UNITED STATES BILL OF RIGHTS
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United States Bill of Rights
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United States Bill of Rights
United States Bill of Rights
United States Bill of Rights
Created September 25, 1789
Ratified December 15, 1791
Location National Archives
Author(s) James Madison
Purpose To set limits on what the government can and cannot do in regard to personal liberties.
The Bill of Rights is the collective name for the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution. These limitations serve to protect the natural rights of liberty and property. They guarantee a number of personal freedoms, limit the government's power in judicial and other proceedings, and reserve some powers to the states and the public. While originally the amendments applied only to the federal government, most of their provisions have since been held to apply to the states by way of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The amendments were introduced by James Madison to the 1st United States Congress as a series of legislative articles. They were adopted by the House of Representatives on August 21, 1789,[1][2] formally proposed by joint resolution of Congress on September 25, 1789, and came into effect as Constitutional Amendments on December 15, 1791, through the process of ratification by three-fourths of the States. While twelve amendments were passed by Congress, only ten were originally passed by the states. Of the remaining two, one was adopted as the Twenty-seventh Amendment and the other technically remains pending before the states.
Originally, the Bill of Rights included legal protection for land-owning white men only,[3] excluding African Americans[4] and women.[5][6] It took additional Constitutional Amendments and numerous Supreme Court cases to extend the same rights to all U.S. citizens.
The Bill of Rights plays a key role in American law and government, and remains a vital symbol of the freedoms and culture of the nation. One of the first fourteen copies of the Bill of Rights is on public display at the National Archives in Washington, D.C..
Contents
[hide]
1 Background and historical context
1.1 English Bill of Rights
1.1.1 Virginia Declaration of Rights
1.2 Articles of Confederation
1.3 The Anti-Federalists
2 Philadelphia Convention
2.1 Delegates to the Consitutional convention
3 The Bill of Rights
3.1 The Ideas of John Locke
3.2 Madison's preemptive proposal
3.3 Early sentiments favoring expanding the Bill of Rights
3.4 Ratification and the Massachusetts Compromise
4 Ratification process
4.1 Later consideration
4.2 Text of the Bill of Rights
4.2.1 Preamble
4.2.2 Amendments
4.3 Proposed amendments not passed with Bill of Rights
4.4 The Bill of Rights
5 Status of the original 14 copies
6 Excluded from The Bill of Rights
7 Display and honoring of the Bill of Rights
8 See also
9 References
10 Further reading
11 External links
Background and historical context
English Bill of Rights
One of the earliest documents used in drafting the American Bill of Rights was the English Bill of Rights of 1689, one of the fundamental documents of English constitutional law. The English Bill of Rights differed substantially in form and intent from the American Bill of Rights, because it was intended to address the rights of citizens as represented by Parliament against the Crown. However, some of its basic tenets were adopted and extended by the U.S. Bill of Rights, including:
the right of petition,
an independent judiciary (the Sovereign was forbidden to establish his own courts or to act as a judge himself),
freedom from taxation by royal (executive) prerogative, without agreement by Parliament (legislators),
freedom from a peace-time standing army,
freedom [for Protestants] to bear arms for their defence, as allowed by law,
freedom to elect members of Parliament without interference from the Sovereign,
freedom of speech in Parliament,
freedom from cruel and unusual punishments and excessive bail, and
freedom from fines and forfeitures without trial.
Virginia Declaration of Rights
Main article: Virginia Declaration of Rights
The Virginia Declaration of Rights, well-known to Madison, had already been a strong influence on the American Revolution ("all power is vested in, and consequently derived from, the people ...";[7] also "a majority of the community hath an indubitable, unalienable, and indefeasible right to reform, alter or abolish [the government]"). It had shaped the drafting of the United States Declaration of Independence a decade before the drafting of the Constitution, proclaiming that "all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights of which ... [they cannot divest;] namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety."[8] On a practical level, its recommendations of a government with a separation of powers (Articles 5–6) and "frequent, certain, and regular"[9] elections of executives and legislators were incorporated into the United States Constitution — but the bulk of this work addresses the rights of the people and restrictions on the powers of government, and is recognizable in the modern Bill of Rights:
The government should not have the power of suspending or executing laws, "without consent of the representatives of the people,".[10] A legal defendant has the right to be "confronted with the accusers and witnesses, to call for evidence in his favor, and to a speedy trial by an impartial jury of his vicinage," and may not be "compelled to give evidence against himself."[11] Individuals should be protected against "cruel and unusual punishments",[12] baseless search and seizure,[13] and be guaranteed a trial by jury.[14] The government should not abridge freedom of the press,[15] or freedom of religion ("all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion").[16] The government should be enjoined against maintaining a standing army rather than a "well regulated militia".[17]
Articles of Confederation
Prior to the acceptance and implementation of the United States Constitution, the original 13 colonies followed the stipulations and agreements set forth in the Articles of Confederation, created by the Second Continental Congress and ratified in 1781. The national government that operated under the Articles of Confederation was too weak however to adequately regulate the various conflicts that arose between the states.[18] The Philadelphia Convention set out to correct weaknesses inherent in the Articles of Confederation that had been apparent even before the American Revolutionary War had been successfully concluded.[18] The newly constituted Federal government included a strong executive branch, a stronger legislative branch and an independent judiciary.
The Bill of Rights is a series of limitations on the power of the U.S. federal government, protecting the natural rights of liberty and property including freedom of religion, freedom of speech, a free press, free assembly, and free association, as well as the right to keep and bear arms. In federal criminal cases, it requires indictment by a grand jury for any capital or "infamous crime", guarantees a speedy, public trial with an impartial jury composed of members of the state or judicial district in which the crime occurred, and prohibits double jeopardy. In addition, the Bill of Rights reserves for the people any rights not specifically mentioned in the Constitution[19] and reserves all powers not specifically granted to the federal government to the people or the States. Most of these restrictions on the federal government were later applied to the states by a series of legal decisions applying the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1868. The Bill was influenced by George Mason's 1776 Virginia Declaration of Rights, the English Bill of Rights 1689, works of the Age of Enlightenment pertaining to natural rights, and earlier English political documents such as Magna Carta (1215).
