Long Parliament

They claimed the parliament was not legally dissolved, its final votes a procedural irregularity (the words used contemporaneously were "device" and "conspiracy") by Monck to ensure the restoration of King Charles II of England.

The humiliating terms imposed by the Scots Covenanters after a second defeat forced him to hold fresh elections in November, which produced a large majority for the opposition, led by John Pym.

[9]: ix Their main target was the Earl of Strafford, former Lord Deputy of Ireland; aware of this, he urged Charles to use military force to seize the Tower of London, and arrest any MP or peer guilty of "treasonable correspondence with the Scots".

[11] Other targets, including John Finch, fled abroad; Archbishop William Laud—by then sufficiently unpopular that in May 1640 a large armed mob attacked Lambeth Palace, seeking to kill him[12]—was impeached in December, joining Strafford in the Tower.

Levying taxes without consent of Parliament was declared unlawful, including Ship money and forced loans, while the Star Chamber and High Commission courts abolished.

[26] On 30 December, Charles induced John Williams, Archbishop of York and eleven other bishops, to sign a complaint, disputing the legality of any laws passed by the Lords during their exclusion.

[27] On 3 January 1642, Charles ordered his Attorney-general to bring charges of treason against Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Manchester, and Five Members of the Commons; Pym, John Hampden, Denzil Holles, Arthur Haselrig, and William Strode.

[31] Charles left Oxford in disguise on 27 April; on 6 May, Parliament received a letter from David Leslie, commander of Scottish forces besieging Newark, announcing that he had the king in custody.

[33] Aware of divisions among his opponents, he used his position as king of both Scotland and England to deepen them, assuming that he was essential to any government; while this was true in 1646, by 1648 key actors believed it was pointless to negotiate with someone who could not be trusted to keep any agreement.

By 1646, they viewed Charles as a lesser threat than the Independents, who opposed their demand for a unified, Presbyterian church of England and Scotland; Cromwell claimed he would fight rather than agree to it.

The Presbyterian faction had the support of the London Trained Bands, the Army of the Western Association, leaders like Rowland Laugharne in Wales, and parts of the Royal Navy.

The Putney Debates attempted to address radicals' objectives, but the return of royalist threats in November led to Fairfax demanding a declaration of loyalty; this re-established command authority over the rank and file, completed at Corkbush.

In April 1648, the Engagers became a majority in the Scottish Parliament; in return for restoring him to the English throne, Charles agreed to impose Presbyterianism in England for three years, and suppress the Independents.

[40] Cromwell "well knew that while the Long Parliament, that noble company, who had fought the great battle of liberty from the beginning, remained in session, and such men as Vane were enabled to mingle in its deliberations, it would be utterly useless for him to think of executing his purposes" (to set up a Protectorate or Dictatorship).

Cromwell knew "that if the Reform Bill should be suffered to pass, and a House of Commons be convened, freely elected on popular principles, and constituting a full and fair and equal representation, it would be impossible ever after to overthrow the liberties of the people, or break down the government of the country".

Word was carried to Cromwell, that the House were on the point of putting the final motion; and Colonel Ingoldby hastened to Whitehall to tell him, that, if he intended to do anything decisive, he had no time to lose".

[42] "While this extraordinary scene was transacting, the members, hardly believing their own ears and eyes, sat in mute amazement, horror, and pity of the maniac traitor who was storming and raving before them.

He then seized the records, snatched the bill from the hands of the clerk, drove the members out at the point of the bayonet, locked the doors, put the key in his pocket, and returned to Whitehall.

One of Vane's speeches effectively ended Richard Cromwell's career:[44] Mr. Speaker, among all the people of the universe, I know none who have shown so much zeal for the liberty of their country, as the English, at this time, have done.

I know not by what misfortune, we are fallen into the error of those, who poised the Emperor Titus to make room for Domitian, who made away Augustus that they might have Tiberius, and changed Claudius for Nero ... whereas the people of England are now renowned, all over the world, for their great virtue and discipline; and yet suffer an idiot, without courage, without sense, nay, without ambition, to have dominion in a country of liberty.

Colonel Lambert subsequently acquitted himself to Henry Vane the Younger, Edmond Ludlow and the "Committee on Safety," an instrument of the Wallingford House party acting under their misdirection.

During these disorders, the Council of State still assembled at the usual place, and: the Lord President Bradshaw, who was present, though by long sickness very weak and much extenuated, yet animated by his ardent zeal and constant affection to the common cause, upon hearing Col Syndenham's justifications of the proceedings of the army in again disrupting parliament, stood up and interrupted him, declaring his abhorrence of that detestable action, and telling the council, that being now going to his God, he had not patience to sit there to hear his great name so openly blasphemed; and thereupon departed to his lodgings, and withdrew himself from public employment.

[52] Edmond Ludlow warned both the Army and key members of Parliament that unless a compromise could be made it would "render all the blood and treasure that had been spent in asserting our liberties of no use to us, but also force us under such a yoke of servitude, that neither we nor our posterity should be able to bear".

[53] Starting on 17 December 1659, Henry Vane representing the Parliament, Major Saloway and Colonel Salmon with powers from the officers of the army to treat with the fleet, and Vice-Admiral Lawson met in negotiating a compromise.

[citation needed] General George Monck, who had been Cromwell's viceroy in Scotland, feared that the military stood to lose power and secretly shifted his loyalty to the Crown.

[63] "The Lord Mayor, Sheriffs and Aldermen of the City, treated their King with a collation under a tent, placed in St. George's Fields; and five or six hundred citizens cloathed in coats of black velvet, and (not improperly) wearing chains about their necks, by an order of the Common Council, attended on the triumph of that day; ... and those who had been so often defeated in the field, and had contributed nothing either of bravery or policy to this change, in ordering the souldiery to ride with swords drawn through the city of London to White Hall, the Duke of York and Monk leading the way; and intimating (as was supposed) a resolution to maintain that by force which had been obtained by fraud".

Orlando Bridgman, who upon his submission to Cromwell had been permitted to practice the law in a private manner, and under that colour had served both as spy and agent for his master, was entrusted with the principal management of this tragic scene; and in his charge to the Grand Jury, had the assurance to tell them 'That no authority, no single person, or community of men; not the people collectively or representatively, had any coercive power over the King of England'".

In Henry Vane's case the House of Lords were desirous of having him specifically excepted, so as to leave him at the mercy of the government and thus restrain him from the exercise of his great talents in promoting his favourite republican principles at any time during the remainder of his life.

[citation needed] Edmond Ludlow one of the members of Parliament excepted by the act of indemnity, fled to Switzerland after the restoration of King Charles II, where he wrote his memoirs of these events.

The republican theory is that the goal and aim of the Long Parliament was to institute a constitutional, balanced, and equally representative form of government along similar lines as were later accomplished in America by the American Revolution.