Government

Bullet Point One

The Development of the Tudor governmental machine, 15 36-15 53: privy council, finance, local control and Parliament

The nature and exercise of royal power

•      Ruled dei gratia or by the will of God

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•      This view was supported and maintained by the Church (through the pulpit) 

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•      Rebellion against the monarch was regarded as rebellion against God

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•      Therefore, treason was regarded as a serious crime

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•      The rebellion in which Mary I took the throne is the only one to succeed – due to the legality of her

•      situation

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•      The importance of law and the legal structure

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•      The monarch was expected to protect and enforce the laws of the kingdom

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•      Rex is Lex and Lex is Rex - the king is the law and the law is the king

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•      The monarch could not ignore or break the law – they were expected to behave within the accepted

•      structure

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•      Their powers included: raising troops, waging war, concluding peace, conducting foreign affairs,

•      summoning and dissolving parliament, pardoning offenders, managing coinage, arranging the marriage

•      of members of the royal family

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•      These political, military and economic powers were known as royal prerogative

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•      The monarch could not: levy taxes, make laws at will, set aside the rights of the subject or behave as a

•      tyrant – they had to respect the believe that everyone within the kingdom were bound by the common

•      ‘weal’ or good

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•      There had to be a balance between the rights and duty of the monarch and their subject

The extent to which royal power increased
in the aftermath of the Henrcian Reformation
and the measures taken to secure and maintain royal power

Financial Gain

•      The crown gained financially at various stages of the Reformation, for example, the clergy paid a fine of £119,000 to be pardoned of praemunire in February 15 31.

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•      Even when the crown was not directly benefiting, the religious changes increased the wealth of the English church, for example with the banning of payment of annates to Rome in the First Act of Annates of 15 32, confirmed in the Second Act of Annates in January 15 34, and in the same month, with the Act to Stop Peter’s Pence, which ended the payment of taxation to Rome. 

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•      By December 15 34, however, the Act for First Fruits and Tenths saw that these particular taxes went to the King and not the Pope. 

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•      The Act for Dissolution of Lesser Monasteries…