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Legislation, Foreign Policy, and the “Proper Business” of the Parliament of 1624*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 July 2014

Mark E. Kennedy
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A dozen years ago Conrad Russell initiated a major historiographical debate when he rejected the traditional interpretation of seventeenth-century parliamentary history expounded in the classic studies of S. R. Gardiner and Wallace Notestein, whose work on early Stuart parliaments dominated the field for three quarters of a century. According to Russell, Gardiner's and Notestein's conviction that Jacobean and Caroline parliaments were the scene of escalating constitutional conflicts between the Crown and the House of Commons was the result of the two historians' failure to understand either the nature of early Stuart politics or seventeenth-century notions of Parliament's proper functions. Politics in general and parliamentary politics in particular were devoid of ideological content, and the provincial gentry who filled the benches of the House of Commons were as certain as the rest of their countrymen that the “proper business” of Parliament was the passing of bills, not the debating of issues of national or constitutional significance. Russell, of course, did not suggest that the conflicts so crucial to the traditional interpretation were made out of whole cloth, but he did deny that disagreements between Crown and Parliament were due to the emergence of a constitutional opposition. Instead, such disagreements were the inevitable product of the pervasive tension that marked the relationship between the royal government in London and the local communities in the provinces. During the reigns of James I and Charles I, the Crown's incompetent parliamentary management made it more difficult than usual for local gentlemen to reconcile their obligations to their king with their loyalties to their communities. The result was some remarkably unhappy parliaments, but since no important issue of principle divided parliamentary leaders from privy councilors or officers of state, there could be no organized, ideologically based opposition, no constitutional crisis leading inexorably to civil war.

Type
Research Article
Information
Albion , Volume 23 , Issue 1 , Spring 1991 , pp. 41 - 60
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Copyright © North American Conference on British Studies 1991

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Footnotes

*

This article has profited from many hours of discussion with Professors Robert Ruigh and Thomas Cogswell about the parliamentary history of the 1620s in general and the Parliament of 1624 in particular. My debt to my friend and colleague Bob Ruigh is too great to be expressed in a short acknowledgement. I also wish to thank Professor Sir Geoffrey Elton, Ms. Margaret Kassner, Professor Theodore Rabb, and Professor David Underdown for their comments and suggestions.

References

1 Gardiner, Samuel R., History of England from the Accession of James I to the Outbreak of the Civil War, 1603–1642, 10 vols. (London, 1883–1884)Google Scholar; Notestein, Wallace, The Winning of the Initiative by the House of Commons, The Raleigh Lecture on History, 1924Google Scholar, in The Proceedings of the British Academy 11 (1926)Google Scholar.

2 Russell, Conrad, “Parliamentary History in Perspective, 1604–1629,” History 61 (1976): 1–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Russell, further developed his interpretation in Parliaments and English Politics, 1621–1629 (Oxford, 1979)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; see particularly the introduction, “Westminster and the Wider World,” pp. 1–84. The phrase “proper business” can be found on p. 190 of the latter work.

3 See also Elton, G. R., “A High Road to Civil War?” in From the Renaissance to the Counter-Reformation: Essays in Honor of Garrett Mattingly, ed. Carter, Charles H. (New York, 1965), pp. 325–47Google Scholar. Professor Elton's own studies of sixteenth-century parliamentary history have painted a picture of Tudor parliaments similarly bereft of a constitutional opposition (“Tudor Government: The Points of Contact. I. Parliament,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, fifth series, 24 [1974]: 183–200CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, “Parliament in the Sixteenth Century: Functions and Fortunes,” The Historical Journal 22 [1979]: 255–78; idem, “Parliament,” in The Reign of Elizabeth I, ed. Christopher Haigh [London, 1984], pp. 79–100; idem, The Parliament of England, 1559–1581 [Cambridge, 1986]).

