England and France – a Tale of Two Monarchies
A rather astonishing aspect of this semester’s study of “The
History of Western Civilization”, for me, has been to discover how much England and France are “joined at the
hips”. They APPEAR, on a map, to be completely
separate countries. And, at this point
in time, they seem to have completely different cultures. However, what our inquiries have led us to
discover is that England and
France,
over the course of the last 2000 years, have had a remarkably interconnected
experience. They have had some of the
same groups of people migrate into, or maraud their way THROUGH their
countries. They have been ruled by some
of the same people, and people in one country have also been “residents” of the
other. So, the question arises – what
can possibly explain how DIFFERENTLY they appear to us today? If their past has been shared, why is their
present status so distinct? Above all,
how did one country end up with a constitutional monarchy and the other with an
absolute monarchy? And what’s the
difference between the two systems?
Question #1 of Foothill
College’s HIST-04b
Mid-Term Exam #3 asks about Absolutism. Option #B reads like this: “By the
second half of the seventeenth century, England
and France were the leading
nations of two contrasting systems of government, economics, political
institutions; for the 18th century, much of Europe’s
history centered on this rivalry.” Then the following questions are raised:
- What
were the differences?
- What
events in each country “solidified” the results?
- Why in
the end did the English model eventually win out?
What I will attempt to do in this essay is to address these
issues. Furthermore, just for my own
satisfaction, I will summarize some of the earlier history of these two
countries, to act as a synopsis for this class.
I will add that I have been selected as one of the “star” pupils in this
class, which means I only need to write ONE final essay rather than three. Therefore, I aim to make it good.
England in the High Middle
Ages (1000-1300) (pp. 170-173)
Chapter 10 of Spielvogel’s Western Civilization[1]
talks about “The Emergence and Growth of European Kingdoms, 1000-1300”. In particular, our author tells the story of
the invasion of England by William,
the French duke of Normandy,
and his subsequent crowning as King of England, in1066. “Gradually, fusion between the victorious
Normans and the defeated Anglo-Saxons created a new England.” (p.171)
In essence, William the Conqueror was both King of England and a vassal to
the King of France. This meant he was
actually MORE powerful than the King of France, and it meant that England and France were symbiotically
joined.
“In the twelfth
century, the power of the English monarchy was greatly enlarged during the
reign of Henry II (1154-1189), the founder of the Plantagenet dynasty.” (p.171) By expanding the number of criminal cases
brought to the king’s court, and by moving the property cases there also, Henry
both increased the power of the royal courts, and the amount of money they
could command. The Church, however,
remained out of his reach. They still
appealed religious questions to the papal courts. Many of the nobles began to resent this
increased power of the monarchy, and they rose in rebellion. King John (1199-1216) signed the famous Magna
Carta in 1215 at Runymeade, which put in writing that the relationship between
lord and vassal, and king and commoner, was one of mutual rights and
obligations. The power of the English
monarchy was further reduced during the reign of Edward I (1272-1307). In effect, Edward created the forerunner of
the Parliament, called the Great Council.
He invited “two knights from every county and two residents
(‘burgesses’) from each town to meet with the Great Council to consent to new
taxes.” The barons and ecclesiastical
lords were not left out. They formed the
House of Lords, while the knights and burgesses belonged to the House of
Commons. Thus, by the end of the 13th
century, England
had a governmental structure in which both the King and the people’s
representatives, the Parliament, jointly determined the laws of the land, the
court cases, and the raising of taxes.
France in the High
Middle Ages (1000-1300) (pp.172-173)
In France,
a different story evolved. After the death
of Charlemagne, and the dissolution of the Carolingian empire following the
death of his sons, the western part of the formerly Frankish kingdom became
what’s now known as France. Hugh Capet was named King of France in 987,
yet he ruled very little territory. The
other dukes, of Normandy, Burgundy,
and Aquitaine,
were actually more powerful than their Capetian “ruler”. “The reign of King Philip II Augustus
(1180-1223) was an important turning point.
Philip II waged war against the Plantagenet rulers of England, who also ruled the French territories
of Normandy, Maine,
Anjou, and Aquitaine, and was successful in gaining
control of most of these territories.
Through these conquests, Philip quadrupled the income of the French
monarch and greatly enlarged its power.”(p172)
In doing so, Philip not only greatly expanded the domain of the French
King, but also his coffers! To
administer this “new kingdom”, he created a French royal bureaucracy. Following the reign Philip II, French kings
continued the practice of expanding the royal domain, but through marriage
alliances and political purchases instead of via war. Louis IX (1226-1270) dominated much of the 13th
century, and was later canonized by the Catholic Church. He played a major role in at least two of the
Crusades, and “was known for his attempts to bring justice to his people and
ensure their rights.”(172) Philip IV the
Fair (1285-1314) followed with the creation of a French form of
parliament. The household staff of the
monarchy was already split 3 ways – “a council for advice, a chamber of
accounts for finances, and a parlement
or royal court.”(173) Philip IV called
representatives of the three “estates” (classes) to meet with him – “the clergy
(First Estate), the nobles (Second Estate), and the townspeople (Third
Estate). This first French parliament
was not very powerful, but “by the end of the thirteenth century France was the largest, wealthiest, and best-governed
monarchical sate in Europe.”(173)
Synopsis of the High Middle Ages (1000-1300)
At the same time that England
was being conquered and hence “unified”, the old empire in France was splitting apart. The consequences of this would soon be felt,
in a fundamental way.
