All-in-all it sounded
like a much bigger deal than it was when on May 24 William and
Mary gave their joint Royal Assent to England’s Act of Toleration
of 1689. The act gave relief
from persecution to a narrow set of exclusively Protestant
dissenters—including Puritans, Baptists, and some Quakers. Such
largess was not extended to Catholics,
Jews, non-Trinitarians, and atheists—a term applied to virtually no one we
would recognize as godless today, but to a great many folks with unorthodox
religious scruples.
To even become eligible
to stop being subject to arrest, imprisonment,
and at least theoretically, execution by being burnt at the
stake as heretics, nonconformists had to pledge an Oath of Allegiance to the monarchy and
an Oath of Supremacy acknowledging the monarch as Supreme Governor of the Church of England as
well as reject the Doctrine of
Transubstantiation. This obviously excluded Catholics, but many Protestant
dissenters, including most Quakers, eschewed
oaths or had other objections.
Those who signed
on the dotted line could cease looking
over their shoulders for the sheriff and were even given leave to worship, but not in homes—who knew what kind of heresy might be preached in small gatherings
behind the sanctity of the English
home? Their buildings could
not be called churches—chapel or meetinghouse were the preferred terms—nor could the building
have a bell tower or steeple. Preachers had to be vetted for orthodox opinions
and licensed by the state.
Moreover, individual adherents of Dissenting sects were still banned from holding any public office, attending universities,
and even testifying in certain court
cases. And, of course, they were subject
to taxation in support of the established
church.
The last person
actually executed for heresy was the unfortunate dissenting clergyman Edward Wightman way
back in 1612. The Church of England and Protestants had become less concerned with each other than
being united in opposition to the Papists who were seen as an existential threat not only to the
established Church but to the monarchy. William and Mary had come to the joint throne earlier the same year from the Netherlands
in the Glorious Revolution as Protestant
rulers to prevent the return of Catholic Stewarts. They
and Parliament hoped that the symbolic toleration of Protestant
dissidents would solidify their rule.
Influential Enlightenment philosopher John Locke had
been advocating for just such
toleration for years. But now it was especially politically expedient.
Under the Act perhaps some dissenters were safe from the lingering threat of the horrors of the flames and the stake. But apparently a cheeky schoolboy still had plenty to worry. In 1697 Thomas Aikenhead was a 20 year old Edinburgh student who with the swaggering bravado of many a young man, and a tongue likely oiled by the Scottish national beverage, was overheard making shocking statements to his friends. To wit:
…that theology was a rhapsody of ill-invented
nonsense, patched up partly of the moral doctrines of philosophers, and partly
of poetical fictions and extravagant chimeras: That he ridiculed the holy
scriptures, calling the Old Testament Ezra’s fables, in profane allusion to
Esop’s Fables; That he railed on Christ, saying, he had learned magick in
Egypt, which enabled him to perform those pranks which were called miracles:
That he called the New Testament the history of the imposter Christ; That he
said Moses was the better artist and the better politician; and he preferred
Muhammad to Christ: That the Holy Scriptures were stuffed with such madness,
nonsense, and contradictions, that he admired the stupidity of the world in
being so long deluded by them: That he rejected the mystery of the Trinity as
unworthy of refutation; and scoffed at the incarnation of Christ.
…Or so read the indictment
against him for blasphemy drawn up by the zealous Lord Advocate, Sir James Stewart, who demanded the death penalty to
set an example to others who might otherwise express such opinions in the
future. The boy refused to recant and a court convicted and
sentenced him.
The case was appealed to the Privy Council where
two members of the Court and two prominent ministers begged for mercy on
account of the defendant’s tender age. The Council declined to commute
the sentence unless the Church of Scotland would intercede on his
behalf. Not only did the church refuse, but its General Assembly also urged
“vigorous execution” to curb “the abounding of impiety and profanity in this
land.”
At the appointed time the lad was taken from jail where upon he delivered
a fine speech that may have been a semi-recantation and was taken to the gallows to be swung.
“the preachers who were the poor boy’s murderers crowded round him at the
gallows, and…insulted heaven with prayers more blasphemous than anything he had
uttered,” according to Thomas Macaulay’s much later account.
Aikenhead’s death was a testimony to how hollow
Toleration could be. He may have been the last to be sent to the gallows
for blasphemy, but plenty more would rot in prison for it. The
last would be John William Gott of the Freethought Socialist League who
served the last of several sentences with 9 months at hard labor in
1922. Yes, you read that right, 1922. The harsh conditions of his final imprisonment broke his health and he died at the age of 56
shortly after his release.