4 The four most recent monographs on individual Jacobean parliaments all focus on political and constitutional issues: Notestein, Wallace, The House of Commons 1604–1610 (New Haven, 1971)Google Scholar; Moir, Thomas L., The Addled Parliament of 1614 (Oxford, 1958)Google Scholar; Zaller, Robert, The Parliament of 1621: A Study in Constitutional Conflict (Berkeley, 1971)Google Scholar; Ruigh, Robert E., The Parliament of 1624: Politics and Foreign Policy (Cambridge, Mass., 1971)Google Scholar. Other historians, however, have examined how the Houses of Parliament conducted their day-to-day business. See especially Foster, Elizabeth Read, The House of Lords, 1603–1649: Structure, Procedure, and the Nature of its Business (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1983)Google Scholar; idem, “The Procedure of the House of Commons against Patents and Monopolies, 1621–1624,” in Conflict in Stuart England: Essays in Honour of Wallace Notestein, ed. William Appleton Aiken and Basil Duke Henning (London, 1960), pp. 57–85; Lambert, Shiela, “Procedure in the House of Commons in the Early Stuart Period,” The English Historical Review 95 (1980): 753–81CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 See Hill, Christopher, “Parliament and People in Seventeenth-Century England,” Past and Present 92 (1981): 105CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cf. Hexter, J. H., “The Early Stuarts and Parliament: Old Hat and the Nouvelle Vague,” Parliamentary History 1 (1982): 203Google Scholar.

6 Clark, J. C. D., Revolution and Rebellion: State and Society in England in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (Cambridge, 1986), p. 170CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

7 See especially Hexter, , “The Early Stuarts and Parliament,” pp. 181–215Google Scholar; idem, “Power Struggle, Parliament, and Liberty in Early Stuart England,” The Journal of Modern History 50 (1978): 1–50; Hirst, Derek, “The Place of Principle,” Past and Present 92 (1981): 79–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Rabb, Theodore K., “The Role of the Commons,” Past and Present 92 (1981): 55–78CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Zaller, Robert, “The Concept of Opposition in Early Stuart England,” Albion 12 (1980): 211–34CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Christopher Hill can hardly be labelled a “neo-Whig,” but he, too, plumps for the importance of belief (“Parliament and People in Seventeenth-Century England,” pp. 100–24). See also Judson, Margaret Atwood, The Crisis of the Constitution: An Essay in Constitutional and Political Thought in England 1603–1645 (New Brunswick, N. J., 1949)Google Scholar; Sommerville, J. P., Politics and Ideology in England, 1603–1642 (London, 1986)Google Scholar.

8 See Sharpe, Kevin, “Parliamentary History 1603–1629: In or Out of Perspective?,” in Faction and Parliament: Essays on Early Stuart History (Oxford, 1978), pp. 1–5Google Scholar; idem, “An Unwanted Civil War?,” New York Review of Books, December 2, 1982, p. 45.

9 History Today, March 1986, p. 56; The Times Literary Supplement, 9 January 1987, p. 16Google Scholar.

10 See Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, pp. 35–48Google Scholar.

11 Journals of the House of Commons, 1: 744Google Scholar. The spelling, capitalization, and punctuation of all quotations has been modernized.

12 See Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, pp. 77–79, 190Google Scholar.

13 Ibid., pp. 183–84.

14 Gardiner, , History of England, 5: 130–31Google Scholar; Ruigh, , Parliament of 1624, pp. 16–42Google Scholar.

15 [Public Record Office], S.P. 14/160/30. Contemporaries concluded that James was referring to the overture made by Francesco delta Rota on behalf of the Duke of Bavaria. Since the king had already rejected della Rota's offer, his announcement of it at this time could have served little purpose other than to underscore his continued unwillingness to break with Spain (Ruigh, , Parliament of 1624, p. 201Google Scholar; Gardiner, , History of England, 5: 181Google Scholar).

16 See Valaresso to the Doge and Senate, 13/23 February 1624 (Calendar of State Papers Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 219); John Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, 20 March 1624 (The Letters of John Chamberlain, ed. McClure, Norman Egbert, 2 vols. [Philadelphia, 1939], 2: 549Google Scholar). See also John Woolley to William Trumbull, 6 March 1624 (Berkshire Record Office, Trumbull MSS., vol. 48, no. 119); Dudley Carleton to Sir Dudley Carleton, 10 March 1624 (S.P. 14/160/58). Buckingham informed both Houses of Lafuente's mission on 24 February (Journals of the House of Lords, 3: 232Google Scholar). I wish to thank the Yale Center for Parliamentary History for allowing me to use its microfilm of the Trumbull Manuscripts.

17 C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 220.

18 The phrase is Aylmer's, G. E., quoted in Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, p. 145Google Scholar.

19 British Library, Add. MS. 18597, Parliamentary Diary of Sir Walter Erie, fo. 4v; S.P. 14/159/60; Erie's Diary, fos. 7v, 10v, 106v.

