Everything about Council Of State England totally explained
The English
Council of State, later also know as the
Protector's Privy Council, was first appointed by the
Rump Parliament on
14 February 1649 after the execution of King
Charles I.
Charles's execution on
30 January was delayed for several hours so that the House of Commons could pass an emergency bill to make it an offence to proclaim a new King and to declare the representatives of the people, the House of Commons, as the source of all just power. This in effect abolished the Monarchy and the House of Lords.
The Council of State was appointed by Parliament on
14 February and
15 February 1649, with further annual elections. The Council's duties were to act as the Executive of the country's government in place of the King and the
Privy Council. It was to direct domestic and foreign policy and to ensure the security of the
English Commonwealth. Due to the disagreements between the
New Model Army and the weakened Parliament it was dominated by the Army.
The Council held its first meeting on
17 February 1649 "with in the chair". This meeting was quite rudimentary, "some 14 members" attending, barely more than the legal quorum of nine out of forty-one councillors elected by Parliament. The first elected president of the council, appointed on
12 March, was
John Bradshaw who had been the President of the Court at
the trial of Charles I and the
first to sign the King's death warrant.
The members of the first council were the Earls of
Denbigh, Mulgrave,
Pembroke,
Salisbury, Lords
Grey and
Fairfax,
Lisle, Rolle,
Oliver St. John, Wilde,
Bradshaw,
Cromwell,
Skippon,
Pickering, Masham,
Haselrig,
Harrington,
Vane jun,
Danvers, Armine,
Mildmay,
Constable, Pennington, Wilson,
Whitelocke, Martin,
Ludlow, Stapleton,
Hevingham,
Wallop,
Hutchinson,
Bond, Popham,
Valentine Walton,
Scot,
Purefoy,
Jones.
At the start of
the Protectorate, ten days after the dissolution of the Rump Parliament on
April 20 1653, Cromwell told the Council that it no longer existed and together with the
Council of Officers, instituted a new Council of State. With the failure of the
Barebones Parliament, the Council was re-modelled with the
Instrument of Government to become something much closer to the old
Privy Council advising the
Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell. Constitutionally between thirteen and twenty-one councillors were elected by Parliament to advise the Protector, who was also elected by Parliament. In reality Cromwell relied on the Army for support and chose his own councillors.
The replacement constitution of 1657, the pseudo-monarchical
Humble Petition and Advice, authorised 'His Highness the Lord Protector'; to choose twenty-one Councillors and the power to nominate his successor. Cromwell recommended his eldest surviving son
Richard Cromwell, who was proclaimed the successor on his father's death on
September 3,
1658 and legally confirmed in the position by the newly elected
Third Protectorate Parliament on
January 27,
1659.
After the reinstatement of the Rump Parliament (
May 7,
1659) and the subsequent abolition of the position of Lord Protector, the role of the Council of State along with other
interregnum institutions becomes confused as the instruments of state started to implode. The Council of State wasn't dissolved until
28 May 1660, when King Charles II personally assumed the government in London.
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