"Parliaments are the best preservers of the rights of this kingdom": Laud, 'absolutism', and the mixed constitution
The commemoration of the Royal Martyr is an appropriate occasion on which to reflect on the oft-repeated suggestion that the Laudians supported 'absolutism'. Leaving aside the fact that 'absolutism' is a notoriously ill-defined term, it may be rather more appropriately applied to some later Enlightenment monarchs who rejected the checks and balances provided by traditional communal and corporate institutions which early modern monarchies such as the Stuarts necessarily relied upon. I have previously pointed to a High Church vision of constitutional order with a mixed polity, derived from Hooker, flowing Lancelot Andrewes, through the Laudians, and into the 18th century. Indeed, Waterland's 1723 Restoration Day sermon and Swift's 1725 Royal Martyr Day sermon illustrate how this commitment to a Hookerian mixed constitution found expression in High Church critique of the Personal Rule. What, however, of Laud himself, so often associated with the accusation o...