20 For the autumn session of the Parliament of 1621, see the accounts in Commons Debates 1621, ed. Notestein, Wallace, Relf, Frances Helen, and Simpson, Hartley, 7 vols. (New Haven, 1935)Google Scholar; [Nicholas, Edward], Proceedings and Debates of the House of Commons in 1620 and 1621, ed. Tyrwhitt, T., 2 vols. (Oxford, 1766), 2: 175–364Google Scholar. See also Russell, Conrad, “The Foreign Policy Debate in the House of Commons in 1621,” The Historical Journal 20 (1977): 289–309CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, Parliaments and English Politics, pp. 121–44; Gardiner, , History of England, 4: 232–65Google Scholar; Zaller, , The Parliament of 1621, pp. 142–87Google Scholar.

21 For the conference, see Commons Debates 1621, 3: 414–26Google Scholar; 4: 423–29; 6: 193–94, 412–19; Nicholas, , Proceedings and Debates, 2: 183–90Google Scholar. For the Commons' resolution to consider the conference on 26 November, see C.J., 1: 642. Cranfield's speech on the 21st addressed an issue whose importance would not have been lost on members of the Parliament of 1624. The Lord Treasurer was certain that “If any [of the Commons] doubt of the King's intention for the employment of this money in that purpose for which it was given,” the House “will give no countenance to such objections” (Commons Debates 1621, 4: 428Google Scholar; see also 3: 424–25; 6: 418–19).

22 Russell, , “The Foreign Policy Debate in the House of Commons in 1621,” pp. 296–97Google Scholar; idem, Parliaments and English Politics, pp. 126, 129–32.

23 Nicholas, , Proceedings and Debates, 2: 252Google Scholar; Commons Debates 1621, 2: 474Google Scholar. For Goring's connection to Buckingham, see Lockyer, Roger, Buckingham: The Life and Political Career of George Villiers, First Duke of Buckingham, 1592–1628 (London, 1981), pp. 173, 268Google Scholar; Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, pp. 12, 108Google Scholar.

24 See Russell, , “The Foreign Policy Debate in the House of Commons in 1621,” p. 297Google Scholar; Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, p. 133Google Scholar.

25 For the Petition of 3 December, see Rushworth, John, Historical Collections, 7 vols. (London, 1659–1701), 1: 40–43Google Scholar; Kenyon, J. P., The Stuart Constitution 1603–1688 (Cambridge, 1966), pp. 43–47Google Scholar

26 When Sir Edward Coke reported the draft of the petition on 3 December, Sir Edward Sackville immediately “took exception to that part of the petition” concerning the prince's marriage. “That sentence would be like the drug coloquintida, which being taken by the King with the rest will make him cast out all the rest.” With more prescience than discretion — Sackville “was hemmed at” by his colleagues — Sir Edward warned the Commons “not to take into their hands, like Phaeton, their father's chariot, whereupon a general incendiary followed” (Commons Debates 1621, 2: 487–88Google Scholar; 6: 220). The House did add a passage assuring the king that the petition was in “no way intending to press upon your Majesty's most undoubted and regal prerogative” (Commons Debates 1621, 2: 498Google Scholar), but the clause concerning the prince's marriage stayed, to the Commons' eventual discomfiture.

27 Russell, Conrad, “The Examination of Mr. Mallory after the Parliament of 1621,” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 50 (1977): 125–32CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Gardiner, , History of England, 4: 266–67Google Scholar.

28 For the king's speech, see Erie's diary, fos. 1–4v; L.J., 3: 209–10.

29 The day was set by the Lords. See L.J., 3: 215.

30 The report was not made until the 27th because, as Sir George Calvert, the Secretary of State, informed the House on the 26th, “the business is so large as that those who are to report it cannot do it in so short a time” (S.P. 14/166, Parliamentary Diary of Edward Nicholas, fos. 24v–25).

31 C.J., 1 721; B. L., Add. MS. 46191, Parliamentary Diary of Sir Nathaniel Rich, fo. 28; Northamptonshire Record Office, Finch-Hatton MS. 50, Parliamentary Diary of John Pym, fo. 9v.

