Ship money and Hampden's case
Charles declared that he must find some way to pay for the government. In 1634 he tried, with disastrous results, to levy a new tax. There were precedents showing that, in return for the navy's protection, the coastal towns had fitted out ships in wartime or paid a sum called 'ship money' to strengthen the fleet. In 1635 Charles, without precedent, demanded this money from all the towns of England in time of peace, and rightly said that he would spend it on repairing ships and protecting England's trade in the Channel against piracy. Many people opposed the new tax. A man named John Hampden refused to pay, in order to test its legality, and although he was prosecuted he was not jailed. Hampden was a wealthy gentleman of Buckinghamshire (the source's wording is garbled here, and this is the likely meaning) and was not counted among agitators; he was a quiet man and, in the words of the royalist Clarendon, 'a very grave and wise' person, who hid firmness of opinion under courtesy and leadership under modesty.
His trial, long delayed, took place in November 1637. The king's judges cited precedents for ship money and held that in time of danger the king had the right to ask for aid without summoning Parliament. Hampden's counsel answered that no necessity had arisen, that the king had time to call Parliament, and that forced collection of money was contrary to the Petition of Right, which the king had accepted. The judges voted for the king, seven to five, but the people sided with Hampden and doubted the impartiality of judges who feared the king's anger. Hampden was set free after a time. Charles kept collecting ship money until 1639 and spent the greater part of it on building ships. (The source says these ships fought victoriously against the Dutch in 1625, a date that cannot be right, since the money was raised after 1635.)
Scotland and the Prayer Book
Meanwhile Charles made mistakes over Scotland. By marrying a Catholic and imposing bishops on the Presbyterian clergy he angered the Presbyterian Scots. Then by an 'Act of Revocation' he ordered that all church or crown lands given to Scottish families since the accession of 'Mary Stuart' (as the source puts it; the date given is 1625) should be taken back, which alarmed the Scottish nobles. He next named five bishops and an archbishop, John Spottiswoode, to the Scottish privy council and made Spottiswoode Lord Chancellor (1635), the first clergyman to hold that office since the Reformation. After much exasperating delay, when he came to Scotland to be crowned he allowed the bishops to conduct the Anglican service in a form close to Catholic ceremony, with special vestments, lighted candles and the kissing of the cross.
The Scottish bishops, resolved to show their power over the Presbyterian clergy, drew up a series of rules of worship which, once corrected and approved by the Archbishop of Canterbury, were called 'Laud's canons'. They gave the king authority in all church matters, forbade clerical assemblies except by the king's order, limited the right to teach to those licensed by a bishop, and reserved the ministry to those who accepted the canons. Charles approved them and ordered them made known in every Scottish church. The Presbyterian ministers protested that half of the Reformation had been undone and declared that Charles meant to put England and Scotland back under Rome.
When an attempt was made at St. Giles' church in Edinburgh to hold worship in the new form, a riot broke out and people threw sticks and stones at the minister. A woman named Jenny Geddes hurled her stool at him and cried, 'You foul thief, would you say mass at my ear?' Petitions from all classes asking for the canons to be withdrawn were handed to Charles, but he thought such petitions treasonable. It was now that Scotland took the lead in revolt against the king.
The Covenant and the Bishops' Wars
On 28 February 1638, representatives of the clergy and the people of Scotland signed a National Covenant at Edinburgh, pledging to keep the Presbyterian faith and worship and to defend the king and the 'true religion'. Almost the whole of Scotland, urged on by the clergy, followed the Covenant. Spottiswoode and all but four of the bishops fled to England. The General Assembly at Glasgow rejected all bishops and declared the Scottish church separate from the state. Charles ordered the members to disperse and threatened to charge them with treason, but they went on sitting. Charles raised an army of twenty-one thousand, mostly without enthusiasm, and marched toward Scotland, whereas the Covenanters had gathered twenty-six thousand men, all roused by religious and patriotic feeling. When the two armies faced each other, Charles agreed to refer the matter to a Parliament and a free Scottish church assembly. A truce was signed on 18 June 1639, and the 'first Bishops' War' ended without bloodshed. But the new assembly at Edinburgh confirmed the 'treasonable' acts of the Glasgow assembly, and the Scottish Parliament approved its measures. Both sides prepared for a second Bishops' War.
Strafford and the Short Parliament
In this crisis Charles called to his help a man who was as strong-willed and exact as the king was wavering and ineffective. His name was Thomas Wentworth. He had entered Parliament at twenty-one (1614) and had often voted against the king. By making him president of the Council of the North, Charles drew his attention, and he rewarded Wentworth's work in carrying out the royal policy by taking him into the privy council and sending him to Ireland as his deputy (1632), where his effective and ruthless policy rooted out disorder and imposed a forced peace. In 1639 he was made Earl of Strafford and became Charles's chief adviser. He advised the king to raise a great army, scatter the Covenanters and build an irresistible force against a defiant Parliament. But raising such an army cost huge sums and was impossible without Parliament's vote. Charles had to call a fourth Parliament.
When this 'Short Parliament' met on 13 April 1640, Charles showed the members a letter, written by the Covenanters to Louis XIII, that had fallen into the hands of English agents. Since it asked help of the French king, Charles said that he had the right to raise an army against such treason. John Pym, who had secretly corresponded with the Covenanters, concluded that their quarrel with the king was like Parliament's quarrel with Charles, and so he urged Parliament to refuse the king money and ally with the Scots. Charles dissolved the Short Parliament for treason. Riots broke out in London, and a crowd attacked the palace of Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury; not finding him, they killed a Catholic man who had refused to attend a Protestant service.
Charles marched toward Scotland with an army hastily gathered. The Scots came forward to the border, defeated the English (20 August 1640) and occupied the north of England. The poor king agreed to pay them 850 pounds a day (the book's figure) until a satisfactory treaty was made, but unable to find the money he left the Scottish army encamped around Newcastle as the firm ally of the English Parliament against the king. Bewildered, Charles invited a number of nobles to meet him at York. They told him that his power was crumbling and that he must find a way to make peace with his enemies. And so for the last time he called Parliament, which this time proved the longest and most eventful in English history.
The Long Parliament opens
The Long Parliament met at Westminster on 3 November 1640. It had about five hundred members, 'the flower of good families and educated lay people,' an aristocratic and un-national body that represented the wealthy more than ordinary people, but plainly represented the future and opposed the past. Most members of the Short Parliament, bent on revenge, were there. Selden, Hampden and Pym sat in it, and Oliver Cromwell, though he led no group, was a distinctive figure in that company.
At this distance it is hard to judge him impartially, because historians since his day have called him a hypocritical and ambitious man or a saintly statesman. A character like his may well have held all the opposite qualities that produced such different assessments, and perhaps at times managed to harmonize them. This explanation may help in understanding Cromwell.