Royal Authority's Decline in The Years 1589 to 1603: Its Extent, Context and Influence

To what extent did royal authority decline in the years 1589 to 1603? In the years 1589 to 1603 royal authority irrefutably declined, with the belief of a large proportion of the general public being that Elizabeth’s previously-claimed “heart and stomach of a king” were indeed succumbing to the “body of a weak and feeble woman.” Age had tarnished the ‘Gloriana’, and in some areas this once authoritative majesty seemed on the brink – especially in regards to the drastic social unrest, brought about by the bad harvests of 1597 and 1598, and mass unchecked inflation. However, this royal authority had by no means been eradicated and opposition was still dealt with swiftly – if anything, with greater force than before, given Elizabeth’s growing irascibility – evidenced by her ‘Golden’ answer to the Parliament of 1601 and the loyalty of the authorities in displacing Essex’s Rebellion. Thus while it had declined to a large extent over her long forty-five years as monarch, the preservation of prerogative (despite concessions over monopolies – a pragmatic response which did not necessarily undermine it) and her ability to arrest any challenges (such as the persistent nuisance Wentworth) proved that royal power was still the highest authority in the land.

Undeniably, the death of many of her key ministers dealt a crippling blow to her royal authority – one from which it never truly recovered, with the weaker replacements of Cecil junior and the disastrous Essex – as these administrators were crucial to enforcing her will. With Mildmay’s passing in 1589 and Hatton’s in 1591, Elizabeth not only lost skilled implementers of her policies, but also the puppeteers which had plucked the strings of the Commons. Burghley’s illness ensured he was confined to a lesser role for the 1590s, while Leicester had died earlier in 1588: into this political vacuum surged the quick-tempered Essex and Robert Cecil, who had been groomed for the role of his father. Robert, Secretary of State from 1596, was politically adept and may have manipulated Parliament successfully given the right support, but as AGR Smith describes it, his colleagues were “mediocrities”, thus he was hamstrung in a way that the combined might of Knollys, Mildmay and Hatton never had been. This served to undermine Elizabeth’s royal authority, as without the ability to keep the MPs in check – other than the much-resorted-to prerogative – she had a lesser role in implementing legislation. Certainly, royal approval still remained the final stage, but there no longer existed powerful enough servants through which her authority could manipulate the Speaker and generally direct the course of sessions. Furthermore, the arrival of Robert and Essex in the Privy Council upset the balance of a once successful and cohesive mechanism, as factionalism came to the fore as it never had previously. While this was potentially a major issue for Elizabeth’s authority – as the Council was often the device through which her effective policies could be crafted and, in some cases, taken to Parliament – she managed to largely limit its destructiveness, showing one of the rare glimmers of powerful royal authority which remained in this later stage. Through the reward of patronage she was able to curtail Essex’s greedy ambition, offering up key positions such as Master of the Court of Wards to Cecil in 1599, and essentially isolating any real power from Essex and his faction (to some degree amending the poor judgement that had brought him into her inner ring.) The arrival of these new ministers does, incontestably, represent an undermining of Elizabeth’s royal authority, on Cecil’s behalf through the huge political vacuum he was endeavouring to fill, and on Essex’s due to his recklessness and introduction of disuniting factionalism. However, Robert Cecil was still a skilled administrator and able to carry out Elizabeth’s will, and her careful management of the Essex wildcard allowed her to retain authority over her Council.

However, arguably her limitation of patronage to Leicester backfired, as it was one of the many factors which led to his 1601 rebellion. His march through London was the ultimate attempt to defy royal authority – to usurp the Queen – yet the fact that it was so unsuccessful gives credence to the remnants of her authority; tarnished as it was, in moments of crisis it appeared to shine still. It could be said that Elizabeth no longer possessed the authority to keep her ministers in check, which was true to some degree – her age had tampered with her temperament and made her much more forgiving of her favourites. Perhaps if Essex had sat beside a younger Elizabeth, his constant disobeying would have robbed him of his ranks swiftly rather than allowing him to explode into rebellion. That thought aside, Essex’s Rebellion did not truly challenge royal authority. Williams described it as “the visible tip of a larger range of discontent”, but although there was severe discontent over socio-economic conditions, Essex’s attempt was by no means linked to this; it was the last desperate roll of the dice by an unstable man on the brink of destruction. That it only lasted twelve hours proves how little challenge it presented. Furthermore, it was far less of a display than the 1569 Northern Rebellion had been, and so possibly it showed that not only did Elizabeth’s royal authority resurface in the face of crisis, but also that the true core of it had not been diminished. (Of course the alternative argument is that Elizabeth in her final years would not have survived a more rational rebellion.) Nevertheless, the persisting loyalty of the masses, and most importantly the London authorities ensured that her royal authority remained strong in the face of opposition and thus had not declined beyond redemption.

