What was at stake in the Putney Debates?

The arguments that took place in the village of Putney among the officers and soldiers of
the New Model Army revealed fundamental divisions within the parliamentary forces.
In the autumn of 1647 the small, Thames-side village of Putney witnessed the most famous and dramatic debates of
the English Civil Wars. The headquarters of the parliamentarian New Model Army was situated there and for a few
days the officers and soldiers argued passionately over the nature of a new constitutional settlement for postwar
England. Their ideas seem, in some cases, strikingly modern; one officer, Colonel Thomas Rainborowe, went so far as
to call for universal manhood suffrage, to the outrage of more senior commanders. Historians have long been
dazzled by Rainborowe’s rhetoric, seeing in his concern for ‘the poorest hee’ the first glimmerings of modern
democracy. But there was more at stake in these debates than simply the extent of the franchise. The soldiers and
officers were divided in their visions of the kind of settlement they wanted for the kingdom and their exchanges at
Putney reveal, perhaps more than any other contemporary source, the fundamental tensions at the heart of the
parliamentarian cause.

The Putney Debates have been known to historians ever since a transcript made by a military clerk was found in
Worcester College, Oxford in 1890. No one who reads the debates can fail to be moved by the eloquence and force
with which Rainborowe defended manhood suffrage. Yet historians have generally been quicker to sympathise with
him than to explain the rationale behind his position. His chief adversary was Oliver Cromwell’s son-in-law Colonel
Henry Ireton, whose fierce resistance to Rainborowe’s demands tends to be seen in equally narrow terms: as the
knee-jerk reaction of a propertied gentleman with much to lose from any radical challenge to the established order.

Historians have often wondered why Ireton and Rainborowe made such an issue of the franchise, given that it
polarised debate so sharply. Rainborowe had the sympathy of many of the soldiers, but few wanted to go as far as
he did and open up elections to all adult men. On the other hand, Ireton made few friends for himself with his
strident denunciations of Rainborowe’s arguments. Rather than find common ground with his fellow officer, he went
out of his way to show that Rainborowe’s ideas would lead to anarchy, disorder and chaos. Ireton’s position can
seem wilfully self-defeating, because he was open to extending the franchise, at least to some extent. In these tense
moments of 1647, when settlement was still so elusive, we might expect him to be striving for consensus. Yet we
find the very opposite. To understand the determination with which both men held their ground, we need to place
the debates at the heart of a contemporary argument over the intellectual foundations of the parliamentarian cause.

When Parliament-men took up arms against the king in 1642, they had to find ways to justify their actions that
would be convincing to themselves and the public. One of the most successful propagandists, Henry Parker, had
appealed to the concept of natural law in many of his writings, arguing that this law underpinned all human laws and
that it commanded all people to defend themselves when in danger. One of his favourite illustrations was that of a
general who turns his cannon against his own soldiers. In this situation, he argued, the soldiers have a duty to
disobey their commanding officer and protect themselves. For Parker the case of Parliament was no different.
Natural law demanded that Parliament-men defend the kingdom and people against a monarch seemingly
determined to destroy them.

By 1647 the New Model Army thought that the danger came not only from the king, whom they had recently
defeated, but also from Parliament itself, or at least from the corrupt members within it. When Parliament sought to
disband the army and send the soldiers to Ireland, therefore, many of the officers and soldiers united together in
resisting these commands. They defended their action in a Representation, written by Henry Ireton and published on
June 14th, 1647. In this highly influential manifesto, Ireton consciously echoed the language of Parker and the earlier
parliamentarian cause in his appeal to the law of nature.

In the Representation Ireton insisted that the New Model was ‘not a mere mercenary army’, but called by Parliament
‘to the defence of our own and the people’s just rights and liberties’. The soldiers had a cause to fight for: it had
been endorsed by Parliament and Ireton insisted that they must not abandon it. Moreover, even their current
rejection of parliamentary commands was, he thought, in line with the true principles of the parliamentarian cause.
For, Ireton explained, ‘Parliament hath declared it no resistance of magistracy to side with the just principles of law,
nature, and nations’ and these principles allow for self-defence when destruction is threatened. Here he included
the aforementioned example of a general whose cannons face his own soldiers. For Ireton, then, the Representation
was a clear assertion that the army could resist its own destruction and defend its own legitimate rights and those of
all Englishmen.

