Monarchy to a Republic and back 1603 – 1685
Sexby was articulating the views of the ordinary soldiers. They knew that many of those that owned the land had got it by being soldiers for the King and had received it for being victorious in battle, or at least their forefathers had. These soldiers had defeated the King in battle so why shouldn’t the land be theirs, with everything that went with it including the right to vote in elections? They did not demand the land, which really would have sparked off a revolution, but they did demand the right to vote. Without such a just cause there was no morality in their participation in the war. The Levellers challenged the notion that political rights went with the land. They argued that the two were separate. That the people had rights. Cromwell dismissed this argument describing the people as having “no interest but the interest of breathing”.
The Army council reassembled on the 29 October 1647 to discuss The Agreement of the People. Cromwell faced his most powerful opponent in Colonel Thomas Rainsborough, the highest-ranking officer to oppose him. The discussion started with legal wrangling but eventually the first clause of the Agreement which called for equal size constituencies was read. Debate began.
Henry Ireton protested:
“The words were unclear. Did they mean that everyone would have the vote, or simply that the people who now had the vote would be more equally represented by fairly drawn constituency boundaries?”
Maximilian Petty answered him: “We judge that all inhabitants that have not lost their birthright should have an equal voice in elections”.
Colonel Rainsborough in a historic speech gave the definitive answer to Petty:
“For really I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live, as the greatest he; and therefore truly, Sir, I think it’s clear, that every man that is to live under a government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government; and I do think that the poorest man in England is not bound in a strict sense to that government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under…”