Europe in the Late Middle
Ages (1300s) (pp. 191-208)
Chapter Eleven, “The Late Middle Ages: Crisis and
Disintegration in the Fourteenth Century,” shows that the 14th
Century brought a lot of changes to the governments of Europe, and both England and France were actively involved in
these changes. Early in the century Europe suffered from the “little ice age”. With shorter growing seasons and disastrous
weather, widespread hunger and famine was prevalent (especially from 1315-1317).(192) The “big event”, however, was the plague in
mid-century (1347-51) that took the lives of a quarter to half of the people.(193) Not surprisingly, “the population collapse of
the fourteenth century had dire economic and social consequences.”(195) With so many lives lost, the shortage in
labor forced the price of labor to rise to the point of pain (especially to the
aristocracy). At the same time, the
reduced demand for food grains led to falling prices for agricultural
products. The effect on the old feudalistic
system was immediate, as more and more the system broke down and was replaced
by a money economy. The other scourge,
not surprisingly, was war, and in particular the Hundred Years’ War between England and France.
England in the 14th
Century (pp.199-200)
“In the fourteenth century, the lengthy reign of Edward III
(1327-1377) was an important one for the evolution of English political
institutions. Parliament increased in
prominence and developed its basic structure and functions during Edward’s
reign.”(199) Edward made several
concessions to Parliament, due to his increased need to raise money to fight
the wars with France,
which increased their powers considerably.
“By the end of Edward’s reign, Parliament had become an important
component of the English governmental system.”(199)
The economic effect of the plague in England was significant. “In England, aristocratic incomes
dropped more than 20 percent between 1347 and 1353.”(195) The response by the English parliament, to try
to limit wage increases, and forbid the free movement of peasants via the
Statue of Laborers in 1351, only made matters worse. “The decline in the number of peasants after
the Black Death accelerated the process of converting labor services to rents,
freeing peasants from the obligations of servile tenure and weakening the
system of manorialism.”(195) In 1381,
the peasants revolted when the monarchy attempted to raise more money by means
of poll tax (“a flat charge on each adult member of the population”).(195) King Richard II (1377-1399) reneged on his
promise to satisfy the peasants’ demands, and had them all arrested (though he
DID eliminate the poll tax!)
Towards the end of the century, Henry of Lancaster led a
revolt against Richard II. Richard was
deposed and killed, and Henry became King Henry IV (1399-1413). This set the stage for the 15th
century’s War of the Roses dispute over rival claims to the English throne.
France in the 14th
Century (1300s) (pp.195-200)
France,
too, suffered a peasants’ revolt in 1358, as the Jacquerie burned castles and murdered nobles in their protest
against the unequal and intolerable working conditions. However, here also the result was failure:
“The Jacquerie failed when the
privileged classes closed ranks, savagely massacred the rebels, and ended the
revolt.”(195) It was NOT a happy time or
place to live!
“The
Hundred Years’ War left France
prostrate. Depopulation, desolate
farmlands, ruined commerce, and independent and unruly nobles made it difficult
for the kings to assert their authority throughout the fourteenth century.”(200)
The Hundred Years War (pp.196-198)
The Hundred Years War most profoundly affected France, for the series of wars really amounted
to a reverse invasion of France
by England. The two countries were still allied through
both marriage ties and ties of land ownership.
However, in 1328 Philip VI, the King of France, seized Gascony
land, which precipitated the duke of Gascony
to respond by invading France. Known to us more memorably as King Edward III
of England,
he also claimed by descent to be the true French king! The Capetian line of kings had no more male
heirs, and Philip, the duke of Valois, was
only a cousin to the Capetians, whereas Edward had a more direct connection. France
also had rival factions within the country (such as the dukes of Burgundy and Orléans), competing
to control the throne, especially during the reign (and insanity) of King
Charles VI (1380-1422)
In 1396 a 20-year truce was negotiated, but in 1415 England’s King Henry V (1413-1422) once again
invaded France. “Henry went on to reconquer Normandy
and forge an alliance with the duke of Burgundy,
making the English masters of northern France.”(197) Joan of Arc helped rally the French troops to
liberate Orléans in 1429, and urged France’s heir to the throne, Charles the
dauphin, to “seize the day”. After her
capture by Burgundian allies of England
in 1430, she was turned over to the Inquisition, who promptly declared her a
heretic, and had her burned. Nevertheless,
the English armies were eventually defeated in Normandy
and Aquitaine. “The death of England’s
best commanders and the instability of the English government under King Henry
VI (1422-1461) also contributed to England’s defeat. By 1453, the only part of France that was left in England’s hands was the coastal town of Calais, which remained English
for another century.”(198)
The Hundred Years’ War had one beneficial result – it
clarified that France and England
were separate and inviolable countries, allied still somewhat by marriages and
by land ownership, but NOT by inheritance to the institutions of state! The governments were distinct, and would
continue to go their separate ways from that point on. By the 18th Century, of course,
the two countries appeared as if they were from completely different
continents, but it’s important to remember how historically connected they
really are.
