Politically, neither Hampden nor Pym was Republican. Both believed in government by King, Lords, and Commons; but both were determined that the King's Ministers should be answerable to Parliament for the policy of the Crown, and that the Commons, who found the money for government, should have a definite say in the spending of that money. As for the royal claim of "Divine right," and the royal view that held passive obedience to be the duty of the King's subjects, and saw in Parliament merely a useful instrument for the raising of funds to be spent by the royal pleasure without question or criticism—these things were intolerable to Hampden, Pym, and the men of the House of Commons. The King would not govern through Parliament; the House of Commons could govern without a King. It was left to the Civil War to decide the issue between the Crown and Parliament, and make the House of Commons supreme.
Things moved quickly in the first year of the Long Parliament. The Star Chamber and High Commission Courts were abolished. Strafford was impeached for high treason, and executed on Tower Hill. Archbishop Laud lay in prison, to be executed four years later. The Grand Remonstrance of the House of Commons was presented to Charles in December, 1641. The demands of the Commons in the Remonstrance were not revolutionary, but they stated, quite frankly, the case for the Parliament. The main points were the need for securities for the administration of justice, and an insistence on the responsibility of the King's Ministers to the Houses of Parliament. The Grand Remonstrance was only carried by eleven votes in the House of Commons, 159 to 148, after wild scenes. "Some waved their hats over their heads, and others took their swords in their scabbards out of their belts, and held them by the pummels in their hands, setting the lower part on the ground." Actual violence was only prevented "by the sagacity and great calmness of Mr. Hampden, by a short speech."
Charles promised an answer to the deputation of members who waited upon him with the Grand Remonstrance, and early in the new year came the reply. The King simply demanded the surrender of five members—Pym, Hampden, Holles, Strode, and Hazlerig—and their impeachment on the charge of high treason. All constitutional law was set aside by a charge which proceeded personally from the King, which deprived the accused of their legal right to a trial by their peers, and summoned them before a tribunal which had no pretence to a justification over them. On the refusal of the Commons to surrender their members, Charles came in person to Westminster with 300 cavaliers to demand their arrest. But the five members, warned of the King's venture, were well out of the way, and rested safely within the City of London—for the citizens were strongly for the Parliament. "It was believed that if the King had found them there (in the House of Commons), and called in his guards to have seized them, the members of the House would have endeavoured the defence of them, which might have proved a very unhappy and sad business."
As it was, Charles could only retire "in a more discontented and angry passion than he came in." The step was utterly ill-advised. Parliament was in no mood to favour royal encroachments, and the citizens of London were at hand, with their trained bands, to protect forcibly members of the House of Commons.
War was now imminent. "The attempt to seize the five members was undoubtedly the real cause of the war. From that moment, the loyal confidence with which most of the popular party were beginning to regard the King was turned into hatred and suspicion. From that moment, the Parliament was compelled to surround itself with defensive arms. From that moment, the city assumed the appearance of a garrison.
"The transaction was illegal from beginning to end. The impeachment was illegal. The process was illegal. The service was illegal. If Charles wished to prosecute the five members for treason, a bill against them should have been sent to a grand jury. That a commoner cannot be tried for high treason by the Lords at the suit of the Crown, is part of the very alphabet of our law. That no man can be arrested by the King in person is equally clear. This was an established maxim of our jurisprudence even in the time of Edward the Fourth. 'A subject,' said Chief Justice Markham to that Prince, 'may arrest for treason; the King cannot; for, if the arrest be illegal, the party has no remedy against the King.'"[[54]]
Both King and Parliament broke rudely through all constitutional precedents in their preparations for hostilities.
The King levied troops by a royal commission, without any advice from Parliament, and Pym got an ordinance passed, in both Houses, appointing the Lords-Lieutenant of the counties to command the Militia without warrant from the Crown.
A last attempt at negotiations was made at York, in April, when the proposals of Parliament—nineteen propositions for curtailing the power of the Monarchy in favour of the Commons—were rejected by Charles with the words: "If I granted your demands, I should be no more than the mere phantom of a king."
By August, Charles had raised the royal standard at Nottingham, and war was begun.