The Establishment of the Commonwealth 1649 Cromwell in Ireland 1649 Battle of Dunbar Sept. 3, 1650 Battle of Worcester Sept. 3, 1651 The Long Parliament dissolved by Cromwell April 20, 1653 The so-called Barebones Parliament July 4 to Dec. 11, 1653 Establishment of the Protectorate Dec. 16, 1653 The First Protectorate Parliament Sept. 3, 1654, to Jan. 22, 1655 Treaty of Alliance with France Oct. 24, 1655 The Second Protectorate Parliament Sept. 17, 1656, to Feb. 4, 1658 Death of Oliver Cromwell Sept. 3, 1658 Richard Cromwell's Protectorate Sept. 3, 1658, to April 22, 1659 The Long Parliament Restored May 7 to Oct. 13, 1659 Military Government Oct. 13 to Dec. 26, 1659 The Long Parliament a Second Time Restored Dec 26, 1659, to March 16, 1660 The Declaration of Breda April 4, 1660 Meeting of the Convention Parliament April 14, 1660 Resolution that the Government is by King, Lords, and Commons May 1, 1660 1. =Establishment of the Commonwealth. 1649.=--It was not to be expected that the men in Parliament or in the army by whom great hopes of improvement were entertained should discover that they had done all that it was possible for them to do. They believed it to be still in their power to regenerate England. The House of Commons declared England to be a Commonwealth, 'without a king or House of Lords,' and, taking the name of Parliament for itself, appointed forty-one persons to be a Council of State, charged with the executive government, and renewed annually. Most members of the Council of State were also members of Parliament; and, as the attendance in Parliament seldom exceeded fifty, the Councillors of State (if they agreed together) were able to command a majority in Parliament, and thus to control its decisions. Such an arrangement was a mere burlesque on Parliamentary institutions, and could hardly have existed for a week if it had not been supported by the ever-victorious army. In the army, indeed, it had its opponents, who, under the name of Levellers, called out for a more truly democratic government; but they had no man of influence to lead them. Cromwell had too much common sense not to perceive the difficulty of establishing a democracy in a country in which that form of government had but few admirers, and he suppressed the Levellers with a strong hand. In quiet times, Cromwell would doubtless have made some attempt to place the constitution of the Commonwealth on a more satisfactory basis, but for the present it needed to be defended rather than improved.