Europe
in the 15th Century (1400s – the Renaissance) (pp.209-230)
Chapter 12, “Recovery and Rebirth: The Renaissance” says
summarizes the next course of events thusly: “In the first half of the
fifteenth century, European states continued the disintegrative patterns of the
previous century. In the second half of
the century, however, recovery set in, and attempts were made to reestablish
the centralized power of monarchical governments.”(224)
France in the 15th
Century (1400s) (pp.224-225)
The beneficial effect of the Hundred Years’ War for France
was that the war united the people against the common (English) enemy. Ironically, this allied both the nobles AND
the peasantry to the monarchy in a way that set the stage for the 17th
Century’s rise of absolutism. King Louis
XI (1461-1483) was most notable for his ability to use this new-found loyalty
to his advantage. By making the annual
direct tax on land or property, the taille,
a permanent tax, he guaranteed the monarchy of annual income (224). He also “repressed the French nobility and
brought the provinces of Anjou, Maine, Bar, and Provence
under royal control.”
England in the 15th
Century (1400s) (p.225)
The Hundred Years’ War depleted the English revenues, and
cost the lives of so many, that the effect was felt for years. In fact, it was instrumental in fueling the
fury that led to the War of the Roses in the 1450s, a fight for the crown
between the House of Lancaster (whose symbol was a red rose) and the House of
York (whose symbol was a white rose). “Finally,
in 1485, Henry Tudor, duke of Richmond, defeated
the last Yorkist king, Richard III (1483-1485) at Bosworth
Field and established a new dynasty.” The first Tudor king was Henry VII
(1485-1509), and he wisely ruled via diplomacy rather than war. Furthermore, he “avoided overburdening the
landed gentry and middle class with taxes”(225), and thus safely steered the
ship of state into the next century.
Synopsis of the 15th Century
What thus developed for both France
and England
during the 15th century was a growing stability of their respective
monarchies. It’s as if these two
countries had strengthened their ships of state, and had stabilized the
political waters surrounding them. They
were ready, now, to re-launch their statecraft into new arenas in the upcoming
centuries. Little did they know,
however, of the calamitous 16th Century, when wars of religion would
tear apart the fabric of Europe, and render
all ships sundered and sent to dock!
Europe in the 16th
Century – the Reformation (1500s) (p.231-249)
Chapter 13, “Reformation and Religious Warfare in the
Sixteenth Century,” illustrates how the Reformation brought with it new ideas
of how the people should be ruled, and how little they were willing to be ruled. As the populace questioned the Catholic
clergy’s legitimacy to rule religious worship, so too did they begin to
question how the monarchies ruled. After
all, the principles are the same; the church was and is a political
institution. When orthodoxy was
overturned in the religious arena, it was intellectually overthrown at the same
time in the political arena. The effects
of this appeared shortly.
England in the 16th
Century (the 1500s) (p.240)
“The English Reformation was initiated by an act of state.” In an effort to produce a male heir, King
Henry VIII (1509-1547) sought Pope Clement VII’s permission to divorce
Catherine of Aragon in order to marry her lady-in-waiting, Anne Boleyn. Unfortunately, Pope Clement depended on the
support of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, and Catherine was his niece. Not one to be stopped by trifles, Henry
sought annulment in England’s
ecclesiastical courts, and received such in 1533 from Thomas Cramer, the
archbishop of Canterbury. In June of 1533 Anne was declared queen, and
in September she delivered birth to, not the son Henry desired, but daughter
Elizabeth. “In 1534 at Henry’s request,
Parliament moved to finalize the Church of England’s break with Rome.” The Act of Supremacy of 1534 declared the king
was the supreme head of the Church of England, “a position that gave him
control of doctrine, clerical appointments, and discipline.” The effect for England was two-fold. It severed the ideological relationship with
the rest of Europe that remained Catholic (including and especially France),
and it strengthened the power of the English monarchy, who now in effect ruled
the dual domains of church and state.
Further changes by Archbishop Cramer and others during the reign of
Henry’s “sickly and underage” son Edward VI (1547-1553) only set the stage for
reversal under the reign of Henry’s daughter Mary (1553-1558). As a Catholic, she sought to return England to the Roman Catholic circle, but only
increased resistance to that with her “unfortunate marriage to Philip II, the
son of Charles V and future king of Spain”. The fury at the burning of 300 Protestant
“heretics” only made England more Protestant than before her reign, and set the
stage for the success of the brilliant Queen Elizabeth.
