Studies Of Political Changes In English Towns, 1485-1640

Before the Reformation urban politics had the political nature of community, the relationship among burgesses was simple and electing officials was more transparent. Social orders in towns relied mainly on the Church and the guilds. In this process, religionary culture plays a vital role. Externally, urban politics were more closed and passive, and their relationship with lords and kings were not intimate.The English Reformation which sprang up in the 1530s made a great impact to towns. The Reformation which happened in the reign of Henry VIII and Edward VI destroyed monasteries, kings confiscated and redistributed the land of the church and political and economic power that was attached to the land. From then on, it had a more significant changes in urban economical, social and cultural life and urban politics. Economically, the properties which belonged to Church were put on the market, the town was also involved in the acquisition, to some extent encouraged the town to sought more political and economic rights. At the same time part of the town met the challenges from outside, the external purchasers of the church properties which stood in towns proclaim their rights in the properties. With urban economy improving, the Lords of the town who was not concerned with towns reclaim the rights not being mentioned for many years. In daily life, the previous parts which had close ties with the Catholic had been eliminated, such changes to the urban social order at the time caused a negative impact. In order to safeguard the vested interests, towns sought support from kings, urban autonomy had been extended widely. Cities and towns resolved these challenges through a variety of formal and informal channels, such as the legal avenues and patronage.The rise of urban oligarchy followed the scale of the system of autonomy, the urban politics of community changed into oligarchy, whether in electing officials or political rules of procedure, most people were excluded. In this process, there had impulsion for urban politics that identity crises emerged among burgesses to new authority and town governments. There was conflict between two kinds of political value in urban political life. Traditional civil political values conceive that there was no difference between the town officials and other burgesses, it was just their turn to serve and make common wealth to towns for these officials. The new political value favored efficiency, it requested that the core of town government should be as small as possible, because it was the only way to reduce the argument to obtain high efficiency, such political values inevitably required power concentrated in a few hands. Traditional political values were the open government to all citizens, and the new political values excluded the majority of people. In this process, the town government gradually established their own authority through various means, such as changing the original church ceremonies and festivals, utilization of tangible City Hall, Mayoral mace, and portraits, etc. For exclusive political growing strong, burgesses gave different degrees of resistance, and oligarchy had been established in the process of conflict and coordination. Urban political changes reflected the public view of the authority:authority was recognized only under the premise that the rights and obligations should coexist to protect the common wealth. This concept was particularly important because it was a basic political trends, that determine the city or even the trend of political activities associated with towns.The development of urban politics was very important for the House of Commons in particular. The Commons were mainly composed of representatives from the city and borough, and the relationship between the Commons and towns was particularly close. With the development of urban politics, the strength of the Commons gradually grew stronger in the late Tudor, and in England, the House of Lords declined and the House of Commons rose, which was significant to the politics of Kingdom. About Demands on regality, from Queen Elizabeth's patience to the tough of the two kings of the early Stuart, the Commons gave recognition and resistance respectively reflecting the basic position of the Commons:rights and obligations coexisted, monarchical power was not infinite. This was also an important reason why the rise of monarchy couldn't change into absolute power.Through the above study, this theme will eventually clarify the following points:the years from 1485 to 1640 were a stage of re-integration of English urban politics, under the impetus of the Reformation, English urban politics in the outer and in the inner had changed great. Outside, there had been large-scale self-government, and more closed and insular urban politics gradually changed into a more participatory and open politics. Inside, the informal association of politics of community transformed to the formal Oligarchy, and the more open and transparent political gave way to the strongly exclusive politics. In this process, the new municipal authority had faced the internal and external challenges. Externally, the urban obtained approval and support from central government through formal and informal channels. Internally, in the process of coordination and conflict with burgesses, the urban governments gradually got their approval by changing the style of political and cultural life. And then, urban government was more appropriate to resolve the town's identity crises both inside and outside to make the urban social order stabilized. Throughout this process, the concept of authority among burgesses was reflected and strengthened, and the pro-active efforts of municipal government and its return promoted the development of urban politics in England. The development enhanced the urban residents' sense of national identity, and expanded the strength of burgesses in the transition period, being helpful to limit the expansion of monarchical power, and setting the tone for the political transition in Early Modern England.