ABSTRACT
The victorious faction in Parliament had beheaded the king (January 1649), erected a republican government without king or house of Lords and forced Ireland and Scotland to acknowledge its authority. The new government in England also sought to control the colonies that had been created over the previous decades. A handful of those colonies resisted its authority and instead declared loyalty to the House of Stuart, proclaiming the eldest son of the dead king to be their new ruler. Parliament acted to subdue these rebellious colonies. It ordered them to acknowledge the current government or to face immediate embargo and possible further consequences. A Declaration was published in the Hague, for a number of reasons. Parliament would have prohibited or punished the publication of views so critical of its emerging colonial policy.
