The accession and fall of James II

Religion and the monarchy, 1660-85

In the wake of the Popish Plot affair, between 1679-81 MPs had passed three Exclusion Bills within the aim of excluding the King’s brother and heir presumptive, James, Duke of York, from the thrones of the three kingdoms because he was a Roman Catholic. None became law, and the Tory reaction of 1681-85 was so successful in quelling opposition that James would become King as James II in 1685.

England at the time of James’ accession

Power was effectively handed back to the Tories by Charles. They had used it to purge the towns and cities of Whigs and Nonconformists between 1681-85. Parliament remained powerful as the Tories strength and the fact that during Charles’ reign Parliament had met regularly, meant that power lay perhaps just as much with the political nation/Parliament as it had with the Crown in the years 1678-1685.

• In 1685 the Whigs were in disarray. After the Rye House Plot (1683), the main Whig leaders had either been executed or were in hiding. Their leader, Shafestbury, had died a few months after fleeing to Holland in 1683.

The golden child?

Monmouth (James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth) was the eldest illegitimate son of Charles II, and was genuinely popular in some circles on account of his fervent Protestantism. Monmouth was a competent military commander. He had been appointed commander-in-Chief of the English Army by his father in 1672 and enjoyed some successes in the Netherlands in the Third-Anglo Dutch War.

• During the Exclusion Crisis he had been seen by Shaftesbury and some of the Whigs as a potential successor to Charles I.

The golden couple?

Mary of Orange- James II’s eldest, Protestant daughter, she had been married off to William against her wishes by Charles II in 1677.

William of Orange- The Protestant ruler of Holland, a superb military commander, and the sworn enemy of Louis XIV.

James’ character and outlook

James was unquestionably stubborn and humourless, though perhaps less inflexible than he has sometimes been thought. He was a firm believer in Divine Right Monarchy- and also believed that neither his father, King Charles I, nor his brother, King Charles II, had been firm and bold enough. James was in favour of religious toleration- not least because he genuinely believed that this would make a peaceful, voluntary return of the English to Catholicism possible.

James’ lack of political skills

Throughout his life, James showed a dangerous inability to profit from political experience. The lessons of the Popish Plot affair and of the Exclusion Crisis, when, as Duke of York, he had been at the centre of a prolonged constitutional crisis, were apparently lost on him- his foremost ambition was always to assist in the voluntary conversion of England to the Catholic faith.

• February 1687- he introduced the first of a series of measures designed to abrogate the existing penal laws for not attending the Church of England, permitting freedom of worship to Quakers and moderate Presbyterians as well as Roman Catholics.

James’ chief advisors

George Jeffreys, 1st Baron Jeffreys of Wem: James’ Lord Chief Justice and Lord Chancellor, responsible for the judicial repression of those who had participated in the Monmouth rising.

Robert Spencer, 2nd Earl of Sunderland: A diplomat closely linked with pro-French policies and a confidant of James’ wife Mary, Sunderland would advise the King until his fall from favour in October 1688.

James comes to the throne

There was little initial opposition to James’ accession, and there were widespread reports of public rejoicing at the orderly succession. James was crowned with his wife on 23rd April 1685. The new Parliament that assembled in May 1685, which gained the name of “the loyal Parliament”, was initially favourable the James- remember, there were barely any Whig or Nonconformist MPs.

• Relations between James and Parliament would be good for the first few months of his reign, largely due to fears aroused by uprisings that had been launched against him in Scotland and South-West England.

• Parliament gave James II £2m a year.

Argyll’s rising (May-June 1685)

Having departed from Holland with 300 soldiers and weapons for 20,000 volunteers, Argyll arrived in Scotland on the 5th of May hoping to trigger a popular rising of Presbyterians against James in support of Monmouth’s insurrection in South-Western England.

• He was met with failure. He attracted relatively few volunteers, lacked experience as a commander, and his forces began to disperse in mid-June after an abortive invasion of Lowland Scotland.

• Most of the rebel leaders were captured. Argyll was executed on 30th of June 1685.

The Monmouth rebellion, July 1685

Having departed from Holland, Monmouth landed at Lyme Regis in Dorset on 11th of June 1685. In the following few weeks, his growing army of Nonconformists, artisans and farm workers fought a series of skirmishes with local militias and regular soldiers. Monmouth’s Sea Green banners were seen as Leveller sympathies.

