Bringing together essays from nine established parliamentary scholars, the volume offers new insights and reflections on the management and importance of Parliaments for the effective and smooth running of the state during the Tudor and early Stuart period.

Notes on Contributors

1. Introduction
Chris R. Kyle

2. Anticlericalism and the Early Tudor Parliament
P.R. Cavill

3. Staging the Settlement: Shekhar Kapur and the Parliament of 1559
David Dean

4. William Cecil, Lord Burghley, and Managing with the Men-of-Business
Norman Jones

5. Foreign Policy and the Parliament of 1576
Glyn Parry

6. The Earl of Essex and Elizabethan Parliaments
Paul E.J. Hammer

7. The Development of Parliamentary Privilege, 1604–29
Paul M. Hunneyball

8. ‘Wrangling Lawyers’: Proclamations and the Management of the English Parliament of 1621
Chris R. Kyle

9. Preaching and English Parliaments in the 1620s
Lori Anne Ferrell

10. The Street Theatre of State: The Ceremonial Opening of Parliament, 1603–60
Jason Peacey

Index

Michael Graves has done much to define ideas of management in Tudor Parliaments. From the role of the Privy Council to parliamentary ‘men-of-business’ and the career of Thomas Norton, Graves has opened up new avenues that relay the importance of systematic, planned management of parliamentary sessions. Managing Tudor and Stuart Parliaments takes Graves’ work as a springboard for discussion that then moves well beyond the narrow confines of the Palace of Westminster chambers, to examine how sermons, state openings, patrons, procedure, foreign policy and individuals were all deployed by the government and members of the Lords and Commons to better manage Parliaments throughout the Tudor and early Stuart period.

Bringing together essays from nine established parliamentary scholars, the volume offers new insights and reflections on management and the importance of Parliaments to the effective and smooth running of the state. Essays cover anticlericalism; Shekhar Kapur and the Parliament of 1559; William Cecil, Lord Burghley, and the Men-of-Business; Foreign Policy and the Parliament of 1576; The Earl of Essex and Elizabethan Parliaments; the development of Parliament Privilege, 1604-1629; Proclamations, censorship & the English Parliament of 1621; preaching and English Parliaments in the 1620's and the ceremonial opening of Parliament, 1603-1660.