The First Protectorate Parliament was summoned by the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell under the terms of the Instrument of Government. It sat for one term from 3 September 1654 until 22 January 1655 with William Lenthall as the Speaker of the House. The Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland was the title of the head of state during part of the Commonwealth period. ... Unfinished portrait miniature of Oliver Cromwell by Samuel Cooper, 1657. ... The Instrument of Government was Englands first codified constitution. ... September 3 is the 246th day of the year (247th in leap years). ... Events April 5 - Signing of the Treaty of Westminster, ending the First Anglo-Dutch War. ... January 22 is the 22nd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... Events New Sweden (Delaware) attacked and captured by Dutch forces. ... William Lenthall (1591 - September 3, 1662), was an English politician of the Civil War period, speaker of the House of Commons. ... In the United Kingdom, the Speaker of the House of Commons is the presiding officer of the Lower House of Parliament, the House of Commons. ...

During the first nine months of The Protectorate Cromwell, with the aid of the Council of State, had drawn up a list of 84 bills to present to Parliament for ratification. But the members of Parliament had their own and their constituents' interests to promote and in the end not enough of them would agree to work with Cromwell, or to sign a declaration of their acceptance of the Instrument of Government, to make the constitutional arrangements in the Instrument of Government work. Cromwell dissolved the Parliament as soon as it was allowed under the terms of the Instrument of Government, having failed to get any of the 84 bills passed. The Protectorate in English history refers specifically to the English government of 1653 to 1659 under the direct control of Oliver Cromwell, who assumed the title of Lord Protector of the newly declared Commonwealth of England (later the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland) after the English Civil War. ... The Council of State is the name of an organ of government in many states, and especially in republics. ...

The First Protectorate Parliament was preceded by the Barebones Parliament and succeeded by the Second Protectorate Parliament. The Barebones Parliament came into being on July 4, 1653. ...

See also

• List of Parliaments of England

This is a list of Parliaments of England from the reign of Henry VII to 1707. ...

Reference

• The British Civil Wars & Commonwealth website: First Protectorate Parliament 1654-55
• www.archontology.org: England: Parliament 1640-1660

Bibliography

From Cromwell:The Oliver Comwell Website: a select bibliography of books and articles:

• A number of articles explore aspects of Cromwell's Protectorate parliaments: H.R. Trevor-Roper's crucial 1956 article on 'Oliver Cromwell and his parliaments', which was included in several later collections and is perhaps most accessible in I. Roots (ed), Cromwell, A Profile (1973);
• P. Gaunt, 'Law making in the first Protectorate Parliament' in C. Jones, M. Newitt & S. Roberts (eds), Politics and People in Revolutionary England (1986);
• I. Roots, 'Law making in the second Protectorate Parliament' in H. Hearder & H.R. Loyn (eds), British Government and Administration (1974);
• P. Gaunt, 'Cromwell's purge? Exclusions and the first Protectorate Parliament' in Parliamentary History 6 (1987);
• C.S. Egloff, 'The search for a Cromwellian settlement: exclusions from the second Protectorate Parliament' in Parliamentary History 17 (1998);
• D. L. Smith, ‘Oliver Cromwell, the first Protectorate Parliament and religious reform’ in Parliamentary History 19 (2000);
• T.A. Wilson & F.J. Merli, 'Naylor's case and the dilemma of the Protectorate' in University of Birmingham Historical Journal 10 (1965-6); and C.H. Firth, 'Cromwell and the crown' in English Historical Review 17 & 18 (1902 & 1903).