• He failed to attract support from any significant section of the political nation, and his forces were unable to compete with the regular army and capture the city of Bristol.

• The rebellion ended with the defeat of Monmouth’s army at the Battle of Sedgemoor on 6th July 1685.

The causes of James’s fall

James received £2m a year- customs and excise brought this in. Parliament voted James all the revenues that had been settled on his predecessor and provided supplementary assistance towards suppressing the rebellions of Monmouth and Argyll.

Jeffrys’ Bloody Assizes

The Autumn Assizes of 1685 began at Winchester was led by Lord Chief Justice Jeffreys. At Dorchester between 300 and 350 rebels were accused. A few were acquitted, others fined or flogged, but the majority were publicly hanged and quartered. Around 200 people were sentenced to death and about 800 transported to the West Indies. James used the rising as the excuse to increase the standing army.

What religious policies did James II introduce?

In February 1687, he introduced the first of a series of measures designed to abrogate the existing penal laws for not attending the Church of England, permitting freedom of worship to Quakers and moderate Presbyterians as well as Roman Catholics.

Why was Monmouth’s rebellion a failure and what happened to him?

He failed to attract support from any significant section of the political nation, and his forces were unable to compete with the regular army and capture the city of Bristol. The rebellion ended with the defeat of Monmouth’s army at the Battle of Sedgemoor on 6th July 1685.

Fears concerning a standing army

James had a force of 20,000 men from 8500 men, these heightened fears of arbitrary government and absolutism. In 1685 James purged Protestant army officer corps and appointed Catholics in their place, which alienated support for the army. This contravened the Test Acts of 1673 and 1678 that stated that no Catholics were to take positions of power or hold office. James’s promotion on Catholic officers showed how he abused his prerogative powers to override Parliamentary approval. Parliament was dismissed in November 1685.

Here comes the ‘Immortal Seven’

The prince’s birth was controversial as English Protestants had expected his sister, Mary, from his father’s first marriage, to succeed their father. Mary and Anne had been raised Protestant and seemed a better successor and choice to James II, than the new heir. A movement grew to replace the new heir with Mary. The Invitation to William was a letter sent by seven notable Englishmen, to Mary’s husband, William of Orange.

• This was received by William on the 30th of June 1688- this asked William to force the ruling King to make Mary the heir to the throne.

• If William were to land in England with a small army, the signatories and their allies would rise up and support him. He would arrive at the Devon port of Torbay on 5th November 1688.

James’s religious policies- first Declaration of Indulgence

In April 1687 James’s first Declaration of Indulgence, cancelling the Penal Laws by the suspending power, was received without enthusiasm by most of his subjects. They perceived this, as an attempt to extend and complete that infiltration by Catholics which was already under way among officers of the Army and elsewhere.

When was James’s second Declaration of Indulgence?

It was on the 27th of April 1688, and it was met with a more concerted opposition than the first from an Anglican clergy, whose loyalty to their Church now clearly began to outweigh the doctrine of Non-Resistance to their King. The Declarations suspended penal laws against Catholics granted toleration to Presbyterians and some Protestant dissenters.

What was the response to the second Declaration of Indulgence?

The petition of Sancroft (Archbishop of Canterbury) and of six other bishops, that they might be excused compliance with James’s order to have the Declaration published from their pulpits, marked the culmination of clerical discontent. They claimed that parliament had declared similar directives illegal in 1662,1672 and 1685, they could not encourage the spread of the Declaration- as it would be against the law.

• 30th June 1688- the acquittal of the Bishops in a trial for the seditious libel that he demanded as a vindication of his personal honour and regal authority. The jury returned a verdict of not guilty and there were great celebrations on the streets of London and the bishops were presented as heroes in political pamphlets.

The Dutch invasion

William landed at Brixham, Torbay, with 54 ships and 14,000 troops on the 5th of November 1688. James failed to predict where William and his troops would land and so his fleet of 52 ships were anchored on the Thames estuary.

The flight of James II

William left Exeter on the 21st of November and met little opposition on his march to London. On 23rd December James finally left England and joined his wife and child at a residence provided for him by Louis XIV at Saint-German-en-Laye. James’s decision to leave the throne when he still appeared to possess considerable military and political strengths came be explained by: he was sick in both mind and body, he could not think coherently, he feared that he would be deposed and may have thought his life was in danger.