Parliament and the Crown had always been partners in brandishing authority over the people ever since Parliament was just the King’s Council of medieval times. After the King’s Army had been defeated and the king dethroned, Lilburne and the Levellers held to their principled convictions and demanded Charles I be tried in a court of common law, just as any other common Englishman. The movement spurred by the Levellers was all but squashed by 1650, and England existed as a makeshift Republic controlled by Parliament (the Commonwealth of England) until 1660, when they invited Charles I’s son, Charles II, to ascend to the throne.