Elizabeth
took the helm in 1558, following Mary’s death. “During Elizabeth’s
reign, England rose to
prominence as the relatively small island kingdom became the leader of the
Protestant nations of Europe and laid the
foundations for a world empire.” (pp. 246-7)
Elizabeth
understood that the cardinal rule of a monarch was to stay alive, and both her
religious and her foreign policies were geared toward that end. She was “intelligent, cautious, and
self-confident”, and “moved quickly to solve the religious problem she
inherited from her half-sister.” (p.247)
Elizabeth
repealed the Catholic laws of Mary’s reign, reinstated the Act of Supremacy which
made her “’the only supreme governor’ of both church and state”, and changed
the church service to be more acceptable to Catholics. Thus, she defused the time bomb her siblings
had set, and ensured the stability of the English realm for a near century.
Diplomatically, Elizabeth
sought to avoid war and to ensure peace.
“Caution, moderation, and expediency also dictated Elizabeth’s foreign policy.” (p. 247) She was not unfamiliar with the purposes of
war, however. She encouraged piracy, and
she provided clandestine aid to French Huguenots and Dutch Calvinists in an
effort to weaken both France
and Spain, England’s perpetual foes during the
Middle Ages. Eventually she WAS drawn
into war with Spain,
but the 1588 invasion by their Armada never happened. Philip II had been persuaded by his advisors
that the people of England
would rise up against her should an invasion be launched, and that a successful
invasion would mean the overthrow of heresy, as England returned to the Catholic
fold. Alas, his number of troops and
ships was insufficient, and they were routed by ships from the Netherlands,
forcing the Armada to turn around and head for home. The war continued for another 16 years, but
“the defeat of the Spanish armada guaranteed for the time being that England
would remain a Protestant country.”
France in the 16th
Century (1500s) (p.245)
France’s
experience during the 16th century was an entirely different
matter. The wars of religion (1562-1598)
played havoc with any efforts for peace.
Calvinism had grown rapidly in France, and it was already
widespread. The Huguenots, as the French
Calvinists were known, were in all levels of society. Furthermore, they had legitimate political
grievances as well as religious opposition to the monarchy. The artisans and shopkeepers, hurt by rising
prices and a rigid guild system; the merchants and lawyers in provincial towns,
with tenuous local privileges, and members of the nobility were all united
against the throne. The danger was that
up to 40 to 50% of the French nobility were Huguenot, including the House of
Bourbon. Next in line to the Valois
dynasty, the Bourbons ruled the southern French kingdom of Navarre. Thus, while only 7% of the population was
Huguenot, “The conversion of so many nobles made the Huguenots a potentially
dangerous political threat to monarchical power.” (p.245) In addition to this, the ultra-Catholic party,
led by the Guise family (with support from the Jesuits and the papacy abroad),
was staunchly opposed to the Huguenots.
With the towns and provinces (who resented the growing power of
monarchical centralization) allied with the Huguenot nobility against the monarchy,
France suffered a major civil war, or wars, as battles took place for over 30
years. “The French Wars of Religion,
then, presented a major constitutional crisis for France and temporarily halted the
development of the French centralized territorial state. The claim of the ruling dynasty of the state
to a person’s loyalties was temporarily superseded by loyalty to one’s
religious beliefs.” As Catholics and
Calvinists fought over religious truth, “…there also emerged in France
a group known as the politiques who
placed politics before religion and believed that no religious truth was worth
the ravages of civil war.” This new
civilizing force eventually prevailed, or perhaps it was only that“…both sides
had become exhausted by bloodshed.” Whatever the case, Henry of Navarre’s
succession to the throne in 1589 allowed a modicum of sanity to surface. Re-named Henry IV (1589-1610), the political
leader of the Huguenots and a member of the Bourbon dynasty quickly converted
to Catholicism and thereby prevented continual war. His coronation in 1594 ended the wars of
religious in France, and his Edict of Nantes in 1598 eliminated the religious
problem altogether by acknowledging Catholicism as the official religion of
France, while guaranteeing Huguenots “the right to worship and to enjoy all
political privileges, including the holding of public offices.” With this battle over, France was ready for the next
Century.
Synopsis of the 16th Century
With England
on sure footing, and France
in recovery, it seemed the signs for success were everywhere. However, the true effects of the Reformation
were yet to be felt.
“That people who were disciples of the Apostle of Peace
would kill each other – often in brutal and painful fashion – aroused
skepticism about Christianity itself”…“It is surely no accident that the search
for a stable secular order of politics and for order in the universe through
natural laws soon came to play important roles.” (p.248) What had thus started in England as an effort to insure a line of male
heirs independent of foreign (papal) control, and in France as a defense of the Catholic
order challenged by critics, soon evolved into a questioning of the basis of
political rule itself.
Europe in the 17th
Century (1600s) – the Age of Absolutism (pp.271-291)
England
and France
entered the 17th Century with very different experiences. France had suffered the devastation
of the Hundred Years’ War in the 15th Century, and the Wars of
Religion in the 16th Century.
