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Principles of Government & Politics (Change in the Model of Kingship?,…
Principles of Government & Politics
Main Principles
Common Weal
Good governance = maintenance of the common weal
Promoting justice
Defend the realm from enemies
Counsel
King living within his means
Historiography
McFarlane
: destruction of the Stubbsian "Constitutional History"
Political discourse simply camouflage for more mundane self-interested designs
Influence of
Namier
Watts
: Need to re-integrate the study of political events and relationships with the study of government/ideas about government
Restore an explanatory framework to political history (increasingly detailed & hard to understand)
Identify defining characteristics of the politics of the period (compare)
Make connections between local and central government
Politicians shaped by commonly held principles and accepted practices
"Cambridge School": relationship between ideas, language, & action
Quentin Skinner
: genuineness of individual professions of principle is not the question
What matters is what principles were chosen and with what effect
Each political society governed by a matrix of ideas to which all politicians must make reference
Range of available principles = determines the range of available actions
DoY & Common Weal: reaction to claiming the throne
Rhetoric does not have to reflect the true feelings of its exponents to be effective
Has to intersect with other rhetoric & schemes of publicly-recognised values
King & Subjects
Fortescue's
Governance
: 2 types of Kingdom
Dominium regale
King has the ability to rule his people by the laws which he makes himself
Can tax & impose of them as he will, without their assent
Dominium politicum et regale
King may not rule his people by any laws other than those which they assent to
Cannot impose on them without their assent
Political royal government: government through a king, but with the wisdom and counsel of many
Assent of subjects
Dudley's
The Tree of Commonwealth
"As the subiectes are bounden to ther Prince, so be all kinges bounden to ther subiectes by the commaundyment of god them to maynteigne and supporte as farre as in hym in his power"
Commonwealth = tree
Prince = ground out of which the tree grows
Worcester's
Boke
"Noblesse": positive contribution towards the common welfare
Based on Cicero's 'res publica'
Change in the Model of Kingship?
Put forward by
Watts
Old
: Model of authority with emphasis on virtuous rule & assumption that the position of each king at the head of the realm was organic & uncontested
Inadequate to meet the challenges of 1450s
New
: Statement of the monopoly of authority to which the king was entitled, and readiness to propose reforms which would aid him to maintain that monopoly
Problem:
covetise
Spread of covetise among advisors had 2 effects
Broke down the loyalty of the advisors to the king
Corruption of the great men who typically advised the king /nobility edged out by lesser men who could be bribed easier
Fortescue
: all men were ambitious & so loyalty primarily to themselves
If a man were as rich as the king, he would inevitably want to be king
People would support a rich man as king, as would be less dependent on them
Somnium Vigilantis
: Normal priority of the issue of defending the common weal over the issue of maintaining loyalty & obedience reversed
Obedience = The fundamental basis of the state (not the common weal)
York: had to abandon claim to work for the common weal & claim throne
Common Weal
Manifestoes
1459 Warwick
: Acting "for the tendre love that we bore unto the commene weal and prosperite of this reaume"
1470 Warwick
: "God knoweth we have evur borne and entende tafore all thinges erthely to the wele of the crowne and thavauncyng of the common weele of Englonde, and for reproving of falshod and oppression of the poore peopull"
Warbeck
: "Indifferent ministration of Justice, and the public weal" under HVII
English Chronicle
1455: "The comones of this londe hated this duk Endmond and loved the duk of York, because he loved the communes and preserved the commune profyte of the londe"
1459: Salisbury & York to HVI
"Oure trewe entent to the prosperyte and augmentacione of youre hyghe estate, and to the commone wele of this reaume, hath be showd vn to youre hyghenesse in suche wrytyng as we made thereof"
1460: lords were the "enemyes to the sayde commune wele"
Defend the Realm
Commonwealth
: One of the roots
Context of the 100 YW/WoR
Strong king desirable
1450 Commons: accused HVI of not maintaining the common weal, relating to severe losses in France
Cade
: Called for arrest of the traitors who lost France
RIII Proclamation
: Accused HT of bargaining away the English claim to the French throne, in return for invasion aid
Governance
: King had a duty in his office to defend his realm against their external enemies by the sword and defend his people against internal wrongdoers by justice
Boke
: Emphasised the need for a leader who could restore the monarchy to its historic glory through personal leadership
1472 Parliament
: Grant of 13,000 archers "For the internal weal and security of this your said realm and its external defence"
Royal Revenues
Fortescue
: Links ability to defend the realm with good management of the royal revenues
Poverty dampens the honour of the king and makes him insecure in his position
Greatest harm: necessity to find extreme measures of getting goods
1459 Warwick
: "Upon the pore peopull, grete extorcion of their goodes and catalles by the minestres of the kinges householde"
EIV took up the idea of living off his own
Parliamentary Acts of Resumption
Warkworth
: EIV called for an Act of Resumption in the first Parliament after his return in 1471
Cade
: Calls for Act of Resumption & laments failure of the crown to pay its debts
Blood
Office of kingship divinely given through blood
Criticise the advisors around him
Idea that councillors should be of royal blood
Cade
: Listen to "the trewe blode of the Realme"
Fortescue's
Replicacion
BUT
problem of depositions
RIII
: HT "hath no maner interest, right, title, or colour, as every man knoweth"