What Enlightenment thinker was The Lord Ashley a major supporter of?
Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury, PC (22 July 1621 – 21 January 1683), known as Anthony Ashley Cooper from 1621 to 1630, as Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, 2nd Baronet from 1630 to 1661, and as The Lord Ashley from 1661 to 1672, was a prominent English politician during the Interregnum and during the reign of King Charles II. A founder of the Whig party, he is also remembered as the patron of John Locke.
Whiggism Whiggism, in North America sometimes spelled Whigism, is a historical political philosophy that grew out of the Parliamentarian faction in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms (1639–1651). The Whigs' key policy positions were the supremacy of Parliament (as opposed to that of the king), tolerance of Protestant dissenters, and opposition to a "Papist" (Roman Catholic) on the throne, especially James II or one of his descendants. After the huge success (from the Whig point of view) of the Glorious Revolution of 1688–1689, Whiggism dominated English and British politics until about 1760, although in practice the political group splintered into different factions. After 1760 the Whigs lost power, apart from sharing it in some short-lived coalition governments, but Whiggism fashioned itself into a generalised belief system that emphasised innovation and liberty and was strongly held by about half of the leading families in England and Scotland, as well as most merchants, Dissenters, and the middle classes. The opposing Tory position was held by the other great families, the Church of England, most of the landed gentry, and officers of the army and the navy.