662, was the eldest daughter of the Duke of York (the future King James II-VII), and his first wife, Anne Hyde. Mary’s uncle was King Charles II, who ruled the three kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland; her maternal grandfather, Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon, served for a lengthy period as Charles’s chief advisor. She was baptised into the Anglican faith in the Chapel Royal at St James’s, and was named after her ancestor, Mary, Queen of Scots. Her godparents included her father’s cousin, Prince Rupert of the Rhine. Although her mother bore eight children, all except Mary and her younger sister Anne died very young, and King Charles II had no legitimate children. Consequently, for most of her childhood, Mary was second in line to the throne after her father.

The Glorious Revolution of 1688 was when Parliament became supreme and limited the power of the Crown.

The Revolution resolved the struggle between Crown and Parliament and it also helped settle the religious struggles within the country. Basically at its heart it was a revolution that deposed King James II-VII of England and Scotland. In 1679 Parliament wanted to exclude James from the succession due to his Catholicism. To be Catholic in a Protestant England at that time was troublesome even if you were the king. During his reign James did not do what others feared, nor what his predecessor Mary I did, and tried to revive Catholicism and make it the official religion of England. No, James did what his brother Charles II did and promoted religious tolerance. Sadly these enlightened kingly brothers were way ahead of their times. England had little tolerance for religious tolerance if that religious tolerance included acceptance of Catholics.

What kept James II-VII on his throne was the knowledge that eventually his Protestant daughter, Princess Mary, would succeed him. Mary was married to her first cousin Prince William III of Orange, who was next in line to the throne after Mary and her sister, Princess Anne.

In 1673 as the Duke of York, James married his second wife, Mary Beatrice d’Este of Modena, the elder child of Alfonso IV, Duke of Modena, and his wife, Laura Martinozzi. The new Duchess of York was a devout Catholic and numerous pregnancies ended in either miscarriages or sickly children that did not live long which seemed to assure a Protestant succession. However, after James came to the throne Mary-Beatrice delivered a healthy son, Prince James Francis Edward, shortly thereafter created Prince of Wales. This solidified the fact that the successor to James II-VII would be another Catholic king. This was not acceptable to many people including Parliament and Prince William III of Orange himself who was considerably anti-Catholic and did not want to see his wife’s chance on the throne (and his) slip away.

It is interesting to note that historians greatly debate whether or not the birth of a Catholic Prince of Wales was the reason for James being overthrown. The truth it seems is that James was so unpopular that William III of Orange was planning to invade England prior to the birth of the Catholic heir. William did not want to be seen as an invader and therefore asked members of Parliament to conduct an act of treason by inviting him to come to England and take the throne. When seven brave members of Parliament achieved this honor, William began assembling his fleet and waited for the right moment to invade. When France was engaged in a battle in Germany William sailed his fleet to England and came ashore on 5/15 November 1688. James II-VII showed little resistance and on December 10, 1688 the king, queen and Prince of Wales fled to France.

With James II-VII now exiled in France William took control of the provisional government and called for a Conventional Parliament. His legal right to do so was questionable but this was a time of revolution. This new Parliament consisted of many loyal monarchists who had sat in Parliament under Charles II. The English Convention Parliament was very divided on the issue of who should wear the crown. The radical Whigs in the Lower House proposed to elect Willem as a king (meaning that his power would be derived from the people); the moderates wanted an acclamation of William and Mary together; the Tories wanted to make him regent only and acclaim Mary as Queen.

On January 28 a committee of the whole House of Commons promptly decided by acclamation that James II-VII had broken “the original contract” had “abdicated the government” and had left the throne “vacant.” The House of Lords rejected the wording of the acclimation and what followed were weeks of debate on the wording of the acclimation and who should be the monarch. Princess Anne, next-in-line after her sister, declared that she would temporarily waive her right to the crown should Mary die before William. Mary, for her part, refused to be made queen without William as king by her side, paving the way for the inevitable mounting of the throne of William III of Orange onto the English & Scottish thrones. The Lords on February 6 changed their minds and avoiding a possible civil war now accepted the words “abdication” and “vacancy.” in the House of Commons acclimation.

