ABSTRACT
In the interval between the abolition of the House of Lords in 1649 and restoration in 1660 an attempt was made to create a new second chamber in its place. The quarrel between the army and the Parliament in 1647 had produced in the minds of the officers a deep distrust of omnipotent Parliaments. On March 11 it was decided that the ‘Other House’ should consist of not more than seventy members, to be nominated by the Protector and approved by the Parliament, while on the 17th the limits of its judicial power were carefully defined. The middle classes, and an increasing number of the gentry, accepted the Protector’s government, because it guaranteed rest and stability after war and revolution. They approved of the new constitutional experiment, and their objection to the ‘Other House’ was only that it would not be conservative enough.