Little wonder, then, that French people wanted peace. English people, on the other hand, entered
the 17th century with a history of a stable monarchy, and growing
Parliamentarianism. They were set to
want more of the same. The perspective
of both countries, and their 17th century experiences, were
therefore bound to differ even. On the
other hand, they were still united on this – both countries continued to value
Monarchy (the rule of one, with an inherited legitimacy). Where they ended up differing is whether the
legitimacy is sanctioned by God, as in the Absolute Monarchy of 17th
Century French, or by the laws of the people, as in the Constitutional Monarchy
of 17th Century England. Chapter 15, “State Building
and the Search for Order in the Seventeenth Century”, shows us how they got
there…
England in the 17th
Century (1600s) – Constitutional Monarchy (pp. 283-287)
With the death of Queen Elizabeth in 1603, the Tudor dynasty
ended also. The Stuart line of English
kings began, ironically, with King James VI of Scotland,
Elizabeth’s
cousin. Inaugurated as James I of England
(1603-1625), he believed in the divine right of kings. The political significance of that term can
perhaps be best explained by Richard Hooker’s 1996 article, “The European
Enlightenment Glossary”, found online at www.wsu.edu/%7Edee/GLOSSARY/DIVRIGHT.HTM.“There
were, essentially, two responses to the political chaos of the seventeenth
century, as many of the aspects of the Reformation began to be translated into
political terms… On the one hand, a
group of thinkers led initially by Hugo Grotius (1583-1645), believed that
natural laws governed states and their relations. Drawing on the thought of Greek and Roman
Stoicism, where the idea of natural law’ originates, Grotius and others
believed that there were constant and immutable rational laws which should be
applied to all governments. In many
ways, this concept is very similar to the Roman concept of the Law of Nations,
which is also derived from Stoic principles.
On the other hand, Jacques-Benigne Bossuet (1627-1704) reinforced
medieval notions of kingship in his theory of the Divine Right of Kings, a
theory which argued that certain kings ruled because they were chosen by God to
do so and that these kings were accountable to no person except God.” Thus, James I believed himself divinely
chosen, and answerable to no electoral assembly. The Parliament under the Tudors, however, was
quite happy with their understanding that the Monarch and the Parliament
co-ruled, and were answerable to each other, and to the laws of the land. The Parliament retaliated by refusing his
requests for money to pay for the increasing cost of government, and were a
constant source of friction for King James I.
Aside from the belief in his religious right to rule, James
also made the mistake of trying to eliminate the Episcopal system of church
organization used by the Church of England.
This angered the Puritans (Protestants in the Anglican Church, inspired
by Calvinist theology). The Puritans
wanted James to eliminate the Episcopal system in favor of the Presbyterian
model used in Scotland
(similar to Calvin’s system in Geneva). Under this model, the presbyters, or
ministers and elders, played a major governing role. The Anglican church, a major support of
monarchical authority, was not pleased, therefore, when James insisted that
Bishops be appointed by him. The
Puritans thereby joined the alliance of forces against the King. Since many of England’s gentry were Puritans
(especially those well-to-do landowners below the level of the nobility, who
formed an important part of the House of Commons), the stage was set for
conflict.
When James son Charles I (1625-1649) came to rule, he
reneged on the promise implied in the 1628 “petition of right” passed by
Parliament. Under this arrangement, the
King was supposed to get Parliament’s approval before implementing any new
taxes. Finding he could no longer rule
co-jointly with Parliament (which he, like his father, never intended to do!),
Charles simply did away with Parliament by not summoning it to meet! Thus, from 1629-1640, England was essentially under the
dictatorial “personal rule” of King Charles, a situation bound to
backfire. And that it did.
As Charles found new ways to tax the middle-class merchants
and wealthy landowners, they became staunchly opposed to this “taxation without
representation.” The Puritans,
meanwhile, took two approaches – they fought furiously, and led the country
into civil war (1642-1648), or they bailed out completely, sailing to America
by the thousands in an effort to set up the Calvinized constituency they so
desired. Ironically, this meant that
many came to this country not so much to establish freedom of religion, as to
practice the absolute implementation of their OWN kind of religion!
Those Puritans who remained in England, along with the
Parliamentarians in revolt against the autocracy of King James I, and with the
backing of the merchants and landlords, formed the nucleus of the New Model
Army led by Oliver Cromwell. With the
fury of ones “doing battle for the Lord”, the Puritan and Parliamentarians
eventually prevailed, and Charles was executed on January 1, 1649. Parliament soon thereafter abolished the
monarchy and the House of Lords, and established England as a republic, or
commonwealth. However, all was not yet
settled. “Between 1648 and 1660, England
faced a trying situation,” as our text puts it. (p284)
Cromwell, with the backing of his army, found he was not able
to work effectively with parliament. So,
he “dismissed it by force” in April of 1653!