On February 13, 1689 Willem III of Orange along with his wife were offered the Crown by Parliament and then became joint sovereigns as King William III-II and Queen Mary II of England, Scotland and Ireland.

Parliament had decided the succession and the power to name the monarch and regulate the succession has been in their hands ever since.

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Charles I, Enters the House of Commons

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Charles, Charles I of England, English Civil War, House of Commons, John Hampden, John Pym, King of Scots, Kings and Queens of England, Parliament, Queen Henrietta Marie

On this Day in Royal History: January 4, 1642, King Charles I of England, Scotland and Ireland (1625-1649) marches into the House of Commons with troops intending to arrest five Members of Parliament for disobeying his orders. This historic and brazen action was the catalyst for the English Civil War 1642-1649.

This act greatly angered the MPs who saw this behavior as a breach of parliamentary privilege. Members of the House slammed the doors of the chamber in the faces of the King’s men. When King Charles finally entered the House of Commons, the Speaker, William Lenthall, refused to reveal the location of the wanted men, famously saying: “May it please your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak in this place but as the House is pleased to direct me, whose servant I am here.”

What lead to this breech of privilege? It came in the aftermath of rebellions in Ireland and Scotland. Charles suspected, and there is evidence his suspicions were correct, that some members of the English Parliament had colluded with the invading Scots. On January 3, 1642, the day before this historic event, Charles directed Parliament to give up five members of the House of Commons – John Pym, John Hampden, Denzil Holles, William Strode and Sir Arthur Haselrig– and one peer from the House of Lords, Lord Mandeville – to be arrested on the grounds of high treason.

When Parliament refused there is some evidence to suggest Queen Henrietta Maria had persuaded Charles to arrest the five members by force and that Charles himself should intended carry out the arrests. However, news of the warrant reached Parliament ahead of him, and the wanted men slipped away by boat shortly before Charles entered the House of Commons. Charles abjectly declared “all my birds have flown”, and was forced to retire, empty-handed.

The failed arrest attempt was politically disastrous for Charles, for in one smooth stroke Charles destroyed his supporters’ efforts to portray him as a defence against innovation and disorder. Parliament quickly seized London, and Charles fled the capital for Hampton Court Palace.

No English sovereign has ever entered the House of Commons since this unprecedented breach of parliamentary privilege. Every year this event is commemorated during the State Opening of Parliament when Black Rod tries to enter the Commons, the door is slammed in his face to symbolise the independence of the elected House of Commons from the monarchy.

Why the Queen cannot give the throne to the Duke of Cambridge.

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Act of Settlement 1701, Edward VI, Elizabeth II, Henry IV, Kingdom of England, Louis XIV of France, Parliament, Prince Charles, Prince William of Wales, The Duke of Cambridge

Frequently on social media I will see posts by people that think the Queen should give the throne to the Duke of Cambridge, bypassing the Prince of Wales. These people generally are not fans of the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall. The Queen has no power to give the crown to anyone. She cannot bypass the Prince of Wales and give the crown to the Duke of Cambridge. The succession to the throne is regulated by Parliament and this authority has been in the hands of Parliament for centuries. Therefore, it would take an Act of Parliament to alter the succession and remove the Prince of Wales from his rightful place in the order of the succession. There is no plans to do so, nor is there any reason or need to alter the succession.

Even during the reigns of the Saxon kings the power to regulate or name your successor was not in the hands of the monarch. That power was in the hands of the Witenagemot (Witan) a council of elders. At the time the English kingship was elective and semi-hereditary. The Witenagemot had the power to name and elect the king and although they limited their choices to the House of Wessex, they would often select a brother of the pervious King especially if the king left children too young to reign.

In 1066 when William I “the Conqueror” became king he abolished the Witenagemot and held the power and right to name his successor. Although the king did hold this power, the will of the king was not always followed. Case in point was Henry I of England (1100-1134) who named his daughter, the Empress Matilda, as his successor. However, despite the Barons swearing an oath to uphold the succession of the Empress Matilda, this oath was ignored upon King Henry’s death allowing the King’s nephew, Count Stephen of Blois, to usurp the throne and plunging England into many years of civil war.

