October 24, 1633 - James II of England
His reign is less a story of conventional villainy than of a king whose religious convictions and governing instincts placed him in direct conflict with the constitutional order of his own kingdoms. James's insistence on advancing Catholic interests through royal prerogative, bypassing parliaments that had explicitly refused to cooperate, eroded the broad coalition that had initially welcomed his accession. The prospect of a permanent Catholic succession, crystallized by the birth of his son in 1688, made the crisis irresolvable through ordinary political means and invited the Dutch intervention that ended his reign.
From Wikipedia
James II and VII (14 October 1633 O.S. – 16 September 1701) was King of England and Ireland as James II and King of Scotland as James VII from February 1685 until he was deposed in the 1688 Glorious Revolution. The last Catholic monarch of England, Scotland, and Ireland, his reign was marked by conflicts over religion, absolutism and the divine right of kings; his deposition ended a century of political and civil strife by confirming the primacy of the English Parliament over the Crown.
James was the second surviving son of Charles I of England and Henrietta Maria of France, and was created Duke of York at birth. At the age of 51, he succeeded to the throne with widespread support on the death of his elder brother, Charles II. The general public was reluctant to undermine the principle of hereditary succession after the trauma of the brief republican Commonwealth of England 25 years before, and believed that a Catholic monarchy was purely temporary. However, tolerance of James's personal views did not extend to Catholicism in general, and both the English and Scottish parliaments refused to pass measures viewed as undermining the primacy of the Protestant religion. His attempts to impose them by absolutist decrees as a matter of his perceived divine right were met with opposition.
In June 1688, two events turned dissent into a crisis. Firstly, the birth of James's son and heir James Francis Edward Stuart on 10 June raised the prospect of a Catholic dynasty, displacing his Protestant daughter Mary, who had been heir presumptive.
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