The Anti-Federalists
See also: Anti-Federalism and Anti-Federalist Papers
On June 5, 1788, Patrick Henry spoke before Virginia's ratification convention in opposition to the Constitution.
Following the Philadelphia Convention, some famous revolutionary figures and statesmen, such as Patrick Henry, publicly argued against the Constitution.[20] Many were concerned that the strong national government proposed by the Federalists was a threat to individual rights and that the President would become a king, and objected to the federal court system in the proposed Constitution.
Thomas Jefferson, at the time serving as Ambassador to France, wrote to Madison advocating a Bill of Rights: "Half a loaf is better than no bread. If we cannot secure all our rights, let us secure what we can."[21] George Mason refused to sign the proposed Constitution, in part to protest its lack of a Bill of Rights.[22]
In a paper later collected into the Anti-Federalist Papers, the pseudonymous "Brutus" (probably Robert Yates) wrote,
We find they have, in the ninth section of the first article declared, that the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless in cases of rebellion — that no bill of attainder, or ex post facto law, shall be passed — that no title of nobility shall be granted by the United States, etc. If every thing which is not given is reserved, what propriety is there in these exceptions? Does this Constitution any where grant the power of suspending the habeas corpus, to make ex post facto laws, pass bills of attainder, or grant titles of nobility? It certainly does not in express terms. The only answer that can be given is, that these are implied in the general powers granted. With equal truth it may be said, that all the powers which the bills of rights guard against the abuse of, are contained or implied in the general ones granted by this Constitution.[23]
Brutus continued with an implication directed against the Founding Fathers:
Ought not a government, vested with such extensive and indefinite authority, to have been restricted by a declaration of rights? It certainly ought. So clear a point is this, that I cannot help suspecting that persons who attempt to persuade people that such reservations were less necessary under this Constitution than under those of the States, are wilfully endeavoring to deceive, and to lead you into an absolute state of vassalage.[23]
Philadelphia Convention
The United States Constitutional Convention[24] (also known as the Philadelphia Convention,[24] and various other names) took place from May 14 to September 17, 1787, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and although the Convention was purportedly intended only to revise the Articles of Confederation, the intention from the outset of many of its proponents, chief among them James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, was to create a new government rather than fix the existing one. Due to the difficulty of travel in the late 18th century, very few of the selected delegates were present on the designated day of May 14, 1787, and it was not until May 25 that a quorum of seven states was secured. The convention convened in the Pennsylvania State House, and George Washington was unanimously elected as president of the convention[25] and William Jackson was elected as secretary. Madison's Notes of Debates in the Federal Convention of 1787 remain the most complete record of the convention.[18]
In late July, 1787, the convention appointed a Committee of Detail to draft a document based on the agreements that had been reached. After another month of discussion and refinement, a second committee, the Committee of Style and Arrangement, headed by Gouverneur Morris, and including Hamilton, William Samuel Johnson, Rufus King, and Madison, produced the final version, which was submitted for signing on September 17. Morris is credited, both now and then, as the chief draftsman of the final document, including the preamble.
Not all delegates were pleased with the results and thirteen of them left before the ceremony, three of those remaining refused to sign: Edmund Randolph of Virginia, George Mason of Virginia, and Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts. George Mason demanded a Bill of Rights if he was to support the Constitution. The Bill of Rights was not included in the Constitution submitted to the states for ratification, but many states ratified it anyway with the understanding that a bill of rights would soon follow.[26] 39 of the 55 delegates ended up signing, but it is likely that none were completely satisfied. Their views were summed up by Benjamin Franklin, who said,
"There are several parts of this Constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them. ... I doubt too whether any other Convention we can obtain, may be able to make a better Constitution. ... It therefore astonishes me, Sir, to find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does; and I think it will astonish our enemies..."
Delegates to the Philadelphia Convention on September 12, 1787 debated whether to include a Bill of Rights in the body of the U.S. Constitution, and an agreement to create the Bill of Rights helped to secure ratification of the Constitution itself.[27] Ideological conflict between Federalists and anti-Federalists threatened the final ratification of the new national Constitution. Thus, the Bill addressed the concerns of some of the Constitution's influential opponents, including prominent Founding Fathers, who argued that the Constitution should not be ratified because it failed to protect the fundamental principles of human liberty.
The Constitution was then submitted to the states for ratification, pursuant to its own Article VII. Twelve articles were proposed to the States, but only ten, corresponding to the First through Tenth Amendments, were ratified in the 18th Century. The first Article, dealing with the number and apportionment of U.S. Representatives, has never been ratified, and the second, limiting the power of Congress to increase the salaries of its members, was ratified in 1992 as the 27th Amendment.
Delegates to the Consitutional convention
The 55 delegates who drafted the Constitution included many of the Founding Fathers of the new nation. Thomas Jefferson, who was Minister to France during the convention, characterized the delegates as an assembly of "demi-gods."[18] John Adams also did not attend, being abroad in Europe as Minister to Great Britain, but he wrote home to encourage the delegates. Patrick Henry was also absent; he refused to go because he "smelt a rat in Philadelphia, tending toward the monarchy." Also absent were John Hancock and Samuel Adams. Rhode Island refused to send delegates to the convention.
Connecticut
Oliver Ellsworth*
William Samuel Johnson
Roger Sherman
Delaware
Richard Bassett
Gunning Bedford, Jr.
