Bring on the clowns

JavaScriptDonkey · Post by **JavaScriptDonkey** » 21 Dec 2012, 15:10

It also massively changed the system.

Parliament became paramount and the divine right to rule was consigned to the history books.

The suppression of the levellers and diggers by the new regime was suspect as was the outcome of the Putney Debates but that's how armies work.

Cromwell ended up with too much power and became inconvenient but without this experience the USA wouldn't have had a parliamentary revolutionary model to follow. It was the failings of the post ECW years that paved the way to a civil secular state wherein the citizens are protected by a sacrosanct constitution.

Surprising that a Fen dweller doesn't know his history.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 21 Dec 2012, 16:36

Nah, different labels, same 1% running the show.

Post by **clv101** » 21 Dec 2012, 17:17

Maybe the French Revolution is a better model?

peaceful_life · Post by **peaceful_life** » 21 Dec 2012, 18:31

I'm not so sure we have a model to replicate, everything that's been has brought us to the here and now.

Perhaps Evolaissance to a steady state......one way or another creativity is required.

JavaScriptDonkey · Post by **JavaScriptDonkey** » 21 Dec 2012, 19:22

biffvernon wrote:Nah, different labels, same 1% running the show.

Prior to 1642 there was only one running the show. Expansion to 1% took quite an effort and a large %% of the landed gentry lay dead and cold afterwards.

Many people in positions of authority after the war had been born under the reign of the entirely absolute monarch Elizabeth 1st. The transformation in so short a time should rightly be regarded as revolutionary.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 21 Dec 2012, 20:24

JavaScriptDonkey wrote: Prior to 1642 there was only one running the show.

Who are you kidding?

JavaScriptDonkey · Post by **JavaScriptDonkey** » 21 Dec 2012, 21:15

biffvernon wrote:
JavaScriptDonkey wrote: Prior to 1642 there was only one running the show.
Who are you kidding?

That was partially what the war was about.

Charles I maintained that he ruled through divine right whereas Parliament disagreed.

Unfortunately for Charles many of those in Parliament were the majority tax payers of the day who could (and did) choke off his revenue.

The 1628 petition of right wherein Parliament tried to get Charles to agree to such niceties as no taxation without Parliamentary consent is a convenient midpoint between the total absolutism of Elizabeth I and the fledgling parliamentary democracy under Cromwell.

When James II had made a mess of his reign we had another uncontested 'revolution' giving us William&Mary and shortly thereafter the 1689 Bill of Rights.

So we journeyed from power being held in the hands of One with appointed counsels and absolute authority through minority land owner voting to actual rights for individuals.

It took another 310 years for all adults over 18 to get to vote but by that stage each vote was mostly worthless anyway.

Little John · Post by **Little John** » 21 Dec 2012, 22:16

JavaScriptDonkey wrote:
biffvernon wrote:
JavaScriptDonkey wrote: Prior to 1642 there was only one running the show.
Who are you kidding?
That was partially what the war was about.

Charles I maintained that he ruled through divine right whereas Parliament disagreed.

Unfortunately for Charles many of those in Parliament were the majority tax payers of the day who could (and did) choke off his revenue.

The 1628 petition of right wherein Parliament tried to get Charles to agree to such niceties as no taxation without Parliamentary consent is a convenient midpoint between the total absolutism of Elizabeth I and the fledgling parliamentary democracy under Cromwell.

When James II had made a mess of his reign we had another uncontested 'revolution' giving us William&Mary and shortly thereafter the 1689 Bill of Rights.

So we journeyed from power being held in the hands of One with appointed counsels and absolute authority through minority land owner voting to actual rights for individuals.

It took another 310 years for all adults over 18 to get to vote but by that stage each vote was mostly worthless anyway.

Are you a student of history JSD? That was nicely explained.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 21 Dec 2012, 23:00

Well he certainly demonstrated why his earlier statement "Prior to 1642 there was only one running the show" was false.

There may have been only one claiming the right to run the show but reality was something else.

(And on several occasions there was more than one claiming to run the show.)

JavaScriptDonkey · Post by **JavaScriptDonkey** » 22 Dec 2012, 11:07

stevecook172001 wrote:Are you a student of history JSD? That was nicely explained.

Thanks.

1620 or so was 11 generations ago for me and I can trace a couple of strands of personal history back that far and a little further.

I've found that being able to name ancestors alive at the time and to offer a good guess at what they looked like and how they lived makes the period seem less remote.

My kids and sundry nephews/nieces also seem to take more from my ramblings when I can tell them the names of their relatives alive at the time.