by Bertie Radcliffe

Created on: March 09, 2009

When deciding whether the nature of the relationship between Elizabeth I and her parliaments, what needs to be established is whether the frequency and seriousness of parliamentary dissent was greater than that of parliamentary acquiescence.

Firstly, the traditionalist view of parliament is that it was a consciously trouble-making body with an organised agenda to erode monarchical powers and sowed the first seeds of civil war. An inherent problem of hindsight is that it causes some events to be exaggerated because of a later result, and much of traditionalist argument, such as Elizabeth's dislike of a settlement that was overly protestant, have been disproved by modern historians. Although this is the case, it does not detract from the fact that there was some genuine confrontation between Elizabeth and her Parliament. This conflict can be divided into two areas: the areas of conflict on Parliamentary privileges and liberties and the instances where action was taken by any of the three powers to block legislature.

The debate on privileges was a small but notable one, and represents part of the larger tussle for power between the monarch and her parliaments. The best example of the battle for these privileges was the Strickland case of 1571. When William Strickland introduced a bill to the Commons implementing reform to the Book of Common Prayer, the Privy Council, at the behest of the queen, ordered him not to attend. This provoked uproar, and the Crown was unable to prevent a Member from attending Parliament because of an offence inside it. This caused Elizabeth to treat such situations with greater care and when Peter Wentworth intended to move for a settlement of succession in 1593, he was promptly arrested for offences outside parliament and thus not covered by privilege. This tension and attempted arrest is a clear display of one of the areas of conflict between Elizabeth and her Parliaments.

Arguably, though, the main source of contention was the matter of Parliamentary Liberties. This area of conflict was largely concerned with what Graves describes as "novel restraints" placed upon parliament by Elizabeth.
Elizabeth
insisted that her marriage, succession and foreign policy were prerogative matters, and as such was unwilling to allow discussion of them in the Commons. The problem with this stance lay in the fact that these were precisely the issues which concerned many loyal, responsible members of the governing class. This situation was exacerbated by

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