Tony Blair - Catholic

[fatbadger]

It's officially the law of England.

Garbage. The Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829 allowed Roman Catholics to hold all positions in the country except head of state.

All non-Anglicans can be Prime Minister (nonconformists have been allowed to since the 1828 Test and Corporations Act; Jews and atheists from the 1860s and 1870s; all others by convention). Thatcher wasn't an Anglican (she was a methodist), and she, of course, famously appointed the evangelical Carey to Archbishop of Canterbury, overlooking a catholic.

When you say Tony Blair will become a catholic, presumably what you mean is that he will become a Roman Catholic. He's been an Anglo-Catholic all his life (as is the current Archbishop of Canterbury - whom he appointed, of course!). At one point, we had the leaders of the three main parties as two Roman Catholics (Charles Kennedy and Iain Duncan Smith) and one Anglo-Catholic (Tony Blair).

It is suspected that Blair will become a Roman Catholic as soon as he is no longer PM. It is ridiculous if he thought that anyone would care if he was a Roman Catholic PM, so I'm not sure why he is waiting (if he is). He is not, as someone suggested, already a Roman Catholic, although he has taken communion in the Roman church - but of course the Church of England recognises Roman Catholic ordinations, which is why, technically, they can take services in the English Church. Therefore, there is nothing at all in him accepting the ministrations of a Roman Catholic priest.

Oh, and whichever of you said that Henry VIII would be turning in his grave should remember that Henry remained a Catholic all his life (although not a Roman Catholic).

 

[Dandyman]

In the wording that sounds more like a Glasgow Hun/Rangers fan than Dandyman.

The Glorious Revolution was when William of Orange took the English throne from James II in 1688. The event brought a permanent realignment of power within the English constitution. The new co-monarchy of King William III and Queen Mary II accepted more constraints from Parliament than previous monarchs had, and the new constitution created the expectation that future monarchs would also remain constrained by Parliament. The new balance of power between parliament and crown made the promises of the English government more credible, and credibility allowed the government to reorganize its finances through a collection of changes called the Financial Revolution. A more contentious argument is that the constitutional changes made property rights more secure and thus promoted economic development.


Tension between king and parliament ran deep throughout the seventeenth century. In the 1640s, the dispute turned into civil war. The loser, Charles I, was beheaded in 1649; his sons, Charles and James, fled to France; and the victorious Oliver Cromwell ruled England in the 1650s. Cromwell's death in 1659 created a political vacuum, so Parliament invited Charles I's sons back from exile, and the English monarchy was restored with the coronation of Charles II in 1660.



The Restoration, however, did not settle the fundamental questions of power between king and Parliament. Indeed, exile had exposed Charles I's sons to the strong monarchical methods of Louis XIV. Charles and James returned to Britain with expectations of an absolute monarchy justified by the Divine Right of Kings, so tensions continued during the reigns of Charles II (1660-1685) and his brother James II (1685-88). Table 1 lists many of the tensions and the positions favored by each side. The compromise struck during the Restoration was that Charles II would control his succession, that he would control his judiciary, and that he would have the power to collect traditional taxes. In exchange, Charles II would remain Protestant and the imposition of additional taxes would require Parliament's approval.


In practice, authority over additional taxation was how Parliament constrained Charles II. Charles brought England into war against Protestant Holland (1665-67) with the support of extra taxes authorized by Parliament. In the years following that war, however, the extra funding from Parliament ceased, but Charles II's borrowing and spending did not. By 1671, all his income was committed to regular expenses and paying interest on his debts. Parliament would not authorize additional funds, so Charles II was fiscally shackled

To regain fiscal autonomy and subvert Parliament, Charles II signed the secret Treaty of Dover with Louis XIV in 1671. Charles agreed that England would join France in war against Holland and that he would publicly convert to Catholicism. In return, Charles received cash from France and the prospect of victory spoils that would solve his debt problem. The treaty, however, threatened the Anglican Church, contradicted Charles II's stated policy of support for Protestant Holland, and provided a source of revenue independent of Parliament.

Moreover, to free the money needed to launch his scheme, Charles stopped servicing many of his debts in an act called the Stop of the Exchequer, and, in Machiavellian fashion, Charles isolated a few bankers to take the loss (Roseveare 1991). The gamble, however, was lost when the English Navy failed to defeat the Dutch in 1672. Charles then avoided a break with Parliament by retreating from Catholicism.

Parliament, however, was also unable to gain the upper hand. From 1679 to 1681, Protestant nobles had Parliament pass acts excluding Charles II's Catholic brother James from succession to the throne. The political turmoil of the Exclusion Crisis created the Whig faction favoring exclusion and the Tory counter-faction opposing exclusion. Even with a majority in Commons, however, the Whigs could not force a reworking of the constitution in their favor because Charles responded by dissolving three Parliaments without giving his consent to the acts.