Eventually the crown evolved into the male preferred primogeniture that remained up until recently which ended with the Crown Act of 2013 and left the succession to the Crown to the eldest child regardless of gender. Also, concurrent with the settling into the tradition of male preferred primogeniture, came the rise of Parliament which also tried influence the crown in matters of succession. When Henry IV (1399-1412) usurped the crown from Richard II (1377-1399) he had his kingship sanctioned by Parliament to give his reign legal status.

Even when monarchs such as Henry VIII (1509-1547) and his son Edward VI (1547-1553) tried to alter the succession they were unable to assert their will without Parliamentary approval. Henry tried to exclude the descendants of the union of his sister Margaret to King James IV of Scotland and Edward tried to bypass his sister Mary and give the throne to his cousin, Lady Jane Grey. In each case Parliament either ignored the king’s will, as was the case with the union of Margaret to King James IV of Scotland, and Parliament did not sanction altering the succession that Edward VI attempted. This was another reason Lady Jane is considered a usurper.

Queen Elizabeth I (1558-1603) was the last monarch who had power to name her successor given the fact that she left no heir. This was a power she refused to use as she did not name her successor, although historians debate whether or not she did name her distant cousin, King James VI of Scotland, as her successor. In 1679 King Charles II of England, Scotland and Ireland actually stopped Parliament from removing his brother, James, Duke of York from the succession due to his Catholicism via the Exclusion Bill. The almost lead to another English civil war.

The Duke of York became King James II-VII of England, Scotland and Ireland in 1685 and it was his abandonment of the throne in 1688 which lead to Parliament calling William III of Orange and Princess Mary, daughter of the deposed king, to the throne which they held jointly. This was made legal with the passing of the English Bill of Rights in 1689. With the Passing of the Act of Settlement in 1701, which regulated the throne to the Protestant descendants of the Electress Sophia of Hanover, Parliament has held the power to regulate the succession to the crown ever since.

Although not England, even the great powerful Louis XIV of France and Navarre (1643-1715), an absolute monarch, was unable to alter the succession to the French throne when he wanted to give succession rights to his legitimized children after the Princes of the Blood. This demonstrates how difficult it is for a monarch to alter the succession to the crown.

I hope this short history lesson demonstrates why the Queen cannot alter the succession to the crown by giving the throne to the Duke of Cambridge bypassing the Prince of Wales.

Survival of Monarchies: England Part V

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2012. Parliament, Buckingham Palace, King George I of Great Britain, Kings and Queens of England, kings and queens of the United Kingdom, Parliament, Prime Minister, Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria of Great Britain

On August 1, 1714 Queen Anne died at the age of 42. Her successor, as designated in the Act of Settlement of 1701 was Princess Sophia of Hanover, who was married to Elector Ernst-August of Hanover. However, The Electress Sophia died in June of 1714 before she could take the throne herself. Therefore it was her son, Elector Georg-Ludwig of Hanover, who mounted the throne as King George I of Great Britain. With him we begin to see the monarchy move even more closer to the constitutional form it has taken today.

George I was actually 52^nd in-line to the throne when he succeeded. All those that were ahead of him were of the Catholic faith. George was 54 years old at the time of his accession and he spoke little English. It was during his reign that the power of the crown was further diminished. One way his power was diminished was though the rise of the office of the Prime Minister. The office is not established by any constitution or law but exists only by long-established convention. In other words the office arose over time and out of necessity.

Let me back track a bit. In 1625 under Charles I a Cabinet style government was created with ministers serving the monarch as a council in matters of state. With the accession of George I the power of those in the Cabinet rose as George I had very little interest in governing. Soon, by 1722, Robert Walpole, 1st Earl of Orford was essentially the First Prime Minister under King George I. Even today the office of Prime Minister does not exist Constitutionally, for the any of the Prime Minister’s executive and legislative powers are actually royal prerogatives which are still formally vested in the Sovereign, who remains the Head of State. Those who hold the office of Prime Minister are, in actuality, First Lord of the Treasury, the position they hold as a member of the sovereign’s cabinet.

