James II was a zealous Catholic, and therefore naturally desired to secure freedom of worship in England for people of his own faith.  In his zeal he went too far, and the Pope expressed his disgust at the King’s foolish rashness.  By the exercise of the Dispensing Power[1] he suspended the Test Act and the Act of Uniformity, in order that Catholics might be relieved from the penalties imposed by these laws, and also for the purpose of giving them civil and military offices, from which the Test Act excluded them (S477).  James also established a new High Commission Court[2] (S488), and made the infamous Judge Jeffreys the head of this despotic tribunal.  This court had the supervision of all churches and institutions of education.  Its main object was to further the spread of Catholicism, and to silence those clergymen who preached against that faith.  The King appointed a Catholic president of Magdalen College, Oxford, and expelled from the college all who opposed the appointment.  Later, he issued two Declarations of Indulgence, 1687, 1688, in which he proclaimed universal religious toleration (S488).  It was generally believed that under cover of these Declarations the King intended to favor the ascendancy of Catholicism.  Seven bishops, who petitioned for the privilege of declining to read the Declarations from their pulpits, were imprisoned, but on their trial were acquitted by a jury in full sympathy with them (S489).

[2] New High Commission Court:  see S19 of this Summary.

These acts by the King, together with the fact that he had greatly increased the standing army, and had stationed it just outside of London, caused great alarm throughout England (S488).  The majority of the people of both political parties (S489) believed that James was plotting to “subverty and extirpate the Protestant religion and the laws and liberties of the kingdom.”

[3] See the language of the Bill of Rights (Constitutional Documents), p. xxxi.

Still, so long as the King remained childless, the nation was encouraged by the hope that James’s daughter Mary might succeed him.  She was known to be a decided Protestant, and she had married William, Prince of Orange, the head of the Protestant Republic of Holland.  But the birth of a son to James (1688) put an end to that hope.  Immediately a number of leading Whigs and Tories (SS479, 490) united in sending an invitation to the Prince of Orange to come over to England with an army to protect Parliament against the King backed by his standing army.

24.  William and Mary; Declaration of Right; Results of the Revolution.