Glorious Revolution - Legacy

Legacy

The Glorious Revolution of 1688 is considered by some as being one of the most important events in the long evolution of the respective powers of Parliament and the Crown in England. With the passage of the Bill of Rights, it stamped out once and for all any possibility of a Catholic monarchy, and ended moves towards absolute monarchy in the British kingdoms by circumscribing the monarch's powers. These powers were greatly restricted; he or she could no longer suspend laws, levy taxes, make royal appointments, or maintain a standing army during peacetime without Parliament's permission – to this day the Army is known as the "British Army" not the "Royal Army" as it is, in some sense, Parliament's Army and not that of the King. (This is, however, a complex issue, as the Crown remained – and remains – the source of all executive authority in the British army, with legal implications for unlawful orders etc.). Since 1689, government under a system of constitutional monarchy in England, and later the United Kingdom, has been uninterrupted. Since then, Parliament's power has steadily increased while the Crown's has steadily declined. Unlike in the English civil war of the mid-seventeenth century, the "Glorious Revolution" did not involve the masses of ordinary people in England (the majority of the bloodshed occurred in Ireland). This fact has led many historians, including Stephen Saunders Webb, to suggest that, in England at least, the events more closely resemble a coup d'état than a social revolution. This view of events does not contradict what was originally meant by "revolution": the coming round of an old system of values in a circular motion, back to its original position, as Britain's constitution was reasserted, rather than formed anew.

Prior to his arrival in England, the new king William III of England was not Anglican, but rather was a member of the Dutch Reformed Church. Consequently, as a Calvinist and Presbyterian he was now in the unenviable position of being the head of the Church of England, while technically being a Nonconformist. This was, however, not his main motive for promoting religious toleration. More important in that respect was the need to keep happy his Catholic allies in the coming struggle with Louis XIV. Though he had promised legal toleration for Catholics in his Declaration of October, 1688, he was ultimately unsuccessful in this respect, due to opposition by the Tories in the new Parliament. The Revolution led to the Act of Toleration of 1689, which granted toleration to Nonconformist Protestants, but not to Catholics.

The Williamite war in Ireland can be seen as the source of later conflict, including The Troubles of recent times. The Williamite victory in Ireland is still commemorated by the Orange Order for preserving British and Protestant dominance in the country.

In North America, the Glorious Revolution precipitated the 1689 Boston revolt in which a well-organized "mob" of provincial militia and citizens successfully deposed the hated governor Edmund Andros, which has been seen as a precedent for the American War of Independence a century later. In New York, Leisler's Rebellion caused the colonial administrator, Francis Nicholson, to flee to England. A third event, Maryland's Protestant Rebellion was directed against the proprietary government, seen as Catholic-dominated.

Lord Macaulay's account of the Revolution in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second exemplifies its semi-mystical significance to later generations.