Ireton had not meant the Representation to be an especially radical document and in 1647 he still envisaged a
settlement that would include the king and would salvage as much of the traditional constitution as possible. Indeed,
in the summer of 1647 he was involved in extensive negotiations with Charles I, as the army officers and their
parliamentarian allies tried to reach a deal with him. The centrepiece of these negotiations was a document known
as the Heads of the Proposals, according to which the king would be restored, but with his powers circumscribed.
The Heads also called for social and economic reform and for some rationalisation of the electoral system, currently
a patchwork of local rules and customs. It was a sensible, potentially workable document, but Charles would not
accept it, even with extensive concessions from Ireton and his allies.

While the Army leaders were negotiating with Charles, new interpretations of the parliamentarian cause began to
emerge, especially among a group of civilian radicals in London. In their publications they had begun to invest the
language of natural law with new political meaning and had even linked it to a concept of inherent, individual rights
and liberties. One pamphleteer, Richard Overton, called for a settlement based upon ‘right reason’, equity and the
spirit of God in his Appeal from the Degenerate Representative Body, published in July 1647. Significantly, he
specifically referred to the army’s Representation of June 14th, suggesting that the army had committed itself in that
document to upholding all rights and liberties based in reason and equality. In Overton’s hands the Representation
had become a much more extensive manifesto for change and reform, a call for the remodelling of the English state
in accordance with right reason. He hoped that by invoking the Representation he could gain the support of the
soldiers for his position.

Overton was not an isolated figure in 1647. He was part of a broader network of civilian radicals that would soon
become known as the Levellers. Historians have spent much time and effort establishing the dynamics of the Leveller
movement, but it is clear that by the autumn of 1647 there was a group of civilians committed to a programme of
reform based upon concepts of equity and natural right. Moreover, many of the soldiers were frustrated by the long
process of negotiation with the king and feared that their own rights and interests would not be properly
safeguarded in any settlement with Charles. By the autumn, therefore, the soldiers were receptive to this language
of rights and liberties and they had even begun to see the parliamentarian cause in these terms.

Nowhere is this fusion of army statements and Leveller principles clearer than in a pamphlet entitled The Case of the
Army Truly Stated, printed in October 1647. Historians have debated whether this pamphlet was written by soldiers
or Levellers, but what is most interesting is the way in which the authors, whoever they were, re-interpret army
documents along Leveller lines. In fact, much of the Case is a gloss upon the Representation. The authors echo that
document when they insist that the army had taken up arms ‘for the people’s just rights and liberties, and not as
mercenary Souldiers’ and that they proceeded ‘upon the principles of right and freedom, and upon the law of nature
and Nations’. On June 14th, claim the authors, the army had engaged to protect the people’s rights as individual
soldiers and Englishmen, though now senior officers had apparently abandoned this cause. Indeed, they lamented
that ‘the law of nature and nations [is] now refused by many to be the rule by which their proceedings should be
regulated’. This was a sharp attack on Ireton and Cromwell for forsaking the perceived commitments they had made
just four months earlier.

The Case was not only an exercise in creative textual interpretation. In the context of the autumn of 1647 it was far
more serious than this, for it contained a scathing critique of the policy of settlement with the king. To negotiate
with Charles was, the authors suggested, to violate the principles to which the army had engaged itself.

Ireton and Cromwell were troubled by the appearance of the Case, especially as they were encountering opposition
from some radical MPs with strong connections to the army. One of these was Colonel Rainborowe, who had
recently been elected to Parliament for Droitwich in Worcestershire, where he had taken electoral advantage both
of his position as military governor and the town’s highly restricted franchise (no universal male suffrage here!).
Through the summer of 1647 he had become increasingly hostile to any negotiations with the king, preferring
instead to start the process of settlement afresh, a stance that played well with many of the soldiers.
Rainborowe had no known connections with Overton or other future Levellers before the end of October, but they
were all united by their frustration with the army leaders’ plans for settlement. Moreover, the possibility for fruitful
cooperation must have been obvious: the civilian Levellers lacked a power base, while Rainborowe seems to have
lacked a coherent intellectual agenda. The civilians had been arguing for natural, common rights and freedom that
were independent not only of the king but also of Parliament; and these common rights could provide the
intellectual justification for the kind of radical action desired by Rainborowe, action which circumvented traditional
constitutional arrangements and began the process of settlement afresh. If the ideas within the Case spread through
the army, then the call for immediate and disruptive action could become unstoppable: the treaty with the king
would be abandoned and the constitution would have to be fashioned anew.

