The Glorious Revolution settled the two-part question of supremacy in English political and religious matters by compromising: Whiggish views of the monarchy and Tory high church preferences prevailed. The ultimate winner was Coke and Selden’s view that the king is chief servant but not master of the law. Like 1660’s restoration of Charles II, the revolution of 1688 ended lawless rule by restoring time-honored customs. Had James II submitted to Parliament, the scope of legal change would have been greater, for the monarch would have been circumscribed, but the hierarchy would have been less clear cut. (The subsequent independence of judges themselves was one of the broadest formal changes.) Writing with verve, Trevelyan shows it to be the decisive event in English constitutional history through the 20th century. Economic prosperity and geopolitical hegemony consequently followed. Although compromise prevailed in England, the victory was one-sided in Scotland and Ireland. To the north of the border, Catholics became Jacobites while Cavaliers opposed the Argyles and Whiggish ministers, especially after Holyrood acceded to Westminster. Across the sea, Protestants dependent on England emasculated native leaders save for Catholic priests, choking off the possibility of reform. Indeed, although the 18th-century English understandably favored institutional conservatism, and did effectively channel working-class and Radical sentiment into a system headed by Parliament, it was late in responding to the industrial economy and delivering the Reform Act.
England
8. Pangle, Montesquieu’s Philosophy of Liberalism (26 Apr 2020)
Montesquieu’s Esprit des Lois simultaneously rejects Aristotelian virtue and universal (i.e., Lockean) liberalism by asserting that moral vices and sociocultural particularisms determine the best mankind can hope for. Man’s nature is a source of justice in the Hobbesian sense of self-preservation, but only as refracted through custom and circumstance. History not teleology holds the key to political comity.
Like Aristotle, Montesquieu studies political regimes; however, whereas for the former the goal of a republic is the best use of freedom (i.e., virtue), for the latter it’s freedom itself. Anticipating Hegel, in a regime where freedom is less than ne plus ultra, some will oppress others simply to avoid oppression. Montesquieu also denies Aristotle’s exultation of the philosophic gentlemen or the statesman. Through private vice such as building wealth, which leads to superabundance, public virtue emerges and thence to patriotism. Religious (e.g., Christian) virtue unacceptably contests the state’s ends. Pangle shows Montesquieu’s definition creates an egalitarian politics with no definite end, only relative characteristics and lack of oppression.
The political sphere is not the source of society’s way of life. Statecraft is less important than the past, subconsciously carried forward. In emphasizing history as revealing social mores, Montesquieu can be seen as the progenitor of sociology, and more obviously foreshadowing Kant, Hegel, and Marx. Cool climates promote restlessness and more specifically scrutiny of government, revealing man’s passion for security, since liberty is an opinion of security. Also in the future, Burke would emphasize custom and Rousseau set aside the ancient emphasis on excellence in favor of base equality and freedom.
A republic (whether aristocratic or democratic) is more easily achieved in small, agrarian units. Montesquieu makes the case for separation of powers, moderate (limited) criminal law, and commerce as harnessing man’s passions to the general welfare. He favored competition between aristocrats and commoners, mediated by monarchy, to check tyranny and also to promote excellence as against mediocrity. As a formula: balance of power and separation of power promotes efficiency (i.e., minimum of friction) in reaching civic ends. In Montesquieu’s treatment of law, one foresees utilitarianism: restraints are to provide universalization of liberty and security, not the promotion of higher ends. Economic superabundance provides for social goods, such as freedom to philosophize. The English system provides an example. It lacks politesse but evidences morals. The English are not worldly but usefully focused on commerce. Consequently their political liberties are well balanced, exemplary. Yet Montesquieu overlooks the Tory institutional loyalties which are the foundation of social opinion, Pangle writes.
The legislator is to be prudent, not high minded, working through man’s passions. To understand a law, Montesquieu says, we have to view its intent, what’s it’s trying to solve. He is modern in espousing a system of institutional balance and competing interests, and preeminently insists on the applicability of circumstance as manifest through historic custom. His views failed to foresee or provide for defense against the French Revolution, Pangle observes, and paradoxically underestimated the durability of English liberty. The author asks: is formulaic security yet to be overwhelmed by man’s intrinsic nature? But Montesquieu, in bringing the principles of political thought down to the realm of current events, calls us to a contemporary accountability.
12. Hexter, Reappraisals in History (9 Jun 2020)
Evaluates shortcomings of mid-20th century historiography using examples from early modern England and Europe. Contemporary professional work has been too clever by half, failing the twin tests of common sense and explaining what happened and why on the past’s own terms. The historian may use a framework to study events, but not to determine their nature: history cannot be discovered or elucidated by rules. Particularly in times of convulsion – when history is most interesting – the narrative supersedes the analytic.
The Scientific Revolution marked a turning point in Western trajectory. Sixteenth-century aristocrats could no longer rise only by martial prowess, no more felt able to ignore the liberal arts. It was the reconstruction of a social class. By contrast, the myth of the contemporary English middle class muddles social change by misunderstanding the extent of the upper classes. Merchants buying in was an ancient habit; Tudor policy protected established groups even while promoting new ones; hierarchy was as important as ever. Economic change, absolutism, and Calvinism were more catalytic.
In the famous essay ‘Storm over the Gentry’, Hexter shows the gentry and peers were of the same class, so statistics are unhelpful. Political claims during the first half of the 17th century were grounded in ancient rights, not class interest; that is, classes do not inevitably pursue selfish ends. Religion may have been the prime mover, but politics was the medium. To get to the bottom of the Interregnum, the historian must ask what the Commons thought it was doing?
In fact, in an enduring conflict between the Stuarts and Parliament, the latter sought to husband its rights to legislate, to tax and supply, and to judge; but did not mean to topple the monarchy. The Petition of Right fell within the civic tradition. It was an effort to rebalance liberty and law, and after the Restoration politicians and notables cluster around the grandees as before.
See http://www.oeler.us/2021/06/22/the-historiography-of-the-english-civil-war/