But back to the days and years after the Act. It affected the far off North American
Colonies. Perhaps nowhere more significantly than in New
England. The virtual Puritan
theocracy there saw that the act gave some relief to their English
cousins. But they had always vigorously
persecuted any deviation from
their own Standing Order. Baptist Roger Williams was driven out to establish Rhode Island.
Anne Hutchinson, her family and allies were banished in 1637 and she had to make a nearly fatal 40 mile trek through virtual wilderness to join Williams. Mary Dyer and her
family were allies of Hutchinson and were also banished. But Mary
returned to England where she met William Fox and became a Quaker
preacher. She boldly returned
to Boston, where the pious authorities were glad to hang her and three other Quakers in 1660.
Now, under the Act of Toleration, Protestant dissidents
were finally given some measure of freedom in the New England colonies.
Not, however, Catholics who remained in danger.
Naturally Rhode Island and William Penn’s
Pennsylvania went further than the Act required and forbad any established religion. They
were joined by neighboring New Jersey and Delaware. But
only Pennsylvania extended toleration to Catholics. In Maryland,
the proprietary colony of Catholic Lord Baltimore, Anglican
settlers had swamped his first Catholic settlement and upon gaining the upper
hand in the Assembly had promptly disenfranchised the “bloody Papists.”
In Virginia
the haughty planters who controlled the government refused to recognize that the Act of Toleration
applied to them. They rallied to the support of the Anglican clergy who demanded the
persecution of rapidly spreading dissenting sects, particularly the pesky Baptists. Baptist
preachers were assaulted and arrested, open air meetings were
rousted by the militia, homes invaded to prevent private services. The persecution
continued for decades, as did appeals
by the Baptists for relief. Despite numerous attempts and the support of some members of the elite who were schooled in the Scottish Enlightenment,
Virginia failed to extend protections
to the Baptists and others right up to the American Revolution.
A sympathetic Thomas Jefferson and his allies
would finally rectify matters with
the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom in 1777. Jefferson’s
ally James Madison would ensure that religious liberty and the Separation
of Church and State were enshrined
in the new Constitution.
Back in the Mother Country a long list of reform acts slowly, excruciatingly
slowly, widened what passed for religious freedom. Here is a
list to give you some idea.
The Papists Act of 1778—Allowed some Catholics
who would make oaths of loyalty to the Crown and reject claims of Pretenders
to hold some public offices, inherit
or purchase land. Perpetual imprisonment for keeping school was abolished and the persecution of Catholic clergy lifted.
Roman Catholic Relief Act 1791—Admitted Catholics
to the practice of law, permitted
the exercise of their religion, and the existence of their schools.
Chapels, schools, officiating
priests, and teachers were
to be registered; assemblies with locked doors, as
well as steeples and bells to chapels, were forbidden; priests were not to wear their robes or to hold service in the open air; children
of Protestants were not to be admitted to their schools; monastic
orders and endowments of schools and colleges
were prohibited.
Doctrine of the Trinity Act 1813—Extended the
protections of the Act of Toleration of 1689 to Unitarians on the same basis as other Protestants.
Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829—Allowed Catholics
to be elected to
Parliament and most Crown offices.
Roman Catholic Charities Act of 1832—Extended
the protection of the Act of Toleration to Catholic schools, places of worship,
education, and charities.
Religious Disabilities Act 1846—Ended most remaining restrictions on Catholics for education, charities,
and property although Oxford, Cambridge, and Durham Universities were allowed to ban Catholics.
Jews Relief Act 1858—Extended the protection of
the Act of Toleration to Jewish schools, places of worship, education, and
charities.
Places of Worship Registration Act 1855—Offered
an optional system of registration for non-Anglican places of worship was passed which gave certain legal and fiscal
advantages for those that registered, and finally held that “alternative religion was not only lawful, but was often facilitated by the law.”
University Tests Act 1871—Allowed Oxford,
Cambridge and Durham Universities to admit Catholics and allow them on their faculties.
Promissory Oaths Act 1871—Repealed most, but not all, of the remaining restrictive clauses of the Act of Toleration.
Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969—Repealed the
final remaining provisions of the Toleration Act.
Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008—abolished
the common law offenses of blasphemy and blasphemous libel in England
and Wales. Blasphemy remains a
criminal offense in Scotland.
The Church of Scotland—Presbyterian—is a “National
Church but not a State Church.” The Anglican Church of
Ireland was disestablished as a State Church by the Irish Church
Act 1869. The Anglican Church in Wales was disestablished by
the Welsh Church Act 1914. But the Church of England remains the
state church there with Queen Elizabeth II as its official head.