Jacob Broom
John Dickinson
George Read
Georgia
Abraham Baldwin
William Few
William Houstoun*
William Pierce*
Maryland
Daniel Carroll
Luther Martin*
James McHenry
John Francis Mercer*
Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer
Massachusetts
Elbridge Gerry*
Nathaniel Gorham
Rufus King
Caleb Strong*
New Hampshire
Nicholas Gilman
John Langdon
New Jersey
David Brearley
Jonathan Dayton
William Houston*
William Livingston
William Paterson
New York
Alexander Hamilton
John Lansing, Jr.*
Robert Yates*
North Carolina
William Blount
William Richardson Davie*
Alexander Martin*
Richard Dobbs Spaight
Hugh Williamson
Pennsylvania
George Clymer
Thomas Fitzsimons
Benjamin Franklin
Jared Ingersoll
Thomas Mifflin
Gouverneur Morris
Robert Morris
James Wilson
South Carolina
Pierce Butler
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney
Charles Pinckney
John Rutledge
Virginia
John Blair
James Madison
George Mason*
James McClurg*
Edmund Randolph*
George Washington
George Wythe*
Rhode Island
Rhode Island did not send delegates to the convention.
(*) Did not sign the final draft of the U.S. Constitution. Randolph, Mason, and Gerry were the only three present in Philadelphia at the time who refused to sign.
The Bill of Rights
The Ideas of John Locke
Madison's "Notes for speech on Constitutional amendments, June 8, 1789, in which he underlined the concept of "natural rights retained"
To some degree, the Bill of Rights (and the American Revolution) incorporated the ideas of John Locke, who argued in his 1689 work Two Treatises of Government that civil society was created for the protection of property (Latin proprius, or that which is one's own, meaning "life, liberty, and estate"). Locke also advanced the notion that each individual is free and equal in the state of nature. Locke expounded on the idea of natural rights that are inherent to all individuals, a concept Madison mentioned in his speech presenting the Bill of Rights to the 1st Congress. Locke's argument for protecting economic rights against government may have been most salient to the framers of the Amendments; quartering and cruel punishments were not the current abuses of 1791.[28]
Madison's preemptive proposal
On June 8, 1789, Madison submitted his proposal to Congress. In his speech to Congress on that day, Madison said:
For while we feel all these inducements to go into a revisal of the constitution, we must feel for the constitution itself, and make that revisal a moderate one. I should be unwilling to see a door opened for a re-consideration of the whole structure of the government, for a re-consideration of the principles and the substance of the powers given; because I doubt, if such a door was opened, if we should be very likely to stop at that point which would be safe to the government itself: But I do wish to see a door opened to consider, so far as to incorporate those provisions for the security of rights, against which I believe no serious objection has been made by any class of our constituents.[29]
Prior to listing his proposals for a number of constitutional amendments, Madison acknowledged a major reason for some of the discontent with the Constitution as written:
I believe that the great mass of the people who opposed [the Constitution], disliked it because it did not contain effectual provision against encroachments on particular rights, and those safeguards which they have been long accustomed to have interposed between them and the magistrate who exercised the sovereign power: nor ought we to consider them safe, while a great number of our fellow citizens think these securities necessary.[29]
The proposal was adopted by the House of Representatives on August 21, 1789, forwarded to the Senate on August 24, and adopted by joint resolution of Congress on September 25, 1789 to be forwarded to the states on September 28.[1][2][30]
Early sentiments favoring expanding the Bill of Rights
A portrait of Alexander Hamilton shortly after the American Revolution
The idea of adding a bill of rights to the Constitution was originally controversial. Alexander Hamilton, in Federalist No. 84, argued against a "Bill of Rights," asserting that ratification of the Constitution did not mean the American people were surrendering their rights, and, therefore, that protections were unnecessary: "Here, in strictness, the people surrender nothing, and as they retain everything, they have no need of particular reservations." Critics pointed out that earlier political documents had protected specific rights, but Hamilton argued that the Constitution was inherently different:
Bills of rights are in their origin, stipulations between kings and their subjects, abridgments of prerogative in favor of privilege, reservations of rights not surrendered to the prince. Such was "Magna Charta", obtained by the Barons, swords in hand, from King John.[31]
Finally, Hamilton expressed the fear that protecting specific rights might imply that any unmentioned rights would not be protected:
I go further, and affirm that bills of rights, in the sense and in the extent in which they are contended for, are not only unnecessary in the proposed constitution, but would even be dangerous. They would contain various exceptions to powers which are not granted; and on this very account, would afford a colorable pretext to claim more than were granted. For why declare that things shall not be done which there is no power to do?[31]
Essentially, Hamilton and other Federalists believed in the British system of common law which did not define or quantify natural rights. They believed that adding a Bill of Rights to the Constitution would limit their rights to those listed in the Constitution. This is the primary reason the Ninth Amendment was included.