32 C.J., 1: 724; Erie's Diary, fo. 40. For the debate, see Ruigh, , Parliament of 1624, pp. 177–83Google Scholar; Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, pp. 171–76Google Scholar; Cogswell, Thomas, The Blessed Revolution: English Politics and the Coming of War, 1621–1624 (Cambridge, 1989), pp. 175–79Google Scholar.

33 James apparently got the idea of parliamentary treasurers from Buckingham. See Buckingham's memorandum to the king, (B.L.) Harleian MS. 6987, fo. 202, printed in Ruigh, , Parliament of 1624, p. 199Google Scholar. At least one well-informed contemporary had no doubt that the idea, an attempt to quiet the Commons' fear that the king would use their money for his own purposes, originated among members of the Commons. On 1 March, four days before James' speech, Dudley Carleton informed his uncle that “This day [the Lords] communicate their counsel to the Lower House, which in all appearance will not be long in resolving to undertake the charge of the war, but will have officers of their own (as some of them in private say) to receive and manage their moneys” (Dudley Carleton to Sir Dudley Carleton, 1 March 1624 [S.P. 84/116, fos. 186–87v]).

34 For the king's speech, see S.P. 14/160/30; L.J., 3: 250–51.

35 Kellie to Mar, 11 March 1624 (Historical Manuscripts Commission, Supplementary Report on the Manuscripts of the Earl of Mar & Kellie preserved at Alloa House, Clacmannanshire, ed. Paton, Henry [London, 1930], p. 195)Google Scholar; S.P. 14/160/58; Trumbull MSS., vol. 47, no. 115, quoted in Cogswell, , The Blessed Revolution, p. 184Google Scholar; H. M. C., Report on the Manuscripts of the Duke of Buccleuch & Queensberry, K.G., K.T., preserved at Montagu House, Whitehall 3 vols. (London, 1926), 3: 232Google Scholar, Parliamentary Diary of Edward, Lord Montagu; Notes of the Debates in the House of Lords, officially taken by Henry Elsing, Clerk of the Parliaments, A.D. 1624 and 1626, ed. Gardiner, Samuel Rawson (Camden Society, n. s. 24 [1879]: 21Google Scholar; Owen Wynn to Sir John Wynn, 9 March 1624 (National Library of Wales, Wynn of Gwydir Papers, MS. 9059E, no. 1198); Valaresso to the Doge and Senate, 12/22 March 1624 (C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 248). Both Wynn's and Valaresso's remarks are repeated in John Beaulieu to William Trumbull, 8 March 1624 (Trumbull MSS., vol. 7, no. 152). Concerning uncertainty over the king's intentions, see also Sir George Calvert to Sir Dudley Carleton, 9 March 1624 (S.P. 14/160/46); The Diary of Sir Simonds D'Ewes (1622–1624), ed. Bourcier, Elisabeth (Paris, n.d.), p. 185Google Scholar.

36 Sir Heneage Finch, the Recorder of London, began his report of the king's speech with an elaborate preamble extolling James' powers of oratory, which made it necessary for Finch to read the king's words verbatim. As Professor Ruigh noted, “behind the flattery lurked the motive of closing loopholes and avoiding misinterpretations which would allow either king or Parliament to escape their responsibilities” (Parliament of 1624, pp. 201–02).

37 Pym's Diary, fo. 21v; Montagu's Diary, pp. 232–33; C.J., 1: 679, 731; Nicholas' Diary, fo. 58. For Eliot's connection to Buckingham, see Ball, J. N., “Sir John Eliot and Parliament, 1624–1629,” in Faction and Parliament, p. 176Google Scholar; Lockyer, , Buckingham, p. 183Google Scholar.

38 The debate eventually took place on 11 March. On the 10th Edmondes, the Treasurer of the Household, informed the House that Western would not be ready with his report until the next day (Erie's Diary, fo. 66v). For Weston's explanation of the delay, see C.J., 1: 682. The House began its debate immediately after Weston delivered his report.

39 C.J., 1: 683. For the debate, see Ruigh, , Parliament of 1624, pp. 204–07Google Scholar; Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, pp. 184–85Google Scholar; Cogswell, , The Blessed Revolution, pp. 189–92Google Scholar.

