Great Britain: Notable Groups, Organizations, and Movements

1678 - 1760 - Tories / Tory Party / Tory Movement (All Facts)

• English (British) Political party formed during the reign of King Charles II

  • They were conservative

  • Their political base was at Oxford (Oxford University)

• They supported the reign of (Catholic) James II of England

• Its establishment represented the emergence of a two-party system for the first time in history, in England

• They

  • were critical of their political rivals because they feared that their political rivals undermined the established order

  • were denounced by their political rivals as “papists in disguise”

• They temporarily unified with their political rivals to overthrow King James II in the Glorious Revolution

  • Although they had first opposed the attempt to exclude James II from the throne, they joined with their political rivals to support his overthrow because of the way he had alienated them with his strange and arbitrary conduct near the end of his reign

  • Some of them were unhappy, however, with their political rivals’ insistence that King James II had abdicated and wanted a regency

  • Some of them wanted Queen Mary alone to rule England, and not the Dutch foreigner William of Orange

    • However, William and Mary came together as a pair and both said they would not take the throne without each other ruling

• They opposed the 1707 Acts of Union passed in the Parliament under Queen Anne of Great Britain

1678 - 1859 - Whigs / Whig Party / Whig Movement (All Facts)

• English (British) Political party formed during the reign of King Charles II

  • They were liberal

  • Their political base was at London

• Its establishment represented the emergence of a two-party system for the first time in history, in England

• They represented the wealthy middle classes of England upon the time of their formation

• They formed in response to and against the idea of there being a reign of James II of England and did not support the reign of Catholics in high office in England

  • They were also known as the Exclusionists, because they desired for James II to be excluded from the throne of England during the Exclusion Bill Crisis

  • They thus fell for the belief that Titus Oates’ fabricated “Popish Plot” was indeed true and that politics in England needed to remain Protestant

  • Their willingness to encourage the London mobs to put pressure on King Charles II caused much concern towards them in England

  • Their political rivals feared they were undermining the established order by seeking to exclude James II from the throne

  • In response, they denounced their political rivals as “papists in disguise”

• They temporarily unified with their political rivals to overthrow King James II in the Glorious Revolution

1688 - 1807 - Jacobites / Jacobitism (All Facts)

• Political Group and Movement that

  • advocated the restoration of the senior line of the (Catholic) House of Stuart to the British throne

  • argued that since kings held their office through divine right, the regime of William and Mary following the Glorious Revolution was illegitimate

  • were thus, initially, the supporters of the exiled King James II of England (King James VII of Scotland) following the Glorious Revolution (his Latin name is from which the namesake name derives)

  • opposed the 1707 Acts of Union of Queen Anne of Great Britain

  • had James Francis Edward Stewart installed in succession to King James II of England

  • came to represent other ideas with which even the House of Stuart disagreed, as they were a third party relative to the two dominant parties that emerged at the time

1702 - The Daily Courant (All Facts)

• First daily newspaper in England / Great Britain

• Published in England / Great Britain during the reign of Queen Anne