Thomas Jefferson was a supporter of the Bill of Rights.[32] George Mason "wished the plan [the Constitution] had been prefaced with a Bill of Rights." Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts "concurred in the idea & moved for a Committee to prepare a Bill of Rights." Roger Sherman argued against a Bill of Rights stating that the "State Declarations of Rights are not repealed by this Constitution." Mason then stated "The Laws of the U. S. are to be paramount to State Bills of Rights." Gerry's motion was defeated with 10-Nays, 1-Absent, and No-Yeas.[33]
Ratification and the Massachusetts Compromise
Ratification of the Constitution
Date State Votes
Yes No
1 December 7, 1787 Delaware 30 0
2 December 11, 1787 Pennsylvania 46 23
3 December 18, 1787 New Jersey 38 0
4 January 2, 1788 Georgia 26 0
5 January 9, 1788 Connecticut 128 40
6 February 6, 1788 Massachusetts 187 168
7 April 26, 1788 Maryland 63 11
8 May 23, 1788 South Carolina 149 73
9 June 21, 1788 New Hampshire 57 47
10 June 25, 1788 Virginia 89 79
11 July 26, 1788 New York 30 27
12 November 21, 1789 North Carolina 194 77
13 May 29, 1790 Rhode Island 34 32
Individualism was the strongest element of opposition; the necessity, or at least the desirability, of a bill of rights was almost universally felt, and the Anti-Federalists were able to play on these feelings in the ratification convention in Massachusetts. By this stage, five of the states had ratified the Constitution with relative ease; however, the Massachusetts convention was bitter and contentious:
In Massachusetts, the Constitution ran into serious, organized opposition. Only after two leading Anti-federalists, Adams and Hancock, negotiated a far-reaching compromise did the convention vote for ratification on February 6, 1788 (187–168). Anti-federalists had demanded that the Constitution be amended before they would consider it or that amendments be a condition of ratification; Federalists had retorted that it had to be accepted or rejected as it was. Under the Massachusetts compromise, the delegates recommended amendments to be considered by the new Congress, should the Constitution go into force. The Massachusetts compromise determined the fate of the Constitution, as it permitted delegates with doubts to vote for it in the hope that it would be amended.[34]
On September 17, 1787, the Constitution was completed, followed by a speech given by Benjamin Franklin, who urged unanimity, although the Convention decided that only nine states were needed to ratify. The Convention submitted the Constitution to the Congress of the Confederation[35]
Massachusetts’ Rufus King assessed the Convention as a creature of the states, independent of the Articles Congress, submitting its proposal to Congress only to satisfy forms. Though amendments were debated, they were all defeated, and on September 28, 1787, the Articles Congress resolved “unanimously” to transmit the Constitution to state legislatures for submitting to a ratification convention according to the Constitutional procedure.[36] Several states enlarged the numbers qualified just for electing ratification delegates. In this they went beyond the Constitution's provision for the most voters for the state legislature to make a new social contract among, more nearly than ever before, "We, the people".[37]
Following Massachusetts' lead, the Federalist minorities in both Virginia and New York were able to obtain ratification in convention by linking ratification to recommended amendments.[38] A minority of the Constitution’s critics continued to oppose the Constitution. Maryland’s Luther Martin argued that the federal convention had exceeded its authority; he still called for amending the Articles.[39] Article 13 of the Articles of Confederation stated that the union created under the Articles was "perpetual" and that any alteration must be "agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and be afterwards confirmed by the legislatures of every State".[40]
However, the unanimous requirement under the Articles made all attempts at reform impossible. Martin’s allies such as New York’s John Lansing, Jr., dropped moves to obstruct the Convention's process. They began to take exception to the Constitution “as it was”, seeking amendments. Several conventions saw supporters for "amendments before" shift to a position of "amendments after" for the sake of staying in the Union. New York Anti’s “circular letter” was sent to each state legislature proposing a second constitutional convention for "amendments before". It failed in the state legislatures. Ultimately, only North Carolina and Rhode Island would wait for amendments from Congress before ratifying.[38]
Article VII of the proposed constitution stipulated that only nine of the thirteen states would have to ratify for the new government to go into effect (for the participating states). After a year had passed in state-by-state ratification battles, on September 13, 1788, the Articles Congress certified that the new Constitution had been ratified. The new government would be inaugurated with eleven of the thirteen. The Articles Congress directed the new government to begin in New York City on the first Wednesday in March,[41] and on March 4, 1789, the government duly began operations.
George Washington had earlier been reluctant to go the Convention for fear the states “with their darling sovereignties” could not be overcome.[42] But he was elected the Constitution's President unanimously, including the vote of Virginia’s presidential elector, the Anti-federalist Patrick Henry.[43] The new Congress would be a triumph for the Federalists. The Senate of eleven states would be 20 Federalists to two Virginia (Henry) Anti-federalists. The House would seat 48 Federalists to 11 Antis from only four states: Massachusetts, New York, Virginia and South Carolina.[44]
Antis' fears of personal oppression by Congress would be allayed by Amendments passed under the floor leadership of James Madison in the first session of the first Congress. These first ten Amendments ratified by the states were to become known as the Bill of Rights.[45] Objections to a potentially remote federal judiciary would be reconciled with 13 federal courts (11 states, Maine and Kentucky), and three Federal riding circuits out of the Supreme Court: Eastern, Middle and South.[46] Suspicion of a powerful federal executive was answered by Washington’s cabinet appointments of once-Anti-Federalists Edmund Jennings Randolph as Attorney General and Thomas Jefferson as Secretary of State.[47][48]
What Constitutional historian Pauline Maier calls a national “dialogue between power and liberty” had begun anew.[49]
George Washington's 1788 letter to the Marquis de Lafayette observed, "the Convention of Massachusetts adopted the Constitution in toto; but recommended a number of specific alterations and quieting explanations." Source: Library of Congress
Four of the next five states to ratify, including New Hampshire, Virginia, and New York, included similar language in their ratification instruments. They all sent recommendations for amendments with their ratification documents to the new Congress. Since many of these recommendations pertained to safeguarding personal rights, this pressured Congress to add a Bill of Rights after Constitutional ratification. Additionally, North Carolina refused to ratify the Constitution until progress was made on the issue of the Bill of Rights. Thus, while the Anti-Federalists were unsuccessful in their quest to prevent the adoption of the Constitution, their efforts were not totally in vain.
After the Constitution was ratified in 1789, the 1st United States Congress met in Federal Hall in New York City. Most of the delegates agreed that a "bill of rights" was needed and most of them agreed on the rights they believed should be enumerated.
James Madison, "Father of the Constitution" and first author of the Bill of Rights
Madison, at the head of the Virginia delegation of the 1st Congress, had originally opposed a Bill of Rights but hoped to pre-empt a second Constitutional Convention that might have undone the difficult compromises of 1787: a second convention would open the entire Constitution to reconsideration and could undermine the work he and so many others had done in establishing the structure of the U.S. Government. Writing to Jefferson, he stated, "The friends of the Constitution...wish the revisal to be carried no farther than to supply additional guards for liberty...and are fixed in opposition to the risk of another Convention....It is equally certain that there are others who urge a second Convention with the insidious hope of throwing all things into Confusion, and of subverting the fabric just established, if not the Union itself."[50]
Madison based much of the Bill of Rights on George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776),[51] which itself had been written with Madison's input. He carefully considered the state amendment recommendations as well. He looked for recommendations shared by many states to avoid controversy and reduce opposition to the ratification of the future amendments.[52] Additionally, Madison's work on the Bill of Rights reflected centuries of English law and philosophy, further modified by the principles of the American Revolution.
