Act of Guarantee

Especially the Patriots, influenced by Enlightenment thought and the American Revolution, opposed his policies, and sought to reform the state and legal system.

After the Netherlands got into war with Britain in 1780, criticism of the stadtholderian regime's functioning steadily increased, and the influence and prestige of the prince gradually crumbled.

Tensions between Orangists and Patriots peaked, both parties started arming themselves and forming exercitiegenootschappen, and the Republic teetered on the brink of civil war.

In September 1786, Patriots under Herman Willem Daendels briefly occupied the towns of Hattem and Elburg, but were soon driven out by stadtholderian forces.

[2] A much more serious confrontation took place at the Battle of Jutphaas (9 May 1787); although it was but a small defeat for the prince of Orange, it nevertheless confirmed that he was no longer able to control the country's internal affairs through force.

After negotiations between Wilhelmina and the British and Prussian envoys, Laurens Pieter van de Spiegel was appointed Grand Pensionary of Holland.

Finally, they wished to secure Dutch military support in case of war with Russia and/or Austria, who had concluded an alliance in 1781, and together had been successfully conquering Ottoman territories since 1787.

The Act was henceforth considered to be an unalienable part of the constitution of the Dutch Republic, which thereby began to look more and more like a unitary state led by an absolutist monarch.

After the French Republican invasion in late 1794, the outbreak of the pro-French Batavian Revolution in Amsterdam forced him and his family to flee to England in January 1795.