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History
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Timelines 1215
- Magna
Carta
- Runnymede,
England, on June 15, 1215, King John of England signed
the Magna Carta in which he conceded a number of legal
rights to his barons and to the people. In order to
finance his foreign wars, King John had taxed abusively.
His Barons threatened rebellion and coerced the King
into committing to rudimentary judicial guarantees such
as the freedom of the church, fair taxation, controls
over imprisonment (habeas corpus) and the right to all
merchants to come and go, freely, except in time of war.
The Magna Carta had 61 clauses the most important of
which may have been #39: "No freeman shall be
captured or imprisoned ... except by lawful judgment
of his peers or by the law of the land". It was the
first time a king allowed that even he could be
compelled to observe a law or the barons were allowed to
"distain
and distress him in every possible way", just short
of a legal right to rebellion. Once sworn to the
document, letters were sent to all sheriffs ordering
them to read the Charter aloud in public. It has been
called the "blueprint of English common law"
and was even recently pleaded in a English case. |
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© 2002 The Junto Society - All rights
reserved. Permission to reprint granted
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