Within a few short years, “Cromwell had destroyed both king and
Parliament.”(p. 284) To maintain control over the country, Cromwell divided it
into eleven regions, and had each one ruled by a major general from the New
Model Army. The irony here is that the
OLD order armies were, often as not, personal armies paid for by lords or
kings, and Cromwell managed to convert the New Model into a caricature of the
old, for now they attempted to assume ALL the powers in the provinces.
Following Cromwell’s death in 1658, and the inept rule by
his son, “the military establishment decided that arbitrary rule by the army
was no longer feasible and reestablished the monarchy in the person of Charles
II (1660-1685).”(p.284) Restoring the
Stuart dynasty was, once again, only a temporary band-aid to a systemic
problem. “Charles was sympathetic to and
perhaps even inclined to Catholicism” (p.284), and his brother and heir James
II (1685-1688) WAS Catholic. The
situation was tolerable so long as “his successors were his Protestant
daughters Mary and Anne, born to his first wife.” (p. 285) When a son was born,
however, “the specter of a Catholic hereditary monarchy loomed large”. The husband of Mary, William of Orange, was
head of the Dutch dominion. When he was “invited” by prominent English noblemen
to invade their country, a constitutional crisis could have resulted. Instead, James fled to France, and in January of 1689,
Parliament offered the throne to William and Mary – provided they accept the
“Bill of Rights”. This law “affirmed
Parliament’s right to make laws and levy taxes and made it impossible for kings
to oppose or do without Parliament by stipulating that standing armies could be
raised only with the consent of Parliament.
The rights of citizens to petition the sovereign, keep arms, have a jury
trial, and not be subject to excessive bail were also confirmed. The Bill of Rights helped fashion a system of
government based on the rule of law and a freely elected Parliament, thus
laying the foundation for a constitutional monarchy.”(p.285) This transition became known as the “Glorious
Revolution”. Since it was essentially
over WHO the monarch would be, rather than whether there would continue to be a
monarch, the system of government in place in England was essentially
strengthened and legitimated.
The issue of the religious right to free worship was
addressed in 1689 by the Toleration Act.
This piece of legislation granted Puritans those rights, while still
withholding them from Catholics.
Nevertheless, the essential issue of persecution of Puritans was
resolved in a way that reconfirmed the majority’s right to have a
state-organized religious institution without fear of threat from abroad (as
Catholicism had been).
The most significant outcome of England’s revolution was this: the
concept of the divine right of kings was thoroughly trounced. It was clear now that kings are placed in
power, and removed from power, by ordinary individuals, and not by God. Although Parliament did not gain all the
powers that it wanted, it clearly was now legitimate partner in power, as it
had “an unquestioned right to participate in affairs of state.”(p286) In the 18th Century this legislative
body would “gradually prove to be the real authority in the English system of
constitutional monarchy.” (286)
France in the 17th
Century (1600s) – Absolute Monarchy (pp. 275-278)
“France
during the reign of Louis XIV (1643-1715) has traditionally been regarded as
the best example of the practice of absolute monarchy in the seventeenth
century.” Spielvogel describes
absolutism like this: “Absolute monarchy or absolutism meant that the sovereign
power or ultimate authority in the state rested in the hands of a king who
claimed to rule by divine right – that kings received their power from God and
were responsible to no one (including parliaments) except God.” It may seem odd to us today to know that the
French citizens believed their King was appointed by God. However, we have the luxury of historical
hindsight. And, we have the comfort of
NOT living in a land of chaos! To the
French citizens of the 17th century, they had no such luxury.
“The fifty years of French history before Louis XIV came to
power were a time in which royal and ministerial governments struggled to avoid
the breakdown of the state. The
situation was especially complicated by the fact that in 1610 and 1643, when
Louis XIII and Louis XIV, respectively, succeeded to the throne, they were only
boys, leaving the government dependent on royal ministers. Two especially competent ministers played
crucial roles in maintaining monarchical authority.”(pp.275-6) Cardinal
Richelieu ruled as chief minister for Louis XIII from 1624-1642, and then
Cardinal Mazarin ruled as his trained successor for Louis XIV, from
1643-1661. During this time, the nobles
were reigned in by, first, Richelieu’s network of spies, and then by Marzarin’s
crushing of the 1652 uprising of the Fronde, “a revolt led primarily by nobles
who wished to curb the centralized administrative power being built up at the
expense of the provincial nobility”.(276)
When Cardinal Mazarin died in 1661, Louis XIV, then 23, to the reins of
the realm into his own hands. And masterful
ones they were! Louis was nothing short
of a genius in his ability to tie the nobility into a tailspin as he corralled
them into his court located out in the country at the Palace of Versailles.
“One of the keys to Louis’s power was the he was able to
restructure the central policy-making machinery of government because it was
part of his own court and household.”(276-277)
By wooing the nobility to his court at Versailles, Louis effectively
removed them from “the royal council, the chief administrative body of the king
and overseer of the central machinery of government...”(277) With control now in his hands of the
increasingly centralized machinery of state, Louis ceded to himself “authority
over the traditional areas of monarchical power: the formulation of foreign
policy, the making of war and peace, the assertion of the secular power of the
crown against any religious authority, and the ability to levy taxes to fulfill
these functions.” What a guy! The recent video “Vatel” takes place in the year
1671, and shows to what a total, indeed farcical, extent King Louis ruled the
roost. Yet this was not his only
masterpiece.
