Chapter 12: Radicalism; Levellers and millenarians

• Levellers


  a predominantly London-based pressure group that sought political, economic, and social reform. 
• Origin of the Levellers


  result of the economic distress caused by Civil War
• Key Leveller Demands

  • Extension of the franchise (the right to vote to all men)
  • Written constitution (Agreement of the People)
  • House of Commons as the legislature, removing power of the monarch and the House of Lords
  • Frequent elections
  • Redistribution of seats
  • Religious freedom
  • Reform of the law
  • Elected local government
  • Economic reform
• Leveller Methods

  • Petitions
  • Processions
  • Pamphlets - Lilburne, with other leading Levellers, produced nearly 250 pamphlets between 1645 and 1649
  • Newspapers
• Significance of the Leveller Methods

  Showed how politics in the period moved beyond the control of the Political Nation and onto the streets of London. 
• What was the army's importance to the Levellers?

  needed backing of the army if they wanted a chance of influencing the post-war settlement
• 'The Case of the Army Truly Stated'


  A pamphlet that circulated around the army, attacking the army leadership for their continuing attempts to settle with Charles. 
• What did the divisions in the NMA due to the Levellers' influence lead to?

  the Putney and Whitehall Debates to discuss their written manifesto The Agreement of the People.
• What were the Putney Debates (Oct-Nov 1647)?


  General Council of the Army and Levellers to debate how England should be governed in future. 
• What was the Levellers’ first Agreement of the People (October 1647)?

  • Proposed that all who wished to be citizens of the state had to sign the document as a sign of their agreement, hence the title Agreement of the People.
  • Suggested sovereignty would be with the people. 
• Main proposals of the Agreement of the People

  • MPs should be elected in proportion to the population of their constituencies
  • parliaments should be elected biennially
  • Parliament should consist of one chamber or house.
• Significance of the Agreement of the People

  a remarkable sign of what revolution had unleashed - in the 1630s the voices of civilian groups such as the Levellers would not have been heard nor considered by Charles or others with political power. 
• • 5th November: end of the Putney Debates following a clash between Ireton and the Leveller sympathiser Rainsborough over the army leaders’ attempts to settle with the king.
  • At this point, all that Ireton and Cromwell had argued for at Putney was undermined by Charles’ escape from Hampton Court.
• What were the Whitehall Debates (Dec 1648-Jan 1649)?

  Levellers met with the General Council of the Army, mainly led by Ireton, to debate the first Agreement of the People at the Whitehall Debates
• What happened during the Whitehall Debates?

  • Levellers and Officers drew up their own versions of the Agreement - differed particularly regarded the extent of religious freedom that should be allowed.
  • Levellers also denounced the Rump Parliament and its narrow representative nature.
• Repression of the Levellers

  • March 1649: leading Levellers, including Lilburne were arrested
  • Although Lilburne was acquitted at his trial in September, the Leveller influence in the army was effectively over and thus so too any real threat the Levellers may have posed to the state.
• What were the Diggers?

  created by Gerrard Winstanley, they were a response to the political, economic, and social effects of the Civil Wars.
• Digger methods

  • established a commune outside London and saw communes as a solution to social inequalities
  • Also published pamphlets -i.e. ‘The Law of Freedom in a Platform’ (1652) where it was argued that “every freeman shall have a freedom in the earth to plant or build or fetch from the storehouses any thing he wants[...]"
• Historian Mark Kishlanksky on the Diggers

  "the Digger movement appeared more ominous than it actually was.” 
• Influence of the Diggers

  • had less immediate influence than the Levellers did
  • number of followers was relatively small
  • commune only lasted a year before being destroyed by Fairfax. 
• Significance of the Diggers

  The path they laid for future radicals —> direct action, communism, liberation theology, and environmentalism. 
• Repression of the Diggers

  March 1649 - a Diggers group occupied waste ground at St George’s Hill. However, those who owned the land were hostile towards them, leading to their failure. 
• Millenarianism


  Key strand of English Puritanism and influence movements such as the Levellers and the Diggers. 
• Who were the Fifth Monarchists?

  • formed in the 1650s, they campaigned for religious, political, economic, and social reform. 
  • first millenarian-centred ‘political’ group big enough to pose a real threat to the state. 
• Who was the leading Fifth Monarchist?

  Colonel Thomas Harrison
• Historian Bernard Capp on the Fifth Monarchists


  the Fifth Monarchists were ‘a political and religious sect expecting the imminent Kingdom of Christ on earth, a theocratic regime in which the saints would establish a godly discipline over the unregenerate masses and prepare for the Second Coming’.