WI: Henry IV remains Protestant?

IOTL, Henry IV, who had previously been Henry III of Navarre, ascended to the throne of France in 1589. He had been a Huguenot up until then, and had fought in the French Wars of Religion, leading Protestant forces against the Royal army. However, he converted to Catholicism upon taking the throne, and would later issue the Edict of Nantes.

What if he had remained Protestant? Is that even possible?

TheLordProtector said:

IOTL, Henry IV, who had previously been Henry III of Navarre, ascended to the throne of France in 1589. He had been a Huguenot up until then, and had fought in the French Wars of Religion, leading Protestant forces against the Royal army. However, he converted to Catholicism upon taking the throne, and would later issue the Edict of Nantes.

What if he had remained Protestant? Is that even possible?

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If he remains Protestant, the Catholic League most likely eventually gets its act together, and nominates a viable candidate. (Maybe Philip II finally swallows his pride, and agrees to let the Infanta Isabella marry Charles de Guise.) The Wars of Religion continue. Maybe one side wins. Maybe the other does. Maybe we wind up with two Frances, one compromising the northern provinces, with an ultraCatholic semirepublican government, the other based in the south, with an absolutist Protestant one.

There are a lot of possibilities.

If going by your method still happens Space Oddity, I could very well imagine a two state solution being a strong possibility.

The French Wars of Religion was largely a three way conflict, between the Catholic League led by the House of Guise and supported by Spain, the Papacy (and somehow, Savoy), the Protesant Hughenots, of which Navarre was part of and supported by the English, and the French Crown/Politiques.

By making Henry IV stay Protesant, you might see the Politique faction divide among religious lines, becoming a straight Catholic vs. Protesant conflict, which may continue beyond it's original end date of 1598. Though I do wish to ask, would a continuation of the conflict see itself continue into the Thirty Years War or a conflict of a similar analogue?

The Catholics would still resist and try to bypass Henry IV by claiming his Catholic cadet relatives were the rightful heirs. Charles, Cardinal de Bourbon was proclaimed Charles X, although IIRC he didn't really want the throne.

This of course, depends on the Duc de Guise still being assasinated OTL. Otherwise the Catholic factions stay fragmented.

M. Adolphe Thiers said:

The Catholics would still resist and try to bypass Henry IV by claiming his Catholic cadet relatives were the rightful heirs. Charles, Cardinal de Bourbon was proclaimed Charles X, although IIRC he didn't really want the throne.

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Yes, he did.

Cardinal Charles being some sort of reluctant figurehead hoisted up by the League is a later Bourbon invention. He'd been a big player in the Catholic circles for years, and had been trying to get the throne for either a Catholic nephew--with the Cardinal of course, serving as an advisor--or himself, if he could get released from his vows.

What if the Cardinal was released from his vows to marry Isabella Clara Eugenia?

Though there was the matter of if the Catholic League could get him released from Henry's clutches. Once Charles died in captivity in 1591, there was no way within the law of French Succession that would give them a Catholic rival claimant to the French throne. At least not without either revoking Salic law or legitimizing the illegitimate son of Charles IX, Charles, Duke of Angouleme.

Razgriz 2K9 said:

Though there was the matter of if the Catholic League could get him released from Henry's clutches. Once Charles died in captivity in 1591, there was no way within the law of French Succession that would give them a Catholic rival claimant to the French throne. At least not without either revoking Salic law or legitimizing the illegitimate son of Charles IX, Charles, Duke of Angouleme.

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Actually, that was a major feature of the Catholic League that people tend to miss--they wanted more than a Catholic succession. They wanted the Estates to have more power in government, and lot more curbs on the royal power. The "we'd have to change the succession laws" wasn't seen as an obstacle--it was seen as the big point.

TheLordProtector said:

IOTL, Henry IV, who had previously been Henry III of Navarre, ascended to the throne of France in 1589. He had been a Huguenot up until then, and had fought in the French Wars of Religion, leading Protestant forces against the Royal army. However, he converted to Catholicism upon taking the throne, and would later issue the Edict of Nantes.

What if he had remained Protestant? Is that even possible?

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In a word: No. The people of France would NEVER accept a Protestant King, just like how the English would never accept a Catholic King. Even if he takes Paris and is crowned in Reims, and those are big ifs, he would still be a Protestant. In all honesty, the Hugenots were a minority, a powerful minority mind you but a minority nun the less. It would be an earlier reverse James II. Even if Henri didn't plan on replacing Catholicism with Protestantism, it wouldn't be to hard for the peasants to be persuaded that he was, again like James II. Henri would have to convert at some point unless he want's invite revolts by Catholic Nobles.

Emperor Constantine said:

In a word: No. The people of France would NEVER accept a Protestant King, just like how the English would never accept a Catholic King. Even if he takes Paris and is crowned in Reims, and those are big ifs, he would still be a Protestant. In all honesty, the Hugenots were a minority, a powerful minority mind you but a minority nun the less. It would be an earlier reverse James II. Even if Henri didn't plan on replacing Catholicism with Protestantism, it wouldn't be to hard for the peasants to be persuaded that he was, again like James II. Henri would have to convert at some point unless he want's invite revolts by Catholic Nobles.

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Maybe so, but that's assuming that he somehow wins the French Wars of Religion by that time. Personally, I think his accession without conversion would only prolong the French Wars of Religion, rather than have a Catholic Revolt, which I would agree would probably be a lot more devastating to combat than the Huguenot Revolts that his successor, Louis XIII would deal with during his rule.

Space Oddity said:

Actually, that was a major feature of the Catholic League that people tend to miss--they wanted more than a Catholic succession. They wanted the Estates to have more power in government, and lot more curbs on the royal power. The "we'd have to change the succession laws" wasn't seen as an obstacle--it was seen as the big point.

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This actually really intrigues me. Say that the Catholic League does win by installing a Catholic Bourbon, I wonder how the butterflies would impact France's government down the road. If Absolutism is checked, then the conditions that lead to the Revolution are drastically altered.

Or even butterflied away, which could potentially mean a completely different Europe.