3.1-3.4

Unit 3.1: European State Consolidation

  • Monarchs centralized power due to:
    • Fear of being overthrown or losing land.
    • People moving to cities for jobs due to overpopulation on farms.
    • Divine right to rule: Kings' authority granted by God, making questioning the king equivalent to questioning God.

Unit 3.2: English Civil War & Glorious Revolution

Two Models of European Political Development in the 17th Century

  • England: Parliamentary monarchy – a limited monarchy where the monarch is subject to the law and the consent of parliament.
  • France: Political absolutism – strong centralized monarchies, where the royal power is dominant.

The Stuart Monarchy

Family tree showing the line of succession from James I to George I

James I (r. 1603-1625)

  • First of the Stuart kings of England.
  • King James VI of Scotland.
  • Unfamiliar with English traditions, like Parliament.
  • Strong believer in the divine right of kings.
  • Levied new custom duties known as impositions to raise money.
  • Balanced power between Catholics and Anglicans (like Elizabeth) and mostly ignored Puritans.
  • Made peace with Catholic Spain.
  • Allowed Catholics to worship.
  • Did not support German Protestants in the Thirty Years’ War.

Charles I (r. 1625-1649)

  • To fund a new war with Spain, Charles levied new taxes.
  • Parliament made him sign the Petition of Right, stipulating that the king:
    • Could not levy taxes without approval by Parliament.
    • Could not declare martial law in peacetime.
    • Could not imprison citizens without trial.
    • Could not quarter troops in private homes.
  • Charles responded to the Petition of Rights by disbanding Parliament.
  • Married the Catholic sister of France’s King Louis XIII, raising fears of a Catholic revival.
  • King desperately needed money in 1640, so he called Parliament into session.
    • Short Parliament lasted 3 weeks and was dissolved when they demanded reforms in April 1640.
    • Long Parliament was called in August 1640.
    • No new taxes without Parliament.
    • Parliament should meet at least every 3 years.
    • The King could not dissolve them.
  • Civil War broke out in the summer of 1642.

Civil War (1642-1649)

  • Royalists (Cavaliers):
    • House of Lords
    • North & West England
    • Aristocracy and Large landowners
    • Catholics & Anglicans
    • More rural
  • Parliamentarians (Roundheads):
    • House of Commons
    • South & East England
    • Puritans
    • Merchants & Townspeople
    • More urban
  • Parliamentarians won.

Oliver Cromwell & the Commonwealth

  • Created an effective army (New Model Army).
  • Ran a military dictatorship which conquered Catholic countries Scotland and Ireland.
  • Imposed Puritan prohibitions against drinking, theatre, dancing, and Christmas.
  • Tried to pass power to his son.

King Charles II - Era of Restoration (1660)

  • Had charm, poise, & political skills.
  • Restored the theaters and reopened the pubs.
  • Favored religious toleration, although he had secret Catholic sympathies.
  • Brought back the Church of England and made a Cavalier Parliament.
  • Realized that he could not repeat the mistakes his father had made.

James II (1685-1688)

  • Brother of Charles II.
  • Was a convert to Catholicism.
  • Had two wives:
    • First was Anglican.
    • Second was Catholic.
  • A son was born who displaced his older sisters in the line of succession.
  • Provoked the revolution that Charles II had succeeded in avoiding.

The Glorious Revolution (1688)

  • Whig & Tory leaders offered the throne jointly to James II’s daughter Mary (raised a Protestant) & her husband, William of Orange.

English Bill of Rights (1689)

  • It settled all the major issues between King & Parliament.
  • It served as a model for the U. S. Bill of Rights.
  • It also formed a base for the steady expansion of civil liberties in the 18c and early 19c in England.
  • Main provisions:
    • The King could not suspend the operation of laws.
    • The King could not interfere with the ordinary course of justice.
    • No taxes levied or standard army maintained in peacetime without Parliament’s consent.
    • Freedom of speech in Parliament.
    • Sessions of Parliament would be held frequently.
    • Subjects had the right of bail, petition, and freedom from excessive fines and cruel and unusual punishment.
    • The monarch must be a Protestant.
    • Freedom from arbitrary arrest.
    • Censorship of the press was dropped.
    • Religious toleration.
  • England becomes a limited Constitutional monarchy and permits worship of all Protestants, but not Catholics (The Toleration Act of 1689).