Prior to 1902 the position was held by a member from the House of Lords, provided that his government could form a majority in the Commons. However, as the power of the aristocracy waned during the 19th century the convention developed that the Prime Minister should always sit in the lower house (House of Commons). During the reign of the first 4 Hanoverian kings the position of Prime Minister could be changed on the whim of the monarch. As time progressed those who were appointed to the office of First Lord of the Treasury, were those whose party had a majority in the lower house.

As we saw last week the Bill of Rights limited the power of the Crown but since then no official law has been instated to further limit the crown is why many of the Sovereign’s prerogative powers are still legally intact but the evolution of the office of Prime Minister has removed the monarch from day-to-day governance, with ministers exercising the royal prerogatives, leaving the monarch in practice with three constitutional rights: to be kept informed, to advise, and to warn.

Under this arrangement Britain might appear to have two chief executives: the Prime Minister and the Monarch. The concept of “the Crown” resolves this apparent paradox. The Crown is considered to be the cabinet which is the state’s authority to govern: to make laws and execute them, impose taxes and collect them, declare war and make peace. Prior to the “Glorious Revolution” of 1688 the monarch solely and exclusively wielded the powers of the Crown. As we have seen, Parliament gradually forced monarchs to assume a neutral political position as Parliament has effectively distributed the powers of the Crown and gave its authority to the Prime Minister and Cabinet. During times when the monarchy was near absolute the king was accountable to no one. Today, the Prime Minister and Cabinet, as representing “The Crown,” are accountable for their policies and actions to Parliament, in particular the elected House of Commons.

During the reign of the Hanoverians they often favored one party over another. As often happened when monarch and his heir were at odds, rival courts were established with one party trying to court favor with the monarch while the other party courted favor with the heir. It was under Queen Victoria (1837-1901) that this began to change. Prince Albert, the Prince Consort, was instrumental in steering the Monarch in the direction of neutrality and not favoring one party over the other.

It was along and difficult road but all of these events and evolving traditions helped steer the monarchy through the changing times. Its willingness to adapt has allowed it to remain.

Survival of Monarchies: England Part IV.

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English Bill of Rights, Kings and Queens of England, kings and queens of Scotland, Mary II of England, Parliament, William III of England

English Bill of Rights

When William III and Mary II were called to the throne by Parliament this forever altered the succession by hereditary right only. The Jacobites that followed the Glorious Revolution today recognizes HRH Prince Franz, The Duke of Bavaria as King Francis II of England and Scotland as the heir general of the Stuart Dynasty. This very small faction will ignore the right of Parliament to designate the succession. That is what happened. With the Glorious Revolution Parliament became the power in the land, supplanting that position once held by the Crown.

By December of that year Parliament passed the historic Bill of Rights on December 16, 1689. Although the Bill of Rights was similar to the Declaration of Right presented by the Convention Parliament to William III and Mary II in March 1689 (or 1688 by Old Style dating), inviting them to become joint sovereigns of England, the Bill of Rights went further and set the limits on the powers of the crown and sets out the rights of Parliament and rules for freedom of speech in Parliament, the requirement for regular elections to Parliament and the right to petition the monarch without fear of retribution.

From Wikipedia here are some basic rights set out by the document:

The Bill of Rights laid out certain basic rights for all Englishmen. The Act stated that there should be:

• No royal interference with the law. Though the sovereign remains the fount of justice, he or she cannot unilaterally establish new courts or act as a judge.
• No taxation by Royal Prerogative. The agreement of the parliament became necessary for the implementation of any new taxes.
• Freedom to petition the monarch without fear of retribution.
• No standing army may be maintained during a time of peace without the consent of parliament.

No royal interference in the freedom of the people to have arms for their own defence as suitable to their class and as allowed by law (simultaneously restoring rights previously taken from Protestants by James II).

