╪During the 17th century, England was rent by political revolutions and civil war. The English beheaded King Charles I (1600-49), making the country a republic for the only time in its history. After the monarchy had been restored, the English overthrew another king, James II (1633-1701), in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. It is no wonder that they were regarded by other Europeans as a violent, impulsive, and unstable people. Yet this was also the period in which the crowns of England and Scotland were united, culminating in the Act of Union of 1707, and the Irish Catholics were subjugated by force of arms. Britain built its first empire, in North America and the West Indies, and its economic power reached new heights. ╥@Elections@
The upheavals of the 17th century left Britain with an electoral system that was, in practice, very imperfect. The British painter William Hogarth (1697-1764) bitingly portrayed the way drunken, corrupted electors were dragged off to vote. Parliamentary representation did not reflect the way population was distributed. Some large towns were unrepresented, while in the notorious "rotten boroughs" a handful of electors selected a Member of Parliament.