Ratification process
On November 20, 1789, New Jersey became the first state to ratify these amendments. On December 15, 1791, ten of these proposals became the First through Tenth Amendments — and U.S. law — when they were ratified by the Virginia legislature.
Ratification timeline:
September 17, 1787 – Final draft of the Constitution is signed and convention adjourns.
September 28, 1787 – Continental Congress approves sending proposed Constitution to states for their consideration.
December 7, 1787 – Delaware is 1st state to ratify the Constitution.
December 12, 1787 – Pennsylvania is 2nd state to ratify the Constitution.
December 18, 1787 – New Jersey is 3rd state to ratify the Constitution.
January 2, 1788 – Georgia is 4th state to ratify the Constitution.
January 9, 1788 – Connecticut is 5th state to ratify the Constitution.
February 6, 1788 – Massachusetts is 6th state to ratify the Constitution.
March 24, 1788 – Rhode Island REFUSES to call ratifying convention.
April 28, 1788 – Maryland is 7th state to ratify the Constitution.
May 23, 1788 – South Carolina is 8th state to ratify the Constitution.
June 21, 1788 – New Hampshire is 9th state to ratify the Constitution.
June 25, 1788 – Virginia is 10th state to ratify the Constitution.
July 26, 1788 – New York is 11th state to ratify the Constitution.
March 4, 1789 – The Constitution goes into effect.
September 25, 1789 – Congress proposes Bill of Rights.
November 20, 1789 – New Jersey is 1st state to ratify the Bill of Rights; rejected article II[53]
November 21, 1789 – North Carolina is 12th state to ratify the Constitution.
December 19, 1789 – Maryland is 2nd state to ratify the Bill of Rights, approved all
December 22, 1789 – North Carolina is 3rd state to ratify the Bill of Rights, approved all
January 19, 1790 – South Carolina is 4th state to ratify the Bill of Rights, approved all
January 25, 1790 – New Hampshire is 5th state to ratify the Bill of Rights, rejected article II.
January 28, 1790 – Delaware is 6th state to ratify the Bill of Rights, rejected article I
February 24, 1790 – New York is 7th state to ratify the Bill of Rights, rejected article II
March 10, 1790 – Pennsylvania is 8th state to ratify the Bill of Rights, rejected article II
May 29, 1790 – Rhode Island is 13th state to ratify the Constitution, rejected article II
June 7, 1790 – Rhode Island is 9th state to ratify the Bill of Rights.
October 17, 1790 – Treaty between New York and Vermont paves way for Vermont's admission to the union.
January 10, 1791 – Vermont becomes 14th state to ratify the Constitution — except that it's not a state until March 4, 1791.
November 3, 1791 – Vermont is 10th state to ratify the Bill of Rights, approved all
December 15, 1791 – Virginia is 11th state to ratify the Bill of Rights, approved all and the Bill of Rights goes into effect.
March 2, 1792 – Massachusetts is 12th state to ratify the Bill of Rights.
March 18, 1792 – Georgia is 13th state to ratify the Bill of Rights.
April 19, 1792 – Connecticut is 14th state to ratify the Bill of Rights.
Articles III to XII were ratified by 11/14 states (> 75%). Article I, rejected by Delaware, was ratified only by 10/14 States (< 75%), and despite later ratification by Kentucky (11/15 states < 75%), the article has never since received the approval of enough states for it to become part of the Constitution. Article II was ratified by 6/14, later 7/15 states, but did not receive the 3/4 majority of States needed for ratification until 1992 when it became the 27th Amendment.
Later consideration
Lawmakers in Kentucky, which became the 15th state to join the Union in June 1792, ratified the entire set of twelve proposals during that commonwealth's initial month of statehood, perhaps unaware — given the nature of long-distance communications in the 1700s — that Virginia's approval six months earlier had already made ten of the package of twelve part of the Constitution.
Although ratification made the Bill of Rights effective in 1791, three of the original thirteen states — Connecticut, Georgia, and Massachusetts — did not ratify the first ten amendments until 1939, when they were urged to do so in a celebration of the 150th anniversary of their passage by Congress.[54]
Text of the Bill of Rights
Preamble
Congress of the United States begun and held at the City of New-York, on Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty nine
THE Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution.
RESOLVED by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, two thirds of both Houses concurring, that the following Articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several States, as amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all, or any of which Articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures, to be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of the said Constitution; viz.
ARTICLES in addition to, and Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress, and ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution.[55]
Amendments
Further information: List of amendments to the United States Constitution
First Amendment – Establishment Clause, Free Exercise Clause; freedom of speech, of the press, and of assembly; right to petition
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Second Amendment – Militia (United States), Sovereign state, Right to keep and bear arms.
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.[56]
Third Amendment – Protection from quartering of troops.
No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
Fourth Amendment – Protection from unreasonable search and seizure.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Fifth Amendment – due process, double jeopardy, self-incrimination, eminent domain.
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Sixth Amendment – Trial by jury and rights of the accused; Confrontation Clause, speedy trial, public trial, right to counsel
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.
Seventh Amendment – Civil trial by jury.
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
Eighth Amendment – Prohibition of excessive bail and cruel and unusual punishment.
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Ninth Amendment – Protection of rights not specifically enumerated in the Constitution.
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Tenth Amendment – Powers of States and people.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Proposed amendments not passed with Bill of Rights
Article I – Apportionment.
After the enumeration required by the first article of the Constitution, there shall be one representative for every thirty thousand, until the number shall amount to one hundred, after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress, that there shall be not less than one hundred representatives, nor less than one representative for every forty thousand persons, until the number of representatives shall amount to two hundred; after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress, that there shall be not less than two hundred representatives, nor more than one representative for every fifty thousand persons.
Article II (ratified in 1992 as Twenty-seventh Amendment) – Congressional pay raises.
No law varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.
The Bill of Rights
United States Bill of Rights currently housed in the National Archives.