No royal interference in the election of members of Parliament

• The freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament.
• “grants and promises of fines or forfeitures” before conviction are void.

no excessive bail or “cruel and unusual” punishments may be imposed.

Although the Bill of Rights did limit the Crown the monarchy did not instantly become the Figurehead Constitutional Monarchy that it is today. No, the King and or Queen still had considerable say in the Government although they were not subject to the will of the House of Commons and the House of Lords respectively. As we shall see in the next session Parliament also has contentions within themselves as the powers of the House of Commons grew the more they desired to limit the powers of the hereditary House of Lords.

However, before that happened a crisis in the succession to the Crown happened once again requiring Parliament to pass the The Act of Settlement in 1701. When William III took the throne jointly with his wife Mary II he was bumped up from third-in-line to the throne to share the Crown with his wife who had been first-in-line until the birth of her Catholic half-brother, James, The Prince of Wales in 1688. As we have seen Princess Anne, the sister of Mary II, relinquished her place in the succession. This meant that when Mary II died in 1694 (making the joint rule of William III and Mary II lasting a mere five years) William III stayed on the throne instead of Anne succeeding. Had William re-married and produced heirs they would have come before the claim of Princess Anne. The union of William and Mary was childless. When William died of pneumonia, a complication from a broken collarbone following a fall from his horse, Sorrel, he was succeeded by his cousin/sister-in-law, the Princess Anne who then became Queen.

Queen Anne, as a princess, married Prince George of Denmark and Norway, Duke of Cumberland the younger son of King Frederik III of Denmark and Norway and Sophie Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg. Ironically, Prince George was first cousin to King George I of Great Britain, his wife’s eventual successor, as his mother was the sister of Ernest Augustus, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, later Elector of Hanover (father of King George I). Anne and George had many many pregnancies but only one child, Prince William, Duke of Gloucester, lived beyond infancy. Sadly, Prince William died of either Scarlet Fever or Smallpox at the age of 11 in 1700. At the time it was thought King William III would not remarry and Anne, worn out from all her pregnancies, would not have another child.

The only legitimate heir at the time was the Catholic James, The Prince of Wales. He was approached by members of Parliament to be placed back in the order of succession under the condition that he convert to Protestantism. He refused to do so. This left Parliament with no other choice but to search for another heir. Eventually Parliament settled the succession to the English and Scottish crowns on the Electress Sophia of Hanover (a granddaughter of James VI of Scotland and I of England) and her non-Roman Catholic heirs. The line of Sophia of Hanover was the most junior among the Stuarts, but consisted of dedicated Protestants. Sophia missed being queen by a few weeks and died on June 8, 1714, before the death of Queen Anne on 1 August 1714, at which time Sophia’s son duly became King George I and started the Hanoverian dynasty.

The act played a seminal role in the formation of the Kingdom of Great Britain. England and Scotland which had shared a monarch since 1603, but had remained separately governed countries. The Scottish parliament was more reluctant than the English to abandon the House of Stuart, members of which had been Scottish monarchs long before they became English ones. English pressure on Scotland to accept the Act of Settlement led to a softening of this attitude which paved the way for the parliamentary union of the two countries in 1707.

In this last section dealing with England/Britain we will see the power of the Crown diminish further with the rise of the office of Prime Minister under the Hanoverian Dynasty.

Survival of Monarchies: England, Part II

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Charles II of England and Scotland, English Civil War, Exclusion Bill, James I of England, King James II-VII of England and Scotland, Oliver Cromwell, Parliament

James VI, King of Scots came to the English throne in 1603 and he had been on the Scottish throne since 1567, a few months after his birth. As stated last week, often a strong monarch was able to gain control of Parliament and even rule without them. However, was the problems James had with Parliament due to him being a weak monarch or was the showdown between Crown and Parliament inevitable? My personal theory is that the two would eventually come into conflict. Society is always in a flux of growth and change and as has happened in all monarchies eventually the people rise up and desire a say in government.

