Glorious Revolution

• King James II fled the country and took refuge with Louis XIV due to overwhelming opposition to his rule

  December 1688
• 60 lords and roughly 600 ex MPs asked William of Orange to take over the government
• The Convention Parliament met to decide how to deal with James' flight, opinion was deeply divided

  1689
• Whigs

  • Believed that a contract existed between the King and his people which had to be upheld by both sides
  • James had broken this contract and had exceed his powers by trying to establish catholicism
  • His actions meant that he had lost the right to rule as King therefore the throne was vacant
• Tories

  • Believed in the hereditary succession and in the divine right of kings
  • Tories had sworn an oath of allegiance to James and felt they could not break their oath as long as the King lived
  • They needed justification for the replacement of James by William of Orange
• The Convention Parliament (1689)


  1. Formed a resolution on the monarchy and worded it in a way to satisfy most Whigs and Tories

  2. James had broken the contract between King and people (Whig)

  3. He had violated the country's fundamental laws (Whig)

  4. His flight meant that he had abdicated the throne (Tory)

  5. Tories in the Lords objected to this statement which led to anti Tory crowds demonstrating outside parliament

  6. William, in a secret meeting with peers, warned that he would return to Holland unless he were made King

  7. William and the political elite agreed that Mary would share the title of monarch but without any power, and if Mary died and William remarried, any children from his second marriage would follow Anne (Mary's sister) in the line of succession

  8. This was formally accepted by the Lords and confirmed by the Common two days later

  9. The throne was offered to William and Mary unconditionally
• The Declaration of Rights, 1689


  • Listed all the errors which James had committed and asserted several traditional liberties of the people which included laws could not be suspended without parliamentary consent, parliament had to approve all forms of taxation, and parliament should meet frequently
  • Was a compromise document that was deliberately ambiguous in terms of the constitutional implications of James' removal
  • William and Mary were not referred to as rightful or lawful heirs
  • A diluted version of the Declaration of Rights passed into law in 1689 as the Bill of Rights
• William and Mary's Coronation

  1. 1689, at a formal ceremony at which the Declaration of Right was read, the crown was offered to William and Mary

  2. At William and Mary's coronation, there was a different oath from that sworn by previous monarchs, indicating their different position and that of parliament

  3. Previous Oath- to 'confirm to the people of England the laws and customs to them granted by the Kings of England'

  4. New Oath- 'to govern the people of this kingdom of england, and the dominions thereunto belonging, according to the statutes in parliamnt agreed on, and the laws and customs of the same'
• The Toleration Act, 1689


  • William was a Calvinist and was keen to gain the support of all Protestants for his war against France and was ready to extend toleration to Catholics
  • 1689 The King asked the Commons to abandon the religious tests which kept dissenters out of public office
  • The predominantly Anglican parliament passed the Toleration Act which meant most dissenters were exempt from penal laws if they took an oath of allegiance and declared against transubstantiation, could worship freely in licensed meeting houses which had to keep their doors open, and could set up their own schools to educate their children
  • Religious toleration did not extend to Catholics, Jews or Unitarians
• The end of Anglican Supremacy

  • The central division within Anglicanism was whether the Church should be broadened to include some dissenters or maintained as it was
  • William appointed Latitudinarians (churchmen who were willing to accept a broad range of Protestant opinion within the Church of England) as bishops
  • Tories believed such churchmen were not doing enough to stop what they feared was the rapid growth of dissent and were particularly worried by the further growth of Quakerism after the Toleration Act
  • Between 1689 and 1701, the Church of England broadened their acceptance of a range of Protestants
  • Increased focus on science and reason marked a shift away from the dominance of religious ideas
  • By 1701, the number and size of Protestant denominations had grown considerably
• Catholicism

  • While it became easier for Catholics to worship without interference, they remained a small religious minority, often subject to religious prejudice
  • The 1689 Bill of Rights excluded Catholics from the throne by removing James II and his children from the succession
  • In 1694 Mary died without any children
  • With the death of Anne's only child and the increasing age of William and Anne, the prospect was raised of another claim on the throne by the children of james II
  • As a result of the Act of Settlement, 57 potential catholic heirs to the throne were excluded, the monarch had to be an active member of the Protestant Church of England, attending services, and the granddaughter of James I, the Protestant Sophia of Hanover, was made next in line to the throne
  • The Act of Settlement was a triumph for the Whigs, who had tried to simply exclude james from the succession but after 1701, exclusion would apply to any Catholic heir to the throne
• The Triennial Act 1694