Internally, Louis XIV was not quite so effective in
organizing his centralized form of government.
“Despite the centralizing efforts of Cardinals Richelieu and Mazarin, France
still possessed a bewildering system of overlapping authorities in the
seventeenth century.” Provinces each had
their own separate forms of government, with regional courts, local estates,
and locally applied laws. The landed
nobility and the lesser nobility still exercised much authority. Thus, Louis had little control over the
privileges and powers of the towns and provinces. “The traditional groups and institutions of
French society – the nobles, officials, town councils, guilds, and
representative Estates in some provinces – were simply too powerfully for the
king to control. Who he WAS able to
control was the royal princes and the very high nobles. By removing them from the provinces, and
assigning only the new aristocrats to form the backbone of his administration,
Louis was able to create a legion of loyal ministers, and to isolate or
indulgently “imprison” the rest. When
all else failed, he still had the power to make war!
Louis created a professional army that numbered 100,000 men
during times of peace, and ran up to 400,000 men during times of war. And war there was! “Louis made war an almost incessant activity
of his reign. To achieve the prestige
and military glory befitting the Sun King as well as to ensure the domination
of his Bourbon dynasty over European affairs, Louis waged four wars between
1667 and 1713. His ambitions roused much
of Europe to form coalitions to prevent
destruction of the European balance of power Bourbon hegemony would cause.”(277)
All of this opulence and aggression came at a price. Fortunately, Louis managed to command the
allegiance of one who showed him how to afford that price. Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619-1683) served as
his controller-general of finances. An
“avid practitioner of mercantilism”, Colbert adhered to the belief that the
wealth of a nation depends on its ability to export more than it imports. Consequently, he created new industries for
luxury items to export, and “granted special privileges, including tax
exemptions, loans, and subsidies, to individuals who established new
industries.” (277) Colbert oversaw the
building of roads and canals to transport these exportable goods, and a
merchant marine to carry them abroad. He
ALSO had the foresight to raise tariffs on foreign manufactured goods, thus
enabling him to carry out the mercantilist’s dream. Louis, however, was ultimately too rich for France’s
blood. By the end of his reign,
“although he had added some territory to France’s
northeastern frontier and established a member of his own Bourbon dynasty on
the throne of Spain, he also
left France
impoverished and surrounded by enemies.”(277-8)
Evaluation
Alas for Louis, his dream of an absolute monarchy would die
with him. None that followed him in France’s
royal succession had his skills, his inclinations, his fortitude, or his good
fortune – neither of personality, or finances, nor of the political, religious,
and intellectual climate necessary – to rule the realm absolutely. Furthermore, his very successes raised the
ire of others who were out to see that this never happened again. And, the simmering rage of the nobles who had
been duped into “opulent exile” at his Palace of Versailles
can only be imagined. As history seems
to show so clearly, the roots of revolution are already in the soils of someone
else’s success.
Ultimately the failure of Absolutism is intrinsic in the
idea, and its institutionalized representatives, itself. Absolutism depends, ultimately, on
individuals, and rarely does a Charlemagne or a Louis, an Elizabeth or a
Catherine, come along that can handle all that the situation of absolutism
demands. Few have the sustaining power,
either internally or externally, to withstand the storms of fate. And when the mighty fall, there is a price to
pay. Indeed, this is perhaps the biggest
lesson illustrated by the chaos in Iraq (well, there are so MANY
lessons here, and we should already know this particular lesson by now, so it
is not really the biggest…). That is to
say, it illustrates once again that the price of power concentrated in the
individual, is that transitions of power BETWEEN individuals can be ugly, and
that very few individuals are equal to the task. Furthermore, when the absolutist authority is
also abusive, all hell is apt to break loose when that authority is removed,
regardless of the method of removal.
People must be trained in the craft of statesmanship. When the individual ruler lasts a long time,
as did Queen Elizabeth and King Louis XIV, then the realm may reap the
advantage of an individual ruling with absolute power. When the co-rule of a parliament is added to
this long-lived, powerful personal ruler, then the state may have an even
greater chance of survival. Best of all,
though is when the state is run within a system of laws, and on the basis of
those laws, for it is than that the inevitable flaws of absolutism may be
overcome.
Theoreticians of Political Science in the 17th
Century (p.286)
Two individuals who sought an understanding in the nature of
statesmanship were English political theorists Thomas Hobbes and John
Locke. Thomas Hobbes
(1588-1679) lived during the years of the English Civil War, from 1642-1648,
during the reign of Charles I. This
experience undoubtedly influenced his thinking.
