Wonderful Parliament

Originally called to address King Richard II's need for money, it quickly refocused on pressing for the reform of his administration.

Instead of granting the King's request, the houses of the Lords and the Commons effectively united against him and his unpopular chancellor, Michael de la Pole, 1st Earl of Suffolk.

He spent much of the following year gathering support, ignoring his parliament-imposed council, and taking legal advice on how to annul the constraints on his rule.

He was increasingly criticised for his patronage of a few select royal favourites, to an extent that has been described as "lavish to the point of foolishness" by a biographer, historian Anthony Tuck.

Several expeditions had left for France in the early years of Richard's reign to defend English territory, but they were almost all military and political failures.

The King was also unpopular because of his choice of advisers, particularly de la Pole, the chancellor, who was felt to exert too much influence on foreign policy and so became inextricably linked with its failure.

Tuck has argued that, while probably the most sensible policy the government could have adopted, pacificism was unpopular with much of the English nobility, as a martial career such as their fathers had enjoyed was expected to be financially and chivalrically profitable.

[13] For Richard, as historian J. S. Roskell put it, it also had the result of creating an "adversely critical attitude towards the government" that reflected negatively upon the King.

[14] On top of the expense and failure of the campaign in France, the King urgently needed funds to defend the border with Scotland, and the kingdom from a possible French invasion.

This behaviour from men, who had showed up well in the tranquillity of peace with their fierce bravery, did not set an example to be followed of what should be done when they thought that battle was at hand and danger imminent.

[3] By 1386, "the Commons had no good reason to overlook the excessive generosity of the King or to acquiesce in his government's arbitrary taxation" as historian John Palmer put it.

His victory now gave him the time and resources to plan an invasion of England, and in March 1386 he began gathering a large fleet[18] at Sluys.

The King convened the royal council to Osney Abbey, in Oxfordshire in August and it was decided to summon a parliament in face of this threat.

He also covered a number of other topics, including the possibility of revaluing the currency—on account, supposedly, of it being taken out of the realm and circulation too often—and moving the Calais Staple to Westminster.

[37] The first—and for the King, most important—item of business on the parliamentary agenda was his request for a subsidy, or tax of movable goods, of four fifteenths and two-tenths, which was calculated to bring in the large sum of around £155,000.

Others (for example, the conduct of the war with France) were shown to be the joint responsibility of the royal council, and so not solely Suffolk's fault;[10] N. B. Lewis has questioned the validity of the claims against de la Pole, suggesting that they were "trivial or unfounded... merely pretexts for dismissing the chief minister of an unpopular King".

[43] In any case, the parliament itself became increasingly focused on personally attacking the earl and the perceived abuse of the authority of the chancellorship, even down to the supposed theft of a charter from Dover Castle.

The affair ended up "dragg[ing] on for at least a month [and] degenerated into three badly sustained and trivial charges, behind each of which motives of malice or private interest may be suspected," one commentator has written.

[58] The Parliament Rolls of Medieval England (PROME) project, notes that at least two of Richard's proposed creations—John, Lord Neville and the under chamberlain to the royal household, Simon Burley, to the earldoms of Cumberland and of Huntingdon respectively—were so unpopular that the King was forced to withdraw them.

Saul has described it as "the worst political crisis of the reign to date"[15] and a direct assault on the traditional principle that medieval kings governed by personal prerogative.

On 19 November, Richard appointed his councillors in Parliament as the Commons had requested; this was described as a "great and continual council,"[60] composed of eleven peers and three principal officials.

[15] Following his impeachment, de la Pole had his royal grants of land reversed (although retaining his earldom) and was sentenced to imprisonment, probably in Corfe Castle.

Saul describes him as "a thinker of some originality",[71] who deliberately turned what had up until then been solely a political controversy in Parliament into a legal dispute to be resolved in court.

[7] Richard's defiant response to the 1386 parliament, and attempts to convict its promoters of treason,[76] turned, says the scholar Alison McHardy, "the king's critics from angry into desperate men".

Palmer has commented that "it is generally recognised that all the constitutional and political troubles of Richard II's reign can be traced back to the Wonderful Parliament".

[21] Although the court party was swept from power in 1386—when, as J. S. Roskell put it, "the exercise of royal authority was virtually handed over to a parliamentary commission"—Richard had a "violent reaction" to the proceedings.

[80] In 1388, a number of men close to the King, including Burley and the Mayor of London, Nicholas Brembre were hanged at Tyburn,[75] while Tresilian was discovered hiding in sanctuary in Westminster Abbey.

[82] Although the epithet 'wonderful' is widely applied to this Parliament—stemming from the use of the Latin mirabilis by a contemporary chronicler to describe it—the term was originally coined to refer to the 1388 assembly.

[85][note 11] John McCall and George Rudisill have argued that the Parliament demonstrated the "inanity of the proceedings and the vindictiveness that motivated them, the weakness of the King's government and the inability of anyone to do anything about it".

[95] And for asmoch as wee remembre, that the moost easy, redy and prone payment, of any charge to be born within this Reame, by the Commens of the same, is by Graunt of Xvcs and xcs all the Levie whereof amongs your people is so useuell.