  • The Bill of Rights had imposed many limits on the royal prerogative, William opposed these infringements on his powers of prerogative but tolerated them in the interests of peace and harmony
  • 1692 the Lords agreed to a Triennial Bill which would establish regular elections every three years, it was passed by the Commons but vetoed by the King, other measures were vetoed in 1693 which, to many MPs, called to mind the anti-parliamentary stance taken by Charles II and James II
  • A powerful campaign was mounted by MPs on all sides of the House of Commons for a Triennial Bill which finally became law in 1694 and tested simply that no future parliament could last longer than three years
  • The act removed one of the most important of the crown's prerogative powers, before this, the monarch had been able to dissolve a parliament which challenged the royal will or to extend the life of one which followed the King's wishes, the act therefore marked a substantial increase in the powers of parliament
  • Although the act was intended to limit royal interference in the Commons, patronage and pensions were still granted to MPs ready to obey the royal will
  • Frequent elections increased party rivalry and the growing divisions between the Whig and Tory parties, for example, the Act of settlement was triggered which would establish the Protestant House of Hanover on the throne but many Tories who were still loyal to the Stuarts were determined to try and block the Hanoverian succession
• The Nine Years' War (1688-97)


  • William took Britain into the League of Augsburg, a coalition of European powers ranged against Louis XIV's France which involved the country in the Nine Years' War
  • The war had a significant impact on domestic policies, William was out of the country campaigning in Europe between spring and autumn each year so left the government of the country in the hands of his wife, Queen Mary
  • The war influenced the composition of parliament, royal powers of patronage increased considerably as the King increased the number of MPs who also served as military officers, many saw this as increasing royal power over the Commons
  • William had to summon parliament every year to gain taxes to fund the war but he was not required to dissolve parliament at any time
• The Importance of William III's Wars in the Development of a Financial Revolution

  • In 1689 William III took both Britain and the Dutch Republic (which he was still the hereditary ruler of) to war against France
  • Britain had been involved in the Hundred Years' War but the Nine Years' War was fought on a much larger scale, over 70,000 troops were involved in the conflict and the cost of financing the war was over £5 million per year
  • In order to meet the high costs of the war many changes were made to the British financial system, the changes to the taxation system and to the ways in which governments raised public loans have been described by many historians as a 'financial revolution'
  • The political and constitutional effect of these developments also had long term implications for the government and marked a profound shift in power from the monarch to parliament
• Changes in Taxation


  1. Customs and excise duties were extended to a wider range of goods, and the rates of taxation were very high, the duties could not be avoided, and provided up yo a quarter of the crowns' income

  2. A land tax was introduced in the early 1690s, and quickly became a permanent and lucrative source of income, the rate for tax was set at 20% of the profits which landlords made from their land, by 1700 the land tax alone accounted for half of the income raised from taxation and, like the customs and excise duties, it was very difficult to avoid

  3. These two measures marked a revolution in the system of taxation, they established permanent and very efficient ways of raising money which continued long after William III's wars and ended
• Changes in Government Borrowing

  1. The british crown had an unenviable reputation for failing to honour its debts, in 1672 Charles II had issued the Stop of the Exchequer when he was unable to repay debts totalling £1 million, his debts ruined many bankers and made it harder for Charles to raise loans for the rest of his reign

  2. William's ministers introduced two important innovations in order to raise money: in 1693 the Million Loan Act was intended to raise a loan of £1 million, and repayment was guaranteed out of income from the excise duties, in 1694 investors were invited to raise a loan of £1.2 million to pay for the war, in return, investors were allowed to establish the Bank of England, which provided banking services as well as raising further crown loans

  3. As a result of these innovative ways of raising loans, the prestige of the London money markets rose, and soon London challenged Amsterdam as a major financial centre
• The Impact of the Financial Revolution

  • The financial position of the crown improved dramatically, by 1700 around 9% of the nation's wealth went towards taxation
  • There was growing confidence in the reliability of the state and its ability to repay its debts
  • The crown's ability to raise funds for the war depended on an annual vote in parliament to supply funds, as a result, parliament became a permanent feature of the system of government