It is commonly understood that originally the Bill of Rights was not intended to apply to the states; however, there is no such limit in the text itself, except where an amendment refers specifically to the federal government. One example is the First Amendment, which says only that "Congress shall make no law...", and under which some states in the early years of the nation officially established a religion. A rule of inapplicability to the states remained until 1868, when the Fourteenth Amendment was passed, which stated, in part, that:
“ No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. ”
The Supreme Court has interpreted this clause to extend most, but not all, parts of the Bill of Rights to the states, a process known as incorporation of the Bill of Rights. The balance of state and federal power under the incorporation doctrine is still an open question and continues to be fought separately for each right in the federal courts.
The amendments that became the Bill of Rights were the last ten of the twelve amendments proposed in 1789. The second of the twelve proposed amendments, regarding the compensation of members of Congress, remained unratified until 1992, when the legislatures of enough states finally approved it; as a result, after pending for two centuries, it became the Twenty-seventh Amendment.
The first of the twelve, which is still technically pending before the state legislatures for ratification, pertains to the apportionment of the United States House of Representatives after each decennial census. The most recent state whose lawmakers are known to have ratified this proposal is Kentucky in 1792, during that commonwealth's first month of statehood.
First Amendment: addresses the rights of freedom of religion (prohibiting Congress from making a law "respecting an establishment" of religion and protecting the right to free exercise of religion), freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and freedom of petition.
Second Amendment: guarantees the right of individuals to possess weapons. The most recent Supreme Court decision interpreting the Second Amendment is McDonald v. Chicago.
Third Amendment: prohibits the government from using private homes as quarters for soldiers during peacetime without the consent of the owners. The only existing case law directly regarding this amendment is a decision of the Court of Appeals (the appellate level between the U.S. District Court and the U.S. Supreme Court) in the case of Engblom v. Carey.[57] However, it is also cited in the landmark case, Griswold v. Connecticut, in support of the Supreme Court's holding that the constitution protects the right to personal privacy.
Fourth Amendment: guards against searches, arrests, and seizures of property without a specific warrant or a "probable cause" to believe a crime has been committed. Some rights to privacy have been inferred from this amendment and others by the Supreme Court.
Fifth Amendment: forbids trial for a major crime except after indictment by a grand jury; prohibits double jeopardy (repeated trials), except in certain very limited circumstances; forbids punishment without due process of law; and provides that an accused person may not be compelled to testify against himself (this is also known as "Taking the Fifth" or "Pleading the Fifth"). This is regarded as the "rights of the accused" amendment, otherwise known as the Miranda rights after the Supreme Court case. It also prohibits government from taking private property for public use without "just compensation", the basis of eminent domain in the United States.
Sixth Amendment: guarantees a speedy public trial for criminal offenses. It requires trial by a jury, guarantees the right to legal counsel for the accused, and guarantees that the accused may require witnesses to attend the trial and testify in the presence of the accused. It also guarantees the accused a right to know the charges against him. The Sixth Amendment has several court cases associated with it, including Powell v. Alabama, United States v. Wong Kim Ark, Gideon v. Wainwright, and Crawford v. Washington. In 1966, the Supreme Court ruled that the fifth amendment prohibition on forced self-incrimination and the sixth amendment clause on right to counsel were to be made known to all persons placed under arrest, and these clauses have become known as the Miranda rights.
Seventh Amendment: assures trial by jury in civil cases.
Eighth Amendment: forbids excessive bail or fines, and cruel and unusual punishment.
Ninth Amendment: declares that the listing of individual rights in the Constitution and Bill of Rights is not meant to be comprehensive; and that the other rights not specifically mentioned are retained by the people.
Tenth Amendment: reserves to the states respectively, or to the people, any powers the Constitution did not delegate to the United States, nor prohibit the states from exercising.
Status of the original 14 copies
George Washington had fourteen handwritten copies of the Bill of Rights made, one for Congress and one for each of the original thirteen states:[58] Connecticut,[59] Delaware,[60] Georgia,[59] Maryland,[61] Massachusetts,[59] New Hampshire,[59] New Jersey,[62] New York,[63][64] North Carolina,[58][65] Pennsylvania,[59] Rhode Island,[59] South Carolina,[59] Virginia.[66]
The copies for Georgia, Maryland, New York, and Pennsylvania are missing. The New York copy is thought to have been destroyed in a fire,[64] whereas the Pennsylvania copy reportedly disappeared in the later 18th century.[citation needed] Two unidentified copies of the missing four (thought to be the Georgia and Maryland copies) survive; one is in the National Archives[67][68] and the other is in the New York Public Library.[65]
North Carolina's copy was stolen by a Union soldier in April 1865 and returned to North Carolina in 2005, 140 years later by FBI Special Agent Robert King Wittman.[58][65]
Virginia's copy was used for the Bill of Rights Tour, to mark the bicentennial of the Bill of Rights, in 1991.
Excluded from The Bill of Rights
Main article: Incorporation of the Bill of Rights
Originally, the Bill of Rights restrictions applied only to the federal government and not to the state governments. Parts of the amendments originally proposed by Madison that would have limited state governments ("No state shall violate the equal rights of conscience, or the freedom of the press, or the trial by jury in criminal cases.") were not approved by Congress, and therefore the Bill of Rights did not apply to the powers of state governments.[69]
States had established state churches up until the 1820s, and Southern states, beginning in the 1830s, could ban abolitionist literature. In the 1833 case Barron v. Baltimore, the Supreme Court specifically ruled that the Bill of Rights provided "security against the apprehended encroachments of the general government—not against those of local governments." In the Gitlow v. New York, 268 U.S. 652, (1925) case, the Supreme Court ruled that the Fourteenth Amendment, which had been adopted in 1868, could make certain applications of the Bill of Rights applicable to the states. However, the Gitlow case stated (p. 666): "For present purposes we may and do presume that freedom of speech and of the press — which are protected by the First Amendment from abridgment by Congress — are among the fundamental personal rights and 'liberties' protected by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment from impairment by the States." However at p. 668, the Court held: "It does not protect publications prompting the overthrow of government by force", which Gitlow and associates advocated in their publications. The Supreme Court has cited Gitlow v. New York as precedent for a series of decisions that made most, but not all, of the provisions of the Bill of Rights restrictions applicable to the states under the doctrine of selective incorporation.