40 L. J., 3: 259.

41 For the speeches on 14 March, see S.P. 14/160/76; Erie's Diary, fos. 83–86; L.J., 3: 265–66.

42 Valaresso to the Doge and Senate, 19/29 March 1624 (C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 254).

43 Lords Debates 1624 and 1626, pp. 25, 27; Montagu's Diary, p. 233; Erie's Diary, fos. 76–76v.

44 C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 255; Sir Robert Cotton io Thomas Cotton, 17 March 1624 (S.P. 14/160/90).

45 Lords Debates 1624 and 1626, p. 27.

46 According to an anonymous newsletter collected by Edward Nicholas, the king's speech “was thought to contradict all that had either been done or said before by the Prince or Buckingham and the whole talk of the city and country was that all that had been delivered in our House [i.e., Buckingham's Relation on 24 February] was now by the King disavowed” (S.P. 14/160/81).

47 Dudley Carleton to Sir Dudley Carleton, 17 March 1624 (S.P. 14/160/89). For other descriptions of the Commons' adverse reaction to the king's speech, see John Millington to his brother, [15 March?] 1624 (S.P. 14/160/82); S.P. 14/160/90; Edward Nicholas to John Nicholas, 18 March 1624 (S.P. 14/160/91); John Hamilton to William Trumbull, 18 March 1624 (Trumbull MSS., vol. 26, no. 113); C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, pp. 254–55; Sir Francis Nethersole to Sir Dudley Carleton, 20 March 1624 (S.P. 81/30, fos. 88–90); Sir Edward Conway the younger to Sir Dudley Carleton, 23 March 1624 (S.P. 14/161/30).

48 Valaresso reported that Buckingham's and the prince's assertions “did not suffice to satisfy the Parliament, since no one but the King could correct and declare things said by himself (C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 255).

49 C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 255; Lords Debates 1624 and 1626, p. 33; S.P. 14/160/79; B. L., Harleian MS. 159, Journal of the Parliament of 1624 compiled by Simonds D'Ewes, fo. 32; Montagu's Diary, p. 234; S.P. 14/160/89; Ruigh, , Parliament of 1624, pp. 212–16Google Scholar; Gardiner, , History of England, 5: 197–99Google Scholar.

50 Montagu's Diary, p. 234; Pym's Diary, fo. 30; Erie's Diary, fos. 89–89v; Bodleian Library, Tanner MS. 392, Parliamentary Diary of Sir Thomas Holland, fo. 54v; L.J., 3: 266; The Letters of John Chamberlain, 2: 548–49Google Scholar. Valaresso reported that “Some of the wisest think that in asking for money before he [i.e., the king] declares himself he intends to satisfy his own necessities if he gets it, and if he does not he will seize upon that as a pretext for dissolving the Parliament” (C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 255).

51 C.S.P. Venetian, 1623–1625, p. 254; Harvard University Library, Houghton English MS. 980, Parliamentary Diary of Sir William Spring, p. 104; The Letters of John Chamberlain, 2: 548Google Scholar.

52 C.J., 1: 738; B.L., Harleian MS. 6383, Parliamentary Diary of John Holles, fo. 102.

53 For the debate on 19 and 20 March, see Ruigh, , Parliament of 1624, pp. 217–27Google Scholar; Russell, , Parliaments and English Politics, pp. 187–89Google Scholar; Cogswell, , The Blessed Revolution, pp. 203–15Google Scholar. For the Commons' resolution, see C.J., 1: 744. The Four Propositions were first mentioned by Sir Benjamin Rudyerd, a client of the Earl of Pembroke, in the speech with which he opened the Commons' debate on 1 March (Erie's Diary, fo. 35v). The Four Propositions were adopted by James in his speech of 5 March (Erie's Diary, fo. 59; L.J., 3: 251).

54 Gardiner, , History of England, 6: 73–75Google Scholar; Young, Michael B., “Buckingham, War, and Parliament: Revisionism Gone Too Far,” Parliamentary History 4 (1985): 56Google Scholar.

55 Glanville was referring to the petition against recusants, Coke to the monopolies' bill (Spring's Diary, pp. 180, 238), but their advice might just as well have been given in regard to the foreign policy debate.

56 The five sessions of the Parliament of 1604/1610 produced 72, 56, 33, 66, and 0 statutes respectively. The Parliament of 1614 produced no statutes and that of 1621 two. The first three parliaments of Charles I's reign produced 9, 0, and 27 statutes respectively.

