Which of These Reasons Do You Think Are Most Important in Bringing About the Collapse of Relations Between King and Parliament?

Which of these reasons do you think are most important in bringing about the collapse of relations between King and Parliament?

Even though at first, Parliament was very keen about cooperating and working with the King, Charles did not want Parliament to interfere with anything. This shortly caused the relationship between Parliament and the King to drastically fall apart. There were five main reasons for the cause of this relationship to turn sour.

Which of these reasons do you think are most important in bringing about the collapse of relations between King and Parliament?

Even though at first, Parliament was very keen about cooperating and working with the King, Charles did not want Parliament to interfere with anything. This shortly caused the relationship between Parliament and the King to drastically fall apart. There were five main reasons for the cause of this relationship to turn sour.

Firstly, Charles' 1st Parliament was met by the failure of the foreign policy. Parliament began to criticise Buckingham because they felt that the subsidies were not being paid correctly. Charles became furious with this as he saw this as a criticism to himself. Criticising Buckingham is also criticising the royal prerogative and therefore criticising the king. A successful foreign policy would have done Charles a great favour. It would have certainly spiked the guns of the Commons. However, his foreign policy was a complete disaster. Mansfield's expedition to Northern Europe was a failure as was an attempted attack on Cadiz in October 1625. Also part of the navy was used to support an attack on the French Protestants at La Rochelle who were being besieged by Richelieu's forces. Many people could not understand why a Protestant naval force was assisting a Catholic army in attempting to defeat another Protestant force.

Secondly, Charles believed that the money from custom farms was his right as king. Charles decided that he would collect tonnage and poundage from the start of his reign. This gave the new monarch a financially sound start to their reign but it also set the mark that it was Parliament that granted it - a sign of the authority Parliament believed it had in 1625 to restrain financial royal excesses. Charles ordered the collection of tonnage and poundage and assumed that Parliament's support for this would naturally follow. Right from the start of his reign he misunderstood the relationship Parliament believed it had with the king. Parliament therefore, instead of being resentful towards the king, decided to use this moment to make the point that tonnage and poundage was like a gift. They decided to vote it to Charles for one year only. However, it was most certainly to end disastrously for Charles.

In Charles' 1st Parliament, many members were opposed to his marriage to Henrietta Maria, a Roman Catholic, fearing that Charles would lift restrictions on Roman Catholics and undermine the official establishment of Protestantism. Although he stated to Parliament that he would not relax restrictions relating to recusants, he promised to do exactly that in a secret marriage treaty with Louis 18th of France. Furthermore, the price of marriage with the French Catholic was a promise of English aid for the French crown in the suppressing of the Protestant Huguenots at La Rochelle, and so reversing England's long held position in the French Wars of Religion. Henrietta became a huge threat to many people and this came to concern. She was a potential threat to the English Church as she was Catholic, therefore undermining the Protestantism of the King. However, Charles tried to influence Parliament that this was not the case but Parliament could see the wood for the trees.

In March 1629, Charles arrested nine members of the Commons for offences against the state. This action by the King made him more unpopular with the people than he already was. Charles defended his action by stating his belief in his own divine right saying that 'Princes are not bound to give account of their actions, but to God alone.' Charles tried to influence