In a later era, Jacques-Benigne Bossuet (1627-1704), who lived during
the reign of Louis XIV, created the concept of the divine right of kings, based
on what he witnessed around him. So too
did Hobbes, at this earlier historical period, base his theories on the
realities around him. In 1651 Hobbes
published Leviathan, in which claimed
that the people of a country contract together to form a commonwealth, to which
they owe their peace and defense.
Individually, they live a life that is “’solitary, poor, nasty, brutish,
and short.’” Together, however, they can
save themselves from the self-destruction this ruthless struggle for
self-preservation entails. “This commonwealth
placed its collective power in the hands of a sovereign authority, preferably a
single ruler, who served as executor, legislator, and judge. This absolute ruler possessed unlimited
power.” Furthermore, rebellion is out of
the question, and must be suppressed.
Bossuet’s Divine Right of Kings can perhaps be seen as the wedding
between the papal principle of power coming from on high, and the Hobbesian
intuition that power comes from down below.
John Locke (1632-1704) takes
another approach to political principles.
His “Two Treatises of Government”, published in1689, is based on the
belief that humanity’s original state of nature is one based on equality and
freedom rather than on a war of one against another. “In this state of nature, humans had certain
inalienable natural rights – to life, liberty, and property.” Locke also envisioned the need of humans to
form some type of compact among themselves.
However, in his view the nature of this contract is to protect these
inalienable rights. “This agreement
established mutual obligations: government would protect the rights of people,
and people would act reasonably toward their government. But if a government broke this agreement – if
a king, for example, failed to live up to his obligation to protect the natural
rights or claimed absolute authority and made laws without the consent of the
community – the people might form a new government.” Locke limited the governing community to the
landed aristocracy. However, “his ideas
proved important to both the Americans and the French in the eighteenth century
and were used to support demands for constitutional government, the rule of
law, and the protection of rights.” In
other words, it is the ideas of Locke, rather than those of Hobbes or of Bossuet,
that form the structural base of democracy.
It is time, finally, to return to the question: “By the
second half of the seventeenth century, England
and France were the leading
nations of two contrasting systems of government, economics, and political
institutions; for the 18th century, much of Europe’s
history centered on this rivalry.”
What were the differences between
the English and French systems of government,
The English system was a constitutional monarchy; the French
system was an absolute monarchy.
What were the differences between
the English and French systems of economics?
Both nations relied on a mercantilism.
What were the differences between
the English and French systems of political institutions?
The English political institutions were the monarch and the
Parliament, comprised of a House of Lords (the landed aristocracy and other
nobles), and a House of Commons (the merchants and the commoners).
The French political institutions were an absolute monarch,
“divinely chosen by God”; and a royal council.
Under Louis XIV, this council was turned into his personal tool of
political power; the people had no representation, and no recourse save
revolution.
What events in each country
“solidified” the results?
The English system of government won the allegiance of its
people, and had the intellectual underpinnings of legitimacy. It was a system of laws, and it satisfied the
differing needs of diverse social, political, economic, and religious groups.
The French system of government was stable so long as the
memory of the chaos of war made an absolute monarchy seem preferable. As time passed, the inherent inadequacies
came to the front. The social classes
had no satisfactory way to settle their differences, and the political system
was too rigid for the mobility of the times and the people. The economics of one-man-rule was upset when
that one man invaded or subjugated those in other countries. And, the times just simply were “a’changing”.
Why in the end did the English
model eventually win out?
The answer to this question is almost inevitable – it’s
better! But why, you may ask? The English system of government is one based
on principles that more of the people are able to support. It has the long tradition, now, of laws and
institutions that support it. And it has
proven its merit over time.
The biggest challenge to the constitutional monarchy of England was the mass exodus of its Puritans and
others to the islands across the Atlantic, and
their subsequent revolt against the King of England. In hindsight, however, this proved to be the
greatest complement. It proved that a
government based on law, with principles of inalienable rights, and practices
of expanding application of those rights, is better suited to the nature of
humanity than one based on the individual authority of one individual, no
matter how divinely created or selected that person may be. Human civilization is, in one sense, just a
mass experiment of science. A system of
government can only be judged “good” or “adequate” if it satisfies more of the
people more of the time, and if it survives longer over the course of time than
other systems of government. That is
what has happened with the English system of government. Indeed, it’s probably a misnomer to call the
system “English”, for countries all over the world have adopted it, and the ideas
of individuals throughout history have gone into its making. Without the experiments in political
government conducted by the Egyptians and the Romans, the Greeks and the
Ottomans, the Arabs and the Dutch, the Han and the Hun – we would be without a
basis to judge (and quite possibly without a chance for existence!). In this sense, the experiment that was
absolutism in King Louis XIV’s France
is just as essential as the current “ideal mode” known as democracy. Yet how lucky we are to live now! It may feel as if we individually lack power
and effect. Yet we know from history, as
our course studying Western Civilization from 500-1700 has shown, that
governments come and go, movements emerge when needed, individuals rise to the
occasion when least expected, and events like the plague just happen. Meanwhile, this paper must be posted!
5:55 PM
3/22/06