(or their sessions) were to be denied participation in the vacancy process, the directory’s final form ended up giving most advantage to the presbyteries. Baillie, however, still disliked the plan, believing there was a danger presbyteries might decide to hold back altogether from becoming involved, and thereby leave the field clear for trouble-makers to promote the cause of virtually anyone.51 In the event, the ensuing political upheavals brought about a situation even worse than he imagined.
The Period of Cromwell
The beheading of Charles I on the 30 January 1649 caused a pro-royalist reaction north of the border. Partly because of this and partly through annoyance that the execution had been done without any consultation, the Scots Parliament proclaimed the Prince of Wales as the new king on the 5 February. Two days later, it passed further legislation, clarifying the limitations to be put upon his authority and making presbyterianism and the Covenants a central fixture to any subsequent negotiations with him. Commissioners were sent to Charles in Holland but because of his reluctance to agree to any of the key conditions, nothing was settled until a year had passed. By May 1650, Charles realized he was running out of options for regaining his throne and accordingly came to terms at Breda, although it was not until actually arriving at Speymouth that he finally, on the 23 June, subscribed the Covenants. News of Charles’s return stimulated Cromwell into action and he crossed the Tweed with an army on the 22 July. The Scots army, although larger, was weakened by purging of its supposed malignant elements, and was routed at the battle of Dunbar on the 3 September.
The Dunbar disaster damaged the Kirk’s credibility and coherence. The Covenanting hardliners in the south and west (especially Lanarkshire, Renfrewshire, Ayrshire and Galloway) banded together52 and issued, on 17 October, a Remonstrance in which they detached themselves from supporting the king’s cause unless he showed real repentance for his sins and repudiated the company of malignants. During November, both the Committee of Estates and the Assembly Commission conducted angry and divisive debates on the “Western Remonstrance” before deciding to reject it. Polarization of opinion increased when, in response to further success by the English forces at Hamilton (1 December), Parliament decided to approach the Church with a plan to bolster both national unity and military effectiveness by relaxing the ban on Engagers and royalists. The Commission’s reaction was to agree that the crisis warranted such a move, and gave it their approval on the 14 December. However, Parliament’s determination to rally mixed support and the Commission’s continued adherence to the policy, set the Kirk on the path to schism.
On the one side, moderates or “Resolutioners,” still hoped that Charles would live up to the trust placed in him, and they gave their blessing to his coronation at Scone on the 1 January 1651. In addition, on the second and third of June, they agreed to the repeal of the Act of Classes of 1649, which had discriminated against malignants, and also approved the Act against the Western Remonstrance, which demanded that it be formally renounced by its adherents.53 On the other side, the Remonstrant party, led especially by James Guthrie (Stirling first charge) and Patrick Gillespie (Outer High kirk, Glasgow), clamored with mounting disgust against what it saw as the Church’s defections. Matters climaxed over the General Assemblies held, because of the advance of Cromwell’s army, at St. Andrews and Dundee in July and August. A clumsy attempt to prevent opponents of the Resolutioners from attending resulted in angry scenes and a protest being lodged by Rutherford, after which over twenty colleagues joined him in walking out. From this point, a bitter breach opened up between the Resolutioners and the Remonstrants (or Protesters), who thereafter refused to countenance the validity of the Assemblies. Unfortunately for the former, their backing for Charles’s invasion of England and subsequent defeat at Worcester on the 3 September, meant that as Cromwell now took control of Scotland, his administration throughout the 1650s would give its favor to their numerically inferior rivals.54
The Settlement of Vacancies
Although the 1649 directory was in place at the start of the period of the Protectorate, any assessment of how it worked is immediately complicated by the partisan split within the Kirk and the readiness of the state to interfere. This began on the 4 June 1652, when Cromwell’s commissioners announced that they were intending to purge the Kirk of all unsatisfactory ministers and replace them with those they considered suitable. In practice, their role tended to be that of arbiter in settlement disputes, and, in such circumstances, the Protester interest was, not unexpectedly, the one which received their repeated favor. Thus encouraged, the latter pursued a policy of placing like-minded candidates in vacancies, even if that involved splitting church courts and establishing rival ministries, as at Douglas (Lanark presbytery) in 1654, where the settlement of their nominee had to be enforced by English dragoons.
Armed force was not the only advantage the Protesters could draw upon. It was open to them to obtain an order ensuring only their candidate received the stipend, even though the other might be supported by virtually all the congregation. As Baillie ruefully noted: “Our churches are in great confusion: no intrant getts any stipend til he have petitioned and subscribed some acknowledgement to the English. When a very few of the Remonstrators or Independent partie will call a man, he gets a kirk and the stipend; but whom the Presbyterie, and well near the whole congregation calls and admitts, he must preach in the fields, or in a barne, without stipend. So a sectarie is planted in Kilbryde, ane other in Leinzie.”55 Having powerful backing meant that the Protester version of a presbytery could even avoid having to wait for vacancies to appear but instead could create them through depositions. Then, if the congregation still held to the former incumbent, it could be claimed that, by adhering to a deposed minister, they had showed themselves malignant. This then opened the door for the right of planting to fall into the presbytery’s hands.56
In terms of parochial placements, potentially the most significant threat for the Resolutioners stemmed from a development which came to be known as “Gillespie’s Charter.” Although there was a wing of the Protesters, led by Johnston of Wariston and Guthrie, which remained wary of too close a relationship with the English administration, this was not a concern shared by Patrick Gillespie, who, through his rapport with the regime, had received the principalship of Glasgow University in February 1653. In August 1654, he persuaded the authorities to set up an examining body, the majority of whom would be Protesters or Independents, which would vet all candidates for vacancies. The ordinance at once provoked much alarm and protest on the grounds that it appeared to turn ministerial fitness into a matter of state concern. The Resolutioners also knew that, at a stroke, it removed any advantage accruing to them from their numerical superiority in the church courts. Fortunately for them, however, the Guthrie/Wariston alignment feared the scheme might act as an encouragement of Independency, and so ruled out any participation. Since Gillespie’s own interest was not big enough to make it workable, the Charter remained an unfulfilled threat.57 Finally, in August 1656, the Resolutioners came to a compromise with the president of the governing Scottish Council whereby church courts would retain their disciplinary authority, provided they submitted returns certifying that entrants were “able and fitt to preach the Gospel,” and that those who had been inducted made supplication to the Council, pledging to live “peaceably and inoffensively” under the government and to behave “as becometh a minister.”58 This arrangement remained in place down to the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660.59
The Application of the 1649 Rules
In looking at how the directory guidelines were applied in the 1650s, it quickly becomes clear, once obvious examples of Resolutioner/Protester manipulation of procedures