As a consequence of the stalemate, Charles did not summon Parliament over the final years of his life, and James did succeed to the throne in 1685. Unlike the pragmatic Charles, James II boldly pushed for all of his goals. On the religious front, the Catholic James upset his Anglican allies by threatening the preeminence of the Anglican Church. He also declared that his son and heir would be raised Catholic. On the military front, James expanded the standing army and promoted Catholic officers. On the financial front, he attempted to subvert Parliament by packing it with his loyalists. With a packed Parliament, "the king and his ministers could have achieved practical and permanent independence by obtaining a larger revenue" . By 1688, Tories, worried about the Church of England, and Whigs, worried about the independence of Parliament, agreed that they needed to unite against James II.


The solution became Mary Stuart and her husband, William of Orange. English factions invited Mary and William to seize the throne because the couple was Protestant and Mary was the daughter of James II. The situation, however, had additional drama because William was also the military commander of the Dutch Republic, and, in 1688, the Dutch were in a difficult military position. Holland was facing war with France (the Nine Years War, 1688-97), and the possibility was growing that James II would bring England into the war on the side of France. James was nearing open war with his son-in-law William.

For William and Holland, accepting the invitation and invading England was a bold gamble, but the success could turn England from a threat to an ally. William landed in England with a Dutch army on November 5, 1688 (Israel 1991). Defections in James II's army followed before battle was joined, and William allowed James to flee to France. Parliament took the flight of James II as abdication and the co-reign of William III and Mary II officially replaced him on February 13, 1689. Although Mary had the claim to the throne as James II's daughter, William demanded to be made King and Mary wanted William to have that power. Authority was simplified when Mary's death in 1694 left William the sole monarch.

The deal struck between Parliament and the royal couple in 1688-89 was that Parliament would support the war against France, while William and Mary would accept new constraints on their authority. The new constitution reflected the relative weakness of William's bargaining position more than any strength in Parliament's position. Parliament feared the return of James, but William very much needed England's willing support in the war against France because the costs would be extraordinary and William would be focused on military command instead of political wrangling.

The initial constitutional settlement was worked out in 1689 in the English Bill of Rights, the Toleration Act, and the Mutiny Act that collectively committed the monarchs to respect Parliament and Parliament's laws. Fiscal power was settled over the 1690s as Parliament stopped granting the monarchs the authority to collect taxes for life. Instead, Parliament began regular re-authorization of all taxes, Parliament began to specify how new revenue authorizations could be spent, Parliament began to audit how revenue was spent, and Parliament diverted some funds entirely from the king's control . By the end of the war in 1697, the new fiscal powers of Parliament were largely in place.


The financial and economic importance of the arrangement between William and Mary and Parliament was that the commitments embodied in the constitutional monarchy of the Glorious Revolution were more credible that the commitments under the Restoration constitution (North and Weingast 1989). Essential to the argument is what economists mean by the term credible. If a constitution is viewed as a deal between Parliament and the Crown, then credibility means how believable it is today that Parliament and the king will choose to honor their promises tomorrow. Credibility does not ask whether Charles II reneged on a promise; rather, credibility asks if people expected Charles to renege.


Another lasting change that made the new constitution more credible than the old constitution was that William and his successors were more constrained in fiscal matters. Parliament's growing ‘power of the purse' gave the king less freedom to maneuver a constitutional challenge. Moreover, Parliament's fiscal control increased over time because the new constitution favored Parliament in the constitutional renegotiations that accompanied each succeeding monarch.

As a result, the Glorious Revolution constitution made credible the enduring ascendancy of Parliament. In terms of the king, the new constitution increased the credibility of the proposition that kings would not usurp Parliament.

 

[mona]

The problem here is that we all sound like lunatics when we talk about beliefs. The American religious right is something to fear as is repressive Catholicism/Islam/Zionism etc. If I was to say that I tend towards nature mysticism, I hope it wouldn't sound as if I was dancing naked around neolithic hillforts with Marina Pepper. But I'm not going to say it and so we end up with "we don't do religion" as a Burnley fan said.

 

[Screaming J]

You mean John Reid that many were touting as potential opponent to Gordon Brown as Labour Leader? Then this whole debate is null and void as there's obviously no problem.

I knew of Ann Widdecombe but thought there was a two tier thing that let her in. Didn't know of John (dont call me Selwyn) Gummer or the other one who means nothing to me.

Isn't anyone who is in the Cabinet a Privy Councillor? I also think the Leader of the opposition is. That's why some MPs are called 'Rt Hons' as opposed to just 'Hons'.

Of course some are also called Right other things too, especially on this list - but that is for another thread!