For centuries the Crown held the majority of power and although the Tudor monarchs only used the Parliament to stamp its approval on what the king or queen desires, usually it had to do with raising taxes, Parliament, mostly the Commons, began to realize it had a more important role in the process of governing and this begun to be realized under the Stuarts. James had an attitude toward Parliament where he thought it was a body that held opinions and enacted laws that he did not have to abide by as he saw himself as the ultimate authority on Laws and legislation. Parliament, for its part, saw themselves as having an equal say in the legislative process of enacting and Laws. With such a contrast in views of their respective roles conflict was inevitable.

James died in 1625 never having resolved his differences with Parliament. Things came to a head under the reign of his son, King Charles I (1625-1649). Charles ruled for 11 years without Parliament and often would raise taxes without the consent of Parliament. One example was when he forced inland towns and villages to pay a maritime related tax meant only for coastal towns that were associated with the shipping industry. When Charles needed Parliament once again for a war with Spain and the Bishop’s War over religion in Scotland. All of this eventually to Civil War where the Parliamentary forces fought the forces of the Crown. In the end Charles I lost his head and the monarchy was abolished.

Oliver Cromwell became the head of state and although technically England was Republic between the years 1649-1660, in truth, it was a military dictatorship with Cromwell, as Lord Protector, wielding as much power as any king, if not more. He was followed in that office in 1658 by his son who was ill-suited for the position and soon left that office leaving England under the control of the military. Chaos and almost anarchy ensued until General Monck saw the wisdom in restoring the monarchy under Charles II (1660-1685).

Charles II had as much power as his predecessors therefore the conflict between Crown and Parliament was not resolved during the Civil War. The Parliament that sat at the beginning of Charles’ reign was called the Cavalier Parliament due to the number of loyal royalists sitting in the Parliament. Despite a honeymoon period between the two bodies they eventually clashed over a number of issues. There were times when Charles ruled without Parliament sitting and there were moments when it was thought that Civil War would once again erupt. One prominent issue concerned the succession to the throne. Charles II had a brood of bastards but not one legitimate child to inherit the throne. This left the king’s brother, Prince James, Duke of York, as the heir to the throne. The problem with this was the fact that James was Catholic and the country was staunchly Protestant.

In 1679 Parliament proposed the Exclusion Bill to officially remove the Duke of York from his place in the succession. Charles was angered by this bill and Protestants in Parliament were angered at the king for supporting his brother. Amid rumors of a Catholic plot to place James on the throne the bill was eventually dropped when Charles dismissed Parliament and ruled for the last 4 years of his reign without them. The unpopular James succeeded as King James II-VII of England and Scotland and was acceptable to Parliament as long as his heir was his Protestant daughter Princess Mary who was married to her cousin (who also had a claim to the English throne) the Protestant defender, Prince Willem III of Orange. In 1688 the King had a son, Prince James Francis, who would be raised Catholic and this lead to the kings down fall.

Next week will feature the Glorious Revolution and the transition of power from the Crown to Parliament.

Legal Succession: Henry VI & Edward IV: Part Two.

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3rd Duke of York, 4th Earl of Cambridge, 6th Earl of March, Act of Accord, and 7th Earl of Ulster., Battle of Blore Heath, Battle of St. Albans, Cecily Neville, Duchess of York, Earl of Warwick, King Henry VI of England, Parliament, Richard Neville, Richard Plantagenet, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Bourchier, Wars of the Roses

To understand how the House of York wrestled the throne from the House of Lancaster let me back track the claims of the House of York. By the reign of Henry VI the claimant to the throne from the House of York was Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York, 6th Earl of March, 4th Earl of Cambridge, and 7th Earl of Ulster.

The House of York was descended in the male line from Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York, the fourth surviving son of Edward III. The House of York also represented Edward III’s senior line, as heir general of Edward III through cognatic descent from Lionel, Duke of Clarence, Edward III’s second surviving son. Being descended from two sons of Edward III gave the house of York the superior claim to the throne over the House of Lancaster, although according to cognatic primogeniture the House of York had the senior claim and junior claim according to the agnatic primogeniture.