The Bill of Rights applied to white men who owned property and excluded most Americans. Free blacks were excluded from The Bill Of Rights because they were not citizens.[70] Also excluded were all women, Native Americans, immigrants and white men who did not own land.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
OATH KEEPERS ( URGENT ALTER SENATE BILL 1867 )
OATH KEEPERS URGENT ALTER SENATE BILL 1867
#1 User is online William Finley
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Joined: 29-June 11
LocationOswego IL.
Posted Today, 08:25 PM
Stop Indefinite Detention of U.S. Citizens Without Due Process
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NOTE FROM STEWART RHODES: Below is an urgent alert from the John Birch society regarding Senate Bill 1867, the Defense Authorization Act of 2012, which will give clear congressional support and authorization for indefinite military detention and military trial of American citizens. If passed, this will amount to a declaration of war against the American people, authorizing the Obama Administration and all future administrations to treat Americans the same as citizens of occupied Iraq or Afghanistan, subjecting us all to military jurisdiction and the jurisdiction of the international laws of war, rather than our Bill of Rights and our domestic criminal laws, upon the mere say so of Obama or one of his minions.
There is a great deal of confusion about this bill, with some incorrectly interpreting it as not affecting American citizens. There is also confusion about the very dangerous legal precedents that this bill seeks to codify and bolster.
I am writing an in-depth article where I will do my best to clarify both what this bill does, how all three branches of the federal government have worked to impose the international laws of war on the American people, and just how close we are to losing our Bill of Rights forever. I will send that article out shortly, but please act now to put some serious pressure on your Senators to stop the detention provisions in S. 1867.
We are now very nearly at the point where all that will save liberty in America is another American Revolution. This bill, if it becomes law, will shove us across that line, placing us in almost exactly the same position our forefathers were in when they were forced to take up arms in defense of their liberty in 1775. If you wish to avoid that, you must stop this bill from becoming law, right now.
- Stewart Rhodes, Founder of Oath Keepers
Stop Indefinite Detention of U.S. Citizens Without Due Process
Immediate action required!
Deep inside the National Defense Authorization Act (S. 1867) that the Senate is currently considering is a dangerous and unconstitutional portion that needs to be stripped out. Congress would grant the President the power to use the military in order to detain certain individuals, including American citizens, without trial or due process, indefinitely.
Section 1031 of the National Defense Authorization Act reads: "Congress affirms that the authority of the President to use all necessary and appropriate force ... includes the authority for the Armed Forces of the United States to detain covered persons.... [including] [d]etention under the law of war without trial...." This "indefinite detention" section hands over to the Executive Branch the power to have the military arrest U.S. citizens. No trial needed. Simple suspicion would suffice.
This could be quite reminiscent of Stalinist Russia where a knock on the door in the middle of the night meant that the person taken by the military was often never seen again, perhaps having been imprisoned in Siberia or executed. The Japanese American Citizens League has warned that this measure's detention principles are similar to the ones that sent innocent Japanese-Americans into concentration camps during WW II.
Sadly, this bill has already been passed in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives with nary a whimper by a 322-96 vote. The excuse given for such an egregious disregard for the Constitution by supporters of the bill including authors Senators John McCain (R- Ariz.) and Carl Levin (D-Mich.) is that the provision would strengthen and codify the legal framework necessary for dealing with "terrorists." Other supporters insist that the language doesn't necessarily include American citizens.
U.S. Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) who voted against the bill in the House, thinks differently. Amash says the act would indeed "permit the federal government to indefinitely detain American citizens on American soil, without charge or trial, at the discretion of the President." He notes that the language "does not preclude U.S. citizens from being detained indefinitely, without charge or trial, it simply makes such detention discretionary," therefore it is misleading and outrageous.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is speaking out in opposition to the "indefinite detainment" provision of S. 1867. He is also offering an amendment that would simply strike out Section 1031 of the bill. As this alert is being written on November 29, the Senate is debating S. 1867 and could vote on the Paul amendment this evening or tomorrow, November 30. A related amendment by Senator Udall to revise the detainee provisions of S. 1867 has already been defeated today by a vote of 37 yeas and 61 nays.
Indefinite detention without due process leaves citizens without the legal protection of the Constitution and strikes at the heart of the essence of U.S. law. It is positively shameful that any elected representative would even consider voting for such an assault on so sacred a fundamental value as the right to due process.
Far too much power has already been either usurped or given over to the Executive Branch under the guise of national security. Contact your Senators immediately and demand that they safeguard individual freedom and liberty by upholding the protections guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. Have them support the Rand Paul amendment that would completely strike Section 1031 from S. 1867, or any other amendment that would accomplish the same purpose.
If one or more amendments are added to S. 1867, it will likely go to a conference committee and then return to both the House and the Senate for a final vote. So, a word to your Representative on this issue is also advised. Make sure you find out how he or she voted on the NDAA before getting in touch.
Thanks.
Your friends at The John Birch Society
Comment at OathKeepers.org
#1 User is online William Finley
Advanced Member
PipPipPip
Group: Illinois Moderators
Posts: 271
Joined: 29-June 11
LocationOswego IL.
Posted Today, 08:25 PM
Stop Indefinite Detention of U.S. Citizens Without Due Process
Quick Links
Oath Keepers Website
Join Oath Keepers
National And State Chapter Forums
Donate
Contact Oath Keepers
Youtube
NOTE FROM STEWART RHODES: Below is an urgent alert from the John Birch society regarding Senate Bill 1867, the Defense Authorization Act of 2012, which will give clear congressional support and authorization for indefinite military detention and military trial of American citizens. If passed, this will amount to a declaration of war against the American people, authorizing the Obama Administration and all future administrations to treat Americans the same as citizens of occupied Iraq or Afghanistan, subjecting us all to military jurisdiction and the jurisdiction of the international laws of war, rather than our Bill of Rights and our domestic criminal laws, upon the mere say so of Obama or one of his minions.
