From: livesey@solntze.wpd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.british,alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: An astonishing Guy
Followup-To: soc.culture.british,alt.folklore.urban
Date: 6 Nov 1992 20:12:54 GMT
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc.  Mountain View, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: solntze.wpd.sgi.com


In article <lfgdnoINN46@exodus.Eng.Sun.COM>, linden@positive.Eng.Sun.COM writes:

Of course, I know that the official version of history
ain't worth shit, and so on, but I thought it might be
amusing to contrast it with the politically correct version
presented here.   This is from Henry Marsh's book on the
English Bill of Rights et. al..

> For 12 brief glorious years England was a republic,
> from January 1 1649 to 1660.

    "For eleven years, England tried to live without a
    King.  The experiment failed and by a tragic irony,
    Cromwell was no more successful in his dealings with
    Parliament than Charles had been.  Four years after
    achieving power, he dropped all pretence at ruling by
    consultation.  He led a troop of armed soldiers into
    the House of Commons and forcibly put an end to
    Parliament.  He was declared Lord Protector by the
    Army, and after one more abortive attempt to govern
    with Parliament, placed England under military rule."


> Then the cup of liberty was dashed from the people's lips when
> the son of the old king, an even bigger dickwad and dilettante
> than his father, grabbed the throne back.

    "Fortunately, the new King was shrewd, and the
    Parliament that recalled him was moderate.  There were
    both roundheads and cavaliers among its members and it
    set about its tasks in a spirit of compromise.  Most of
    the acts of the Cromwellian period were rescinded, but
    those which abolished the Court of Star Chamber and the
    other Royal Courts remained.  There was to be no
    taxation save by the consent of Parliament, and the
    vexed question of Ship Money was finally settled.
    Besides Ship Money there were also the other  feudal
    dues which the King might have used to raise money
    without parliamentary consent - the 'aids' when his
    daughters were married, or when his sons were made
    knights, and other dues going back five hundred years
    to the days of the Normans.  All these were abolished
    by Parliament in December 1660 seven months after the
    King's return.  Charles II was thus deprived of the
    Courts that he might have used for the arbitrary
    punishment of obdurate subjects, and of the means of
    raising money without Parliamentary consent.
    
    [I guess this means Ronnie Reagan and Ollie North
    pulled off quite a trick between them.   Charles I
    would have been proud, and Charles II and George III
    envious.   njl]"


> The cup of liberty passed on to the American people, who had the
> same thirst as the British, but were more successful in satisfying it
> a century later.

    "We have seen how Charles I had brushed aside writs of
    habeas corpus.  Parliament was resolved that such writs
    which had once been the safeguards of the subjects'
    liberties, should not again be ignored.  If a man had
    been imprisoned by some local Lord, his friends could
    seek the King's help, and the King (or one of his
    officers) would issue a writ over the Great Seal
    commanding the man who held the prisoner to 'have the
    body' of the prisoner brought before a magistrate for
    proper trial.  Charles I had shown that with a
    tyrannous king such writs might be of no avail.
    Parliament in 1679 resolved to defend the process
    against future misuse and passed the Habeas Corpus Act.

    [That's the same habeas corpus mentioned in the US
    Constitution, the one suspended by Lincoln and again in
    1941, so it ain't entirely clear how full this cup of
    liberty has been.  njl]"

> 
> To this day, it is the law in Britain that a Roman Catholic cannot
> hold the office of Prime Minister.

Is it?

jon.