As I stated last week Richard, Duke of York was made Lord Protector of the realm during the incapacity of Henry VI. However, once Henry recovered the Duke of York lost that position and John Beaufort, Duke of Sommerset (another descendant of Edward III) and Queen Margaret of Anjou had many of his statues and reforms overturned.

By 1455 the conflicts between the Houses of York and Lancaster reached fever pitch and with the First Battle of St. Albans the Wars of the Roses had commenced. The Yorkists were victorious in this first salvo of the war. The Duke of York, along with his ally, Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick killed Edmund, Duke of Somerset and captured King Henry VI. What is interesting to note is that Henry VI had been under control of Somerset and the Queen. Instead of taking the throne for himself at this point, the Duke of York restored King Henry VI to full power and authority.

With Henry VI in full power and the Yorkists in control, the Lancastrian faction still plotted to take back control of the king. Despite  Thomas Bourchier, the Archbishop of Canterbury‘s attempts to reconcile both parties conflicts arose once more in 1459. The Lancastrians got the upper had in the Battle of Blore Heath but after a Yorkist victory in 1460 at the Battle of Northampton a strange even occurred.

Richard, Duke of York, along with his wife Cecily Neville, Duchess of York (aunt of York’s ally The Earl of Warwick) marched on London and was well received with all the pomp and circumstance due a reigning monarch. Parliament was in session and when The Duke of York declared that he was the rightful and legal king based on primogeniture he was met with stunned silence. Even the Earl of Warwick did not support the Duke of York taking the throne and even Parliament, who agreed that Richard had the best hereditary claim, did not want to over thrown the king. What Warwick wanted, at this time, was to remove the Lancastrian control over the king.

This tense moment was resolved peacefully with the Act of Accord which recognized the Duke of York as heir to King Henry VI even though this displaced the 6-year-old Edward, Prince of Wales in the line of the succession.

I will continue this examination of the rivalry for the throne between the Houses of York and Lancaster in my next post on Wednesday.

What I want to focus on is the issue of legality. Henry IV was a usurper as we mentioned recently. Does that mean the entire House of Lancaster which reigned from 1399 to 1461 was also illegally on the throne? Apparently not. Once in power his rule was accepted by Parliament, a body itself that was gaining in power and authority, and this established the legality of the Lancastrian line. The 1460 Act of Accord also demonstrates the growing role Parliament was playing in regulating the legal succession to the throne.

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

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1789, Bastille Day, Charles I of England, Colonel Thomas Pride, English Civil War, French Revolution, July 14, Long Parliament, Lord Strafford, Louis XVI, Oliver Cromwell, Parliament, Pride's Purge

Saturday is Bastille Day where they celebrate the 1789 storming of the Bastille which was the start of the French Revolution. Since I don’t write long posts on the weekends I thought I would take the celebration of Bastille Day to examine how monarchies adapt and survive. Although Louis XVI and his Queen, Marie Antoinette, did not survive the French Revolution the monarchy in France did limp on for a few decades after it was restored following the Napoleonic period. The question I ask is where did Louis XVI go wrong? Where did Charles I of England & Scotland go wrong in the 1640s culminating in his beheading in 1649? Did each have a part to play in their demise? Ah, so many questions. I often think history is complex and I personally eschew simple cause and effect answers. Generally many factors play into the events of history. So in this small little blog I will examine some of the factors that caused the downfall of these people and also examine, in the big picture, how monarchies that survive to this day, have been able to adapt.

