Unionism in Scotland as England and Ireland. The political union between the Kingdoms of Scotland and England (also including Wales) was created by the Acts of Union, passed in the parliaments of both kingdoms in 1707 and 1706 respectively. Causes for this included English fears that Scotland would select a different (Catholic) monarch in future, and the failure of the Scottish colony at Darien. The Union was brought into existence under the Acts of Union on 1 May 1707, forming a single Kingdom of Great Britain. Scottish jacobite resistance to the union, led by descendants of James VII of Scotland (II of England),
Acts of Union 1707 were unhappy about the prospect, however. English overseas possessions made England very wealthy in comparison to Scotland, a poor country with few roads, very little industry and almost no Navy. This made some view unification as a markedly unequal relationship. In Scotland, some claimed that union would enable Scotland to recover from the financial disaster wrought by the Darien scheme through English assistance and the lifting of measures put in place through the Alien Act to force the Scottish Parliament into compliance with the Act of Settlement. The combined votes of the Court party with a majority of the Squadrone