The real test to royal authority, though, was the growing socio-economic crisis which afflicted the last years of her reign. Bad harvest failures in 1597 and 1598, the consequent eighty percent rise in corn prices, a death rate estimated at around six percent and the lowest real wages since before the Black Death all ensured that this was the most dangerous threat to royal authority. After all, it was a socio-economic based rebellion (Kett’s in 1549) which had helped secure Somerset’s downfall. The fact that Elizabeth’s regime was able to weather this storm is not sufficient evidence to claim her royal authority was strong, or that it really persisted – more that it endured. Riots broke out in London, Oxfordshire and Norfolk but luckily for Elizabeth they did not amount to any popular threat; similarly the Oxfordshire ‘Rising’ only amassed four people. While this in itself was no threat (though by the brutal consequences for the ‘rebels’ one would think it had almost toppled the Tudors) it revealed the potential for catastrophic crisis and vast social upheaval; the “larger range of discontent” that Williams noted. Some credit must be given to the Crown and her ministers for the successful social legislation – the Poor Law Acts of 1598 and 1601, and the Act for the Punishment of Rogues (the defender of the realm against a supposed vagrant epidemic) – which lessened the consequences of this social unrest and went some way to combatting it. However, it failed to reach the root of the problem – inflation, for example. Thus the socio-economic crisis in the last years of her reign did not cause a decline in royal authority, though it had the biggest potential to; neither did it show any great strengths of her authority, as the legislation was largely buoyed by luck that various accounts of rioting did not amass a popular rebellion, a test which it is doubtful whether the somewhat diminished power of Elizabeth would have been able to handle.

The decline in authority over Parliament had arisen through a loss in her key puppeteers, and was compounded by the war with Spain (and to some extent the trouble in Ireland) which forced the Crown into a dangerous reliance on subsidies. However, the debate and outcome of the 1998 and 1601 Parliaments should not be seen as an eradication of her authority, nonetheless it showed some decline. Her need for extraordinary revenue gave the MPs a voice they had previously not possessed – her powers of prerogative in proroguing and dismissing Parliament was hamstrung by the need for finance, and the loss of her Commons councillors gave the MPs a greater freedom in debating matters of their own interest. Monopolies were the main cause of discontent, and while Elizabeth had to concede to their demands in terms of cancelling some and promising to investigate, she retained her prerogative (prerogative being the epitome of her authority) through compromise. Her royal authority had previously been shown through her imprisonment of Wentworth in 1593 for challenging this prerogative, a sign that it was still very much in existence. Furthermore, her 1601 Golden Speech granted her the subsidy she had requested, proving that through the power of her personality she could still enforce her will and control her people, and that the rapidly fading majesty of the ‘Gloriana’ could be resurrected when most needed.

In conclusion, Elizabeth’s authority had inevitably declined with age and the loss of many of her skilled administrators. She had been forced to compromise in Parliament, and the dire socio-economic conditions had reached crisis level – however, as nothing disastrous ever amounted from this, her authority was never really tested (the futility of the Essex Rebellion was swiftly crushed). When faced with opposition, though, her majesty did resurface and she was able to enforce her will – whether through the unquestionable nature of prerogative (the very survival of which proves her authority had not declined too drastically) evidenced with the imprisonment of the leader of the so-called “Puritan Choir”, or her strong personality, such as with the Golden Speech of 1601. Thus while her royal authority cannot be said to have remained as potent as it was in her early reign, it would be similarly incorrect to suggest that it had declined to a point where it was, in any way, matched by another power in England.