Louis XVI, King of France and Navarre (1774-1792)

Shortly after the storming of the Bastille the French royal family was forcibly removed from the opulent Palace at Versailles to the Tuileries Palace in Paris where they lived as virtual prisoners. For a brief period of time Louis did enjoy a considerable level of popularity. Initially the abolition of the monarchy was not the goal of the revolutionaries. If they had a clear goal it was to end the absolutist nature of the crown and to bring it under the control of a constitution which limited its powers. Much of the fight was between those supporting changes, sometimes radical changes, and those who wished to preserve the monarchy. Louis was indecisive and in his heart he was the King and his heritage and tradition taught that it was the king that wielded the reigns of power. Other factors were his unpopular wife, and Austrian royal by birth, and many rightfully feared that the king and the queen would draw Austria and other absolute monarchies to their side. Invasion of France by foreign powers in support of the monarchy was a constant threat. There was distrust all around on both sides. In the end because of their shoddy treatment Louis and his family tried to escape their prison like existence in the Tuileries Palace but were caught and returned to Paris. Louis was also secretly planning, with the aid of loyal ministers, his escape once again and the appeal to foreign powers for their aid in restoring the monarchy and ending the revolution. Before they could implement these plans Louis and Marie Antoinette were arrested and the evidence of their dealings with foreign powers to regain power was their undoing and the reasons for being executed for high treason. What if questions are impossible to answer. Had Louis not conspired with foreign powers, had his queen been more popular, would he have lost his head, or was it inevitable?

Charles I, King of England and Scotland (1625-1649)

For eleven years Charles ruled as an absolute monarch in a country not used to absolute monarchs. during that time he ruled without calling Parliament. Even his more powerful predecessors, Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, still had to wrestle with ministers and Parliament from time to time. Henry had a formidable will and Elizabeth also had a formidable will along with diplomatic skills and feminine charm. As with the case with Louis XVI the seeds for revolution were sown in the past. For Charles the problem concerned with who wielded the power, the Crown or Parliament? The struggle for power between the two entities had a long tradition and in viewing the threads of history it can be seen that the the two would eventually bump heads. Charles did abuse his power during those eleven years of personal rule. He raised taxes illegally and forced loans upon his people. In 1640 the call of war beckoned in the form of the Bishops War when Charles wanted to force an episcopal style of worship on his Scottish subjects. In order to accomplish his tasks he needed to raise funds and for that he needed Parliament. Charles called two Parliaments within a short time which were distrusting of the king. There was actually distrust on both sides. Despite many concessions given to Parliament by the king there was still a struggle between both the Crown and Parliament. An event that pushed the two parties closer to war was the handling of Lord Strafford. Lord Strafford was the king’s deputy in Ireland and when Parliament could not prove a charge of treason against him the House of Commons resorted to passing a Bill of Attainder which did not require proof of guilt for the conviction of high treason only the king’s signature. The king knew Strafford to be innocent of the charges and yet the king also knew to ignore the Bill from the House of Commons would trigger war. So the king sent Strafford to slaughter as a sacrificial lamb. Upon Straffords death Ireland fell into chaos fearing reprisals by a protestant army. As tensions continued to rise Charles entered Parliament with 400 troops to arrest 5 members on charges of treason. This failed miserably as the members had been tipped off and flew the coup. The speaker of the House of Commons told the king he was a servant of Parliament and not the king. Fearing for his safety Charles left London and the English Civil War had begun. It would last, off and on, until 1649 with the defeat of the king and his execution for high treason. Even with an assured victory for Parliament at the end of the war it was still possible for the king to keep not only his head but his crown as well. Toward the end of 1648 the king was willing to negotiate and accept the concessions of Parliament and rule with limited powers. Parliament was willing to accept him and have him return to power. So what happened? Colonel Thomas Pride and his troops scored a military coup d’état and purged Parliament of all those that supported the king. With nothing left but the rump of the Long Parliament and the remaining members who were anti-monarchist, Charles was convicted of high treason and executed.

I could go one with more examples, such as Wilhelm II of Germany, Nicholas II of Russia, Constantine II of Greece etc. It may be impossible to examine these monarchies and answer the question “was there something these monarchs could have done differently to save either themselves or their thrones?” Was their demise inevitable? We’ll never know. One thing I do observe from the tapestry of history is that the monarchies that have survived were the ones that were willing to adapt to changes. Those that wanted to keep the status quo and retain power were the ones that failed and ended up in the trash bin of history. The source of the change seems to have come from the majority of the people in these states and the problem seems to be that the monarchies would not, or could not, either listen to the changes in the wind or see the proverbial hand writing on the wall.