Identify and explain what affected the power of Elizabeth I between 1558 and 1603.

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Identify and explain what affected the power of Elizabeth I between 1558 and 1603.

   During Elizabeth I’s accession, her name was greeted as a true sovereign ‘of no mingled blood of Spaniard, or stranger, but born mere English here among us.’  Elizabeth saw it as her mission to unite a divided people living in a state of complete turmoil, and she came to embody a truly national consciousness with such success that she gave her name to an age. However, the traditional picture of Elizabeth’s reign as a great age for both the Queen and the English nation contains only some truth – by the end of her reign there was conflict and opposition with the parliament and other European powers, as well as financial instability. There were various issues throughout her reign which both waned and augmented the power of the monarch, namely her relationship with parliament, her expectation to marry, the succession problem, and the issue of England’s official religion.
  Elizabeth had sought to resolve the extreme hostilities between the Catholics and Protestants that her predecessor Mary had created. Both Elizabeth and Cecil
‘held religion to be the matter of conscience’  – she felt that religion had to be settled within England by dissolving papal and Spanish dominance. Elizabeth’s Religious Settlement of 1559 set aside Mary’s restored Catholicism in favour of a form of moderate Protestantism, and was an honest attempt to rule England at religious peace and compromise whilst bringing as many as possible into the fold. Elizabeth introduced the ‘Act of Supremacy’ which reduced the pope’s influence and ascertained her as governor of the Church of England, rather than the supreme head – neither extreme religion would accept a woman as the head of Church. Another aspect of the Religious Settlement was the ‘Act of Uniformity’, which was Elizabeth’s attempt to ensure that as many believers as possible could find salvation. It required the use of a Book of Common Prayer in all churches and provided a system of punishment for those who failed to use it or publicly objected to it.
  However, Elizabeth’s Religious Settlement did not necessarily diminish the threat posed by religion, particularly Catholicism. On the death of Mary and accession of Elizabeth, many Protestants returned from mainland Europe where they had fled under the reign of Mary. They returned in full expectation that they were returning to a state where Protestantism was the one and only tolerated religion. However, many Catholics had also remained in England on Elizabeth’s accession because of the conciliatory tone she had taken on religious issues. Elizabeth’s Religious Settlement failed to satisfy both the Catholic and Protestant extremes of society. When assessing the threat of Catholicism to the Elizabethan Church and state, it is essential to distinguish between Roman Catholics and English Catholics.
 The Roman Catholics’ remained loyal to the Pope and a minority engaged in treasonable activities, whereas the English Catholics who formed the majority were loyal to Elizabeth. Despite many becoming recusants after 1570, they never really presented a threat to either the Queen’s person or her Church.
  Furthermore, apart from the Northern Rebellion, Elizabeth faced no major uprising in support of Catholicism. The plots surrounding Mary Stuart were concerning but formed part of the evidence that Catholicism was simply the religious veneer given to treason. Whilst those adhering to the traditional Catholic religion heavily outnumbered Protestants, and whilst Elizabeth’s claim to the throne was disputed by Catholics, Elizabeth did not wish to alienate the Catholic powers. Elizabeth faced the aggressive anti-Catholicism of her most loyal supporters and key members of the Privy Council, and her approach to the religious challenge was dictated by her view of her political needs. The sense of threat was compounded by deteriorating relations with Catholic Spain, by the presence of Mary Stuart, by the Queen’s childlessness, and that in many areas of England; Protestantism was unwelcome from the start of Elizabeth’s reign. Nevertheless, Elizabeth responded to the situation in a collected manner and refused to accept policies of unmitigated harshness towards Catholicism, as she realised this would have caused more opposition. Her Religious Settlement encouraged conformity via penalties for refusing to attend Anglican services. The penalties were worth avoiding but were not excessively harsh; instead it was time and usage that would cut the ties binding her people to traditional Catholicism.
  Catholicism presented a threat to Elizabeth’s power because it threatened to undermine everything Elizabeth had achieved and what she stood for. The arrival of Mary Queen of Scots’ in 1568 united in Elizabeth all of the worst nightmares of English foreign policy – she was a Catholic rival contender for the throne and a focus for the traditional Anti-English alliance of Scotland and France. Recognition of Mary’s claim would have jeopardised England’s

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future political independence and its official Protestant religion. Elizabeth and her parliament were obviously concerned about this, for example, the Ridolfi Plot of 1571 was discovered and parliament demanded the execution of Mary or at least her removal from succession. However, Elizabeth did not feel that Mary and the threat to revert religion was enough to damage her power – she was content with the fact that attention had been brought to the fact that Mary was unable and unworthy of the crown, which in turn strengthened Elizabeth’s power because it gave her the initiative. Furthermore, the Throckmorton Plot of ...

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