57 The bills concerning the Sabbath, swearing, limitations of actions, recusants, informers, pleading the general issue in informations of intrusion, reformation of jeofailes, authorizing justices of the peace to restore possession in certain cases, and Welsh cottons were passed without being first committed. See C.J., 1: 673, 674, 728, 679, 744, 746. All but the bills concerning jeofailes and authorizing justices to restore possession were passed by the Commons in 1621; the remaining two bills were reported from committee and ordered to be engrossed.

58 Six of the sixty-nine bills were passed by the Lords in 1621, but sent down too late in either the spring or autumn sessions to be considered by the Commons.

59 C.J., 1: 758.

60 Nicholas' Diary, fo. 59; Pym's Diary, fos. 22v, 35.

61 C.J., 1: 694; Nicholas' Diary, fo. 182v; Pym's Diary, fo. 83v.

62 C.J., 1: 706; Nicholas' Diary, fos. 209–09v; Staffordshire County Record Office, D661/11/1/2, Parliamentary Diary of Richard Dyott, fos. 143v–44. At the same time the Commons was asking for an additional week, a backbencher was informing his constituents that the House had made little progress on a matter of considerable local importance. On 20 May John Angell, who sat for Rye, wrote to the mayor and jurats of the town to assure them that the Commons would soon resolve the dispute concerning Dungeness lighthouse. “But truly,” Angell continued, “the businesses that are in the House at this time are of so great importance and high a nature that these more ordinary businesses are put off from time to time and infinitely delayed” (Historical Manuscripts Commission, Thirteenth Report, Appendix, Part 4 [London, 1892]: 171Google Scholar). There is nothing in Angell's letter to suggest that he had any fears that his constituents would not understand why more progress had not been made concerning a purely local issue.

63 For Chaworth's speech, see Spring's Diary, p. 132. For the loss of his seat, see C.J., 1: 748. Sir George was expelled when the House agreed with William Mills that he and not Chaworth should have been returned at Arundel. But neither Sir Francis Nethersole nor Chaworth himself had any doubt that the Commons were motivated by their disapproval of the latter's speech on 19 March. See Ruigh, , Parliament of 1624, pp. 224–25 and note 129Google Scholar.

64 S.P. 14/165/56.

65 The phrase is Morrill's, John (The Revolt of the Provinces: Conservatives and Radicals in the English Civil War, 1630–1650 [London, 1976], p. 17)Google Scholar.

66 For Coke's speech, see Spring's Diary, p. 57. One member of the House of Commons who is not known to have spoken during the Parliament of 1624 is Thomas Scott of Canterbury. The thoughts he recorded in his private diary demonstrate that historians cannot take the silence of backbenchers as proof of lack of interest in foreign policy or national politics. See Clark, Peter, “Thomas Scott and the Growth of Urban Opposition to the Early Stuart Regime,” The Historical Journal 21 (1978): 1–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

67 See Ruigh, Parliament of 1624, passim; Cogswell, Thomas, The Blessed Revolution: English Politics and the Coming of War, 1621–1624 (Cambridge, 1989), pp. 137–261Google Scholar.

68 C.J., 1: 704; Erie's Diary, fos. 184–84v; Wiltshire Record Office, Parliamentary Diary of John Hawarde, pp. 290–91.

69 Sommerville, Politics and Ideology in England; Adams, S. L., “Foreign Policy and the Parliaments of 1621 and 1624,” in Sharpe, , Faction and Parliament, pp. 139–71Google Scholar; Adams, Simon, “Spain or the Netherlands? The Dilemmas of Early Stuart Foreign Policy,” in Before the English Civil War: Essays on Early Stuart Politics and Government, ed. Tomlinson, Howard (London, 1983), pp. 79–101CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Peter Lake's study of Thomas Scott the Puritan minister and pamphleteer, “Constitutional Consensus and Puritan Opposition in the 1620s: Thomas Scott and the Spanish Match,” The Historical Journal 25 (1982): 805–25CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

70 Clark's, J. C. D. comment that in the eighteenth century “An ‘opposition’ was still a campaign, not an institution” (Clark, , Revolution and Rebellion, pp. 85, 132–36)Google Scholar applies to the seventeenth century as well. Nonetheless, to Charles and Buckingham, intent on fighting an unpopular war, the distinction may have made little practical difference.