The names John Lilburne,
Robert Overton and William Walwyn, key radicals in the leftist phase of the
English revolution do not come to mind when thinking of the leaders of the
English Revolution like Robespierre and Saint Just do for the French Revolution
and Lenin and Trotsky do for the Russian Revolution, but they should. They
represented the heart of the London-centered programmatically- based plebian
urban artisan democratic opposition to monarchy and hierarchic rule. Although
Oliver Cromwell is, from a military perspective at least, more justly recognized
as a destroyer of the principle of monarchy from a historical perspective the
documents of the Levelers presented here in detail represent a precious accrual
of propaganda for all later democratic movements.
As far as the English
revolution is concerned this writer’s sympathies lie with the social program
put forth by John Lilburne and the Levellers and the social actions of Gerard
Winstanley and the True Levellers (or Diggers) on Saint George’s Hill. The English
historian Christopher Hill’s studies of those movements and others, as
expressed in the religious terms of the day, initially drew me to the study of
the English Revolution. Those plebian-based democratic programs in the England
of the 1600’s were more a vision (a vision in many ways still in need of
realization) than a practical reality. Even Cromwell’s achievements were a near
and partially reversible thing. Such are the ways of humankind’s history.
The English Revolution was by
any definition a great revolution. It is therefore interesting to compare and
contrast that revolution to the two other great revolutions of the modern era-
the French and the Russian. The most notably thing all three have in common is
once the old regime has been defeated it is necessary to reconstruct the governmental
apparatus on a new basis, parliamentary rule, assembly rule or soviet role, as
the case may be. The obvious contrast between revolutions is what class takes
power- patricians or plebeians? That has
been the underlying strain of all modern social revolutionary movements. The
defeat of the Levellers and their
democratic program, based as it was on the relatively small urban artisan class
and their supporters in the New Model
Army demonstrates that they were just a little to early in the development of
the capitalist modern world to succeed.
The editor has provided a
good introduction to these documents which places the struggle for adoption of
such Leveller programs as the various Agreements of the People in proper
perspective for those not familiar with the details of the English Revolution. I
note, as the editor does, that the army played an unusually heavy role in the
political struggles, especially among the plebian masses which formed the core
of the army (through the ‘Agitators’). In an age when there were no parties, in
the modern sense, the plebian base of the army is where the political fight to
extend parliamentary democracy was waged. That it was defeated by military
action led by Cromwell at Burford in 1649 represented a defeat for plebian
democracy. Thus, the political fortunes of the Levellers rose and fell with
their influence in the army. In the latter revolutions mentioned above
urban-based political parties that the army as a sword of the revolution. That
is quite a different proposition Read on.
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