It was in this explosive political and intellectual context that the debates at Putney were called and the issue of the
franchise became the flashpoint. Cromwell and Ireton needed to respond to the charges in the Case and they hoped
they could preserve the unity of the army, despite the efforts of the Levellers and others to drive a wedge between
soldiers and officers. To achieve this, Ireton was aware that he needed to wrest the intellectual initiative from the
radicals and reassert his own interpretation of the army’s central documents. He wanted to defend the
Representation and to show that the ongoing negotiations with Charles were not a violation of its spirit.
Unfortunately for him, his task became a lot tougher with the dramatic entry upon the stage of the Levellers.

Not long after the debates had opened, a new document, known as The Agreement of the People, was read out to
those present. It was an inspired piece of political opportunism written by Levellers. It called for a new settlement,
based upon a written constitution, which would define the powers of a new sovereign representative. Its novelty
was much commented upon – at the time and since – but the authors of the Agreement insisted that this proposal
was the constitutional counterpart to the army’s Representation. It was this notion that the Agreement was
compatible with – even inseparable from – the army’s own platform that Ireton was so anxious to deny. He would
seize upon the issue of the franchise to demonstrate his point in forceful fashion.

The connection between the Agreement and the Representation has rarely been acknowledged by historians,
although the authors of the Agreement went out of their way to highlight it. They even claimed that it was drawn up
‘in order to the fulfilling of our Declaration of June the 14’. The Leveller John Wildman, who was probably involved in
writing at least parts of the Case, was particularly keen to draw these connections at Putney. He insisted that the
chief aim of the Agreement was the same as that of the Representation: both were designed ‘to secure the Rights of
the people in their Parliaments’; both were undergirded by ‘principles of right and freedom, and the lawes of nature
and nations’ and the army ought therefore to accept the programme outlined in the Agreement.

Ireton was livid at this hijacking of the Representation to radical ends and he lost no time in countering such an
interpretation. In one of his sharpest speeches of the entire period he denounced the ‘venome and poyson’ in
Wildman’s words. He was absolutely adamant that this was not the meaning of the Representation. The army was
not committed to a programme based in natural law, but to the maintenance of agreements and engagements. He
accepted that all humans had a natural right to protect their own person and to stay alive, but for him natural right
ended there. In his view, the army had only resisted Parliament when it was absolutely necessary, when the soldiers
had been faced with destruction and, even then, they had done so on grounds already sanctioned by Parliament
itself: this was his view of the Representation. He agreed with Wildman that no one could be obliged to suffer their
own destruction; this had, after all, been the lynchpin of the parliamentarian case since 1642. But Ireton did not
believe it was legitimate to appeal to the law of nature in all circumstances, or to claim that Parliament went to war
to extend the rights of Englishmen or reform the constitution. He thought that, if it were permissible to plead the
law of nature against constitutions and against Parliament whenever a person was discontented, then anarchy
would soon result. For him, it was only if our destruction were at hand that the law of nature came into play. Ireton
knew that the law of nature was a dangerous weapon and he was desperate to ensure that it was used sparingly.

All the points which Ireton made against Wildman were repeated and expanded later in the debates, when the
franchise and the right to vote were discussed. These issues came up after the first clause of the Agreement had
been read out, for here it was suggested that parliamentary seats should be distributed according to the number of
people living in a particular district. At first glance this was hardly a revolutionary statement and those at Putney, like
subsequent historians, were taken aback by the bitter clashes that followed. But Ireton and Rainborowe saw
immediately what was at stake and they were determined to seize the moment for their own purposes.
Ireton began by questioning the meaning of the clause and Rainborowe lost no time in insisting that it meant
universal manhood suffrage. He even claimed that the right to vote was a natural right, that it belonged to all men
because all should give their consent to the government that ruled over them. Ireton had not, perhaps, expected
Rainborowe to adopt the language of natural right with such alacrity, but Rainborowe had his reasons. He was eager
to shift the intellectual ground away from the old constitution, for he was thinking instead of a new settlement,
based on natural rights and liberties. How sincere he was is impossible to say – after all, he had been elected to
Parliament by fewer than 30 voters – but he could see the difficulties in Ireton’s argument and he was determined to
exploit them for maximum political effect. Ireton had conjured the spectre of natural law and natural right with the
Representation and Rainborowe was now taking advantage. If the soldiers could be brought to adopt a platform of
natural rights, with the right to vote at its heart, then the army could be mobilised against any settlement agreed by
the existing, unreformed Parliament.