Unit 3.3: Economics

Agricultural Revolution

  • The peasants wanted improvements to have a stable food supply.
  • More food more people.

Advances in Farming

  • Crop rotation
  • Enclosure Movement: Small farmers were displaced as land was enclosed.
  • Mixed farming: Livestock and crops on the same land.
  • Tilled soil
  • New farm machinery
    • Jethro Tull invented the seed drill in 1701.
    • Joseph Foljambe updated the cast iron plow in 1730.
    • Andrew Meikle invented the thresher in 1784.

National Markets

  • Cash crops: No longer just subsistence farming.
  • Also needed:
    • Banking
    • Lines of credit
    • Insurance
    • Merchants
    • Transportation
    • Taxes/tariffs

Transportation & Land Conversions

  • Canal system: Tripled the number of usable roadways.
  • Drained other wetlands for more farms.
  • Water meadows: Flooded parts of the year and farmed other parts.

Textile Industry

  • Cottage Industry
  • Wool industry: Many people made money through this trade.
  • People didn’t need to leave home
  • Inventions:
    • Spinning Jenny (1765)
    • Water frame (1769)
    • Spinning mule (1779)
    • Cotton gin (1793)

Industrialization

  • Innovations:
    • Water mill
    • Steam Engine: Could move away from rivers.
  • As machines got bigger, they could not fit in homes.

Le Chapelier Law

  • 1791
  • Banned workers associations such as guilds and trade unions.
  • Banned strikes.
  • Existed in France and German city-states but not in Britain.
  • Overturned in 1884.

Private Property

  • Eminent Domain (1625)
  • Some believed individual property must be sanctioned by the state.
  • John Locke believed everyone had a right to property.
  • Aristocratic class in England ok with taxes, direct representation, unlike France/America.

Insurance

  • Needed as more people owned property (businesses).
  • artisans and craftspeople
  • Joint stock companies helped insure investments.
  • Lloyd’s of London established in 1688.

Banking

  • Emerged in Italy as moneylenders.
  • Medici family.
  • Fugger family in Germany.
  • Mostly dealing in precious metals.
  • Bank of England helped fund the navy.

Unit 3.4: Mercantilism

Commercial Revolution

  • Global Commerce & Trade
  • more products
  • more opportunities to make money
  • Columbian Exchange
  • new products
  • Triangle Trade
  • slave trade added to the Columbian exchange
  • Native Americans were not a great source of labor - disease

Triangle Trade

  • Ships would leave Americas to Europe carrying raw materials.
  • In Europe, the raw materials were turned into finished goods.
  • The goods were brought to West Africa where they would be traded for hundreds of captive Africans.
  • Middle Passage

Mercantilism

  • Balance of trade should be in favor of the crown.
  • Colonies supported the crown through forced trade and taxation.

New Products

  • Sugar
    • Main product of the 1600-1700’s driving trade and slavery.
    • Caribbean colonies (West Indies).
    • Navigation Acts: Britain tried to make a monopoly of trade with their colonies through forced trade.
  • Fabrics
    • Silk from China, eventually made in France too.
    • Cotton from India.
  • Tobacco
    • Found in the New World (Caribbean, Cuba, Brazil, Virginia).
    • John Rolfe.
    • Will eventually become the world’s main supplier.
  • Rum
    • Distilled liquor made from sugar and sold to Africa for slaves.
    • Declined in profit due to the American Revolution (slowed trade).
    • Manufactured elsewhere (eventually US).
    • Anti-slavery movement made people boycott it.
  • Tea
    • By 1750, tea consumption in England grew 200%.
    • Tea tax = 10% of tax revenue.
    • Tea smuggling in American colonies.
    • The tea tax + forced trade led to the Boston Tea Party.
  • Coffee
    • Venetian merchants introduced it.
    • Grown in South America, Caribbean.
    • Became more popular as tea became a reason for protest.