The next thing that needs to be taken into account is Wolsey’s influence on regional councils. At the time it was very hard to control the whole of England as it was so spread out and communication was limited. Like with England’s justice system, Wolsey decided to develop the council of the north and the prince’s council in Ludlow in order to make controlling the outer extremities of England. These councils could deal with serious cases as well as civil cases. Despite the efforts Wolsey put into this idea it was never very effective and was probably a contributing factor to his poor reputation.
The third thing that Wolsey had a lot of responsibility over was finance. This was one of his key responsibilities to the King who spent a lot of money on war and building castles. As well as the funding from customs duties and crown duties Wolsey had to find ways of making sure the King had the money to afford what he wanted. Taxation was the obvious choice for this but in order to tax people Parliament had to be approached and Wolsey had a tendency of not handling parliament very well (also a contributing factor to his bad reputation). Instead, Wolsey introduced a new form of tax called subsidy where the richer people pay more (lasted the whole of the Tudor period). This was followed by the introduction of forced loans which in total raised £350,000 however these were not completely repaid again lowering Wolsey’s popularity. Finally, the last thing he introduced which again made him very unpopular and in fact led to a rebellion was the amicable grant. This was very similar to the forced load but there was no intention of paying the money back. People saw this for what it was as a form of taxation but with no parliamentary support and rebelled. Although Wolsey took full blame, the King still supported him.
Another factor that should be thought about is Wolsey’s role in religion and the church. Wolsey was a member of the clergy so he was very involved in the church. He was also very tolerant and was often prepared to listen to other peoples idea’s as a result of this no one was ever burnt at the steak. He also encouraged education within the church and set up the “Cardinal College”. I t was this sort of enthusiasm and open-mindedness as well as being very hard working that backs up the argument that Wolsey did not deserve his bad reputation. However, this can be overshadowed by the fact that he broke a lot of the rules that he, as a member of the clergy, was supposed to abide by.
Lastly, the way in which Wolsey dealt with the problem of enclosures needs to be taken into account. At the time enclosure was a big problem in rural England and Wolsey dealt with it by recognising it as a result of greed on the part of the landowners. He launched a national enquiry to identify enclosed land and as a result 260 landowners were accused. However there was little practical effect and despite his best efforts to do the right thing Wolsey only made more enemies this time they were the landowners.
In conclusion, I think that it is obvious that Thomas Wolsey’s traditionally bad reputation is in many ways justified as through many of his actions he made enemies. This is especially true of his involvement in finance as it eventually lead to a revolt. However it is equally arguable that he was only acting in the interest of improving things and making life easier for others rather than purposely make them worse. A good example of this is his development of England’s justice system as his primary interests were in making justice more accessible and despite making some enemies he succeeded in doing so.