Ireton recognised immediately what Rainborowe was trying to do. The authors of the Case had begun to turn
Parliament’s ideals against it, but now Rainborowe was threatening to destroy the parliamentarian cause itself (at
least as Ireton understood it) and with weapons which Ireton had helped to sharpen. When Parliament had
challenged the king and then when the army had challenged Parliament, both had appealed to natural law and
natural right. Ireton thought these concepts were now being used to undermine all existing authority and even all
property. For, as Ireton never tired of insisting, if a person could claim a natural right to vote and to share in the
government then he might just as easily claim a natural right to property and to anything else that took his fancy.
But Ireton was adamant that we have only a natural right to preserve ourselves when our absolute and certain
destruction is imminent. We have a natural right to life itself, but not to the things which we think will make our life
better.

This was not simply an abstract debate. By the end of October 1647 a settlement between the army and the king was
looking increasingly unlikely and rumours were circulating that the king might do a deal with the Scots. If the army
were to prevent that alliance and to impose a settlement themselves, then they would need to justify and explain
their principles once more. Natural law and natural right would be central to any claims for legitimacy and both
Ireton and Rainborowe wanted to take control of these crucial concepts. At Putney, Rainborowe saw his chance to
win the soldiers over to his radical position of a new settlement without the king and without a powerful House of
Lords. Ireton was desperate to neutralise this possibility.

In the end, neither man won outright at Putney. Rainborowe clearly had substantial support within the army, but
most of the soldiers shied away from his more extreme proposals. Many of the soldiers were more concerned with
their own rights as men who had risked their lives for the parliamentarian cause, rather than with the abstract rights
of ‘all Englishmen’. Ireton eventually made clear that he also sought an extension of the franchise, but that he
wanted to secure the rights that existed (or should exist) under the constitution; it was the thought that such rights
might be ‘natural’ that had raised his hackles. Compromise was possible over the franchise, but on November 5th
the meeting voted to write to Parliament, criticising any further negotiations with the king. That was a step too far
for Cromwell and Ireton and at that point the debates were brought to a hasty conclusion. Meanwhile, Charles was
drawing closer to the Scots and the fruit of their secret negotiations would be a second civil war in 1648.

At Putney, the logic of the parliamentarian cause was tested almost to breaking point. The Agreement of the People
raised, in its sharpest form, the dilemma that had haunted the king’s adversaries since the early 1640s. From the
moment they decided to take up arms against the king, they had accepted that it was legitimate to invoke the laws
and rights of nature when the existing constitution had become insufferable. But to appeal to the law of nature was
to unleash a powerful force with the potential to dissolve all constitutional arrangements. The royalists had been
saying this from the start of the war, but at Putney the parliamentarians finally had to deal with the radical potential
of their own ideas. It was over the issue of the franchise that Ireton chose to confront this problem head on, in a
brave effort to bring the language of natural rights back under his control.

What was at stake in the Putney Debates was not only, or even primarily, the scope of the franchise. Ireton and
Rainborowe clashed over the very foundations of the parliamentarian cause, as they tried to work out a settlement
for England in which the centrality of the king was no longer taken for granted. A new political order needed to be
created and it needed to have the soldiers’ backing. At Putney, Rainborowe offered the soldiers a stark alternative to
Ireton and his powerful rhetoric clearly won him supporters. Ultimately, however, it was Ireton’s limited reading of
natural law that would prevail. When he came to justify the army’s actions against Parliament and the king in 1648
and 1649, his careful, cautious references to natural law are proof of the profound impact of the Putney Debates on
the course of the English Revolution.