When the monarchy was abolished

Submitted by Anon on 28 February, 2002 - 11:02

The English Revolution was the first bourgeois revolution of the world. Most people know it was cavaliers against roundheads, parliament versus the crown, Oliver Cromwell versus Charles I. But why? Who did parliament represent - whose interests? And who backed the king, and why?
When we investigate this, we find that different class forces were involved. The following quote about the English civil war is from someone who fought in it:

"A very great part of the knights and gentlemen of England...adhered to the King And most of the tenants of these gentlemen, and also most of the poorest of the people, whom the others call the rabble, did follow the gentry and were for the King. On the Parliament's side were (besides themselves) the smaller part of the gentry in most of the counties, and the greatest part of the tradesmen and freeholders and the middle sort of men, especially in those corporations and counties which depend on such manufactures." (Colonel Baxter: Autobiography)

What Baxter is saying here is that the conflict was between the king and the aristocracy (supported by those most dependent on them) on the one side and the rising middle classes on the other. The English revolution demonstrated the entire strength and determination of the bourgeois class, already grown economically firmly rooted and politically independent. Directly or indirectly, Oliver Cromwell laid the foundations for several trends which re-emerged later in the seventeenth century - a constitutional system in which the head of state had limited power and parliament played a much expanded role, a larger degree of freedom in religion and the creation of a more united British state.

When the growing capitalist class, the poor farmers and craftsmen, led by Cromwell, shattered the system of feudalism, and executed Charles I in the process, reigning monarchs and ruling nobilities everywhere saw the pattern of future history unfolding. The English Revolution broke the barriers to man's advance and allowed the capitalist class to open the road leading to modern large-scale industry. Because of these developments, it provided the basis on which, for the first time, a new class, the working class, began to grow, to organise and to challenge the prevailing system of society. The revolution we are building today is the next stage on: capitalism, at first progressive, in so far as it led the way for technical advance, has developed to the point limited by its own structure. It became, as feudalism was before it, a barrier to the further advance of man. It ceased to serve a useful purpose. The working class now goes forward to put an end to capitalism and to build Socialism. The English Revolution set this train of historic events in motion.

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