There is a great deal of confusion about this bill, with some incorrectly interpreting it as not affecting American citizens. There is also confusion about the very dangerous legal precedents that this bill seeks to codify and bolster.
I am writing an in-depth article where I will do my best to clarify both what this bill does, how all three branches of the federal government have worked to impose the international laws of war on the American people, and just how close we are to losing our Bill of Rights forever. I will send that article out shortly, but please act now to put some serious pressure on your Senators to stop the detention provisions in S. 1867.
We are now very nearly at the point where all that will save liberty in America is another American Revolution. This bill, if it becomes law, will shove us across that line, placing us in almost exactly the same position our forefathers were in when they were forced to take up arms in defense of their liberty in 1775. If you wish to avoid that, you must stop this bill from becoming law, right now.
- Stewart Rhodes, Founder of Oath Keepers
Stop Indefinite Detention of U.S. Citizens Without Due Process
Immediate action required!
Deep inside the National Defense Authorization Act (S. 1867) that the Senate is currently considering is a dangerous and unconstitutional portion that needs to be stripped out. Congress would grant the President the power to use the military in order to detain certain individuals, including American citizens, without trial or due process, indefinitely.
Section 1031 of the National Defense Authorization Act reads: "Congress affirms that the authority of the President to use all necessary and appropriate force ... includes the authority for the Armed Forces of the United States to detain covered persons.... [including] [d]etention under the law of war without trial...." This "indefinite detention" section hands over to the Executive Branch the power to have the military arrest U.S. citizens. No trial needed. Simple suspicion would suffice.
This could be quite reminiscent of Stalinist Russia where a knock on the door in the middle of the night meant that the person taken by the military was often never seen again, perhaps having been imprisoned in Siberia or executed. The Japanese American Citizens League has warned that this measure's detention principles are similar to the ones that sent innocent Japanese-Americans into concentration camps during WW II.
Sadly, this bill has already been passed in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives with nary a whimper by a 322-96 vote. The excuse given for such an egregious disregard for the Constitution by supporters of the bill including authors Senators John McCain (R- Ariz.) and Carl Levin (D-Mich.) is that the provision would strengthen and codify the legal framework necessary for dealing with "terrorists." Other supporters insist that the language doesn't necessarily include American citizens.
U.S. Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) who voted against the bill in the House, thinks differently. Amash says the act would indeed "permit the federal government to indefinitely detain American citizens on American soil, without charge or trial, at the discretion of the President." He notes that the language "does not preclude U.S. citizens from being detained indefinitely, without charge or trial, it simply makes such detention discretionary," therefore it is misleading and outrageous.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is speaking out in opposition to the "indefinite detainment" provision of S. 1867. He is also offering an amendment that would simply strike out Section 1031 of the bill. As this alert is being written on November 29, the Senate is debating S. 1867 and could vote on the Paul amendment this evening or tomorrow, November 30. A related amendment by Senator Udall to revise the detainee provisions of S. 1867 has already been defeated today by a vote of 37 yeas and 61 nays.
Indefinite detention without due process leaves citizens without the legal protection of the Constitution and strikes at the heart of the essence of U.S. law. It is positively shameful that any elected representative would even consider voting for such an assault on so sacred a fundamental value as the right to due process.
Far too much power has already been either usurped or given over to the Executive Branch under the guise of national security. Contact your Senators immediately and demand that they safeguard individual freedom and liberty by upholding the protections guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. Have them support the Rand Paul amendment that would completely strike Section 1031 from S. 1867, or any other amendment that would accomplish the same purpose.
If one or more amendments are added to S. 1867, it will likely go to a conference committee and then return to both the House and the Senate for a final vote. So, a word to your Representative on this issue is also advised. Make sure you find out how he or she voted on the NDAA before getting in touch.
Thanks.
Your friends at The John Birch Society
Comment at OathKeepers.org
DECLARATION OF THE CAUSE AND NECESSITY TO TAKE UP ARMS JULY 6 1775
DECLARATION OF THE CAUSE AND NECESSITY OF TAKING UP ARMS JULY 6 1775
#1 User is online William Finley
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Posted Today, 01:34 PM
Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms was a document issued by the Second Continental Congress on July 6, 1775, to explain why the Thirteen Colonies had taken up arms in what had become the American Revolutionary War. The final draft of the Declaration was written by John Dickinson, who incorporated language from an earlier draft by Thomas Jefferson.
Contents
[hide]
1 Content
2 Authorship
3 References
4 Further reading
5 External links
[edit] Content
Wikisource has original text related to this article:
Declaration of the causes and necessities of taking up arms
The Declaration describes what colonists viewed as the unconstitutional effort of the British Parliament to extend its jurisdiction into the colonies following the Seven Years' War. Objectionable policies listed in the Declaration include taxation without representation, extended use of vice admiralty courts, the several Coercive Acts, and the Declaratory Act. The Declaration describes how the colonists had, for ten years, repeatedly petitioned for the redress of their grievances, only to have their pleas ignored or rejected by the British government. Even though British troops have been sent to enforce these unconstitutional acts, the Declaration insists that the colonists do not yet seek independence from the mother country. They have taken up arms "in defence of the Freedom that is our Birthright and which we ever enjoyed until the late Violation of it", and will "lay them down when Hostilities shall cease on the part of the Aggressors".
[edit] Authorship
In the 19th century, the authorship of the Declaration was disputed. In a collection of his works first published in 1801, John Dickinson took credit for writing the Declaration. This claim went unchallenged by Thomas Jefferson until many years later, when Jefferson was nearly 80 years old. In his autobiography, Jefferson claimed that he wrote the first draft, but Dickinson objected that it was too radical, and so Congress allowed Dickinson to write a more moderate version, keeping only the last four-and-a-half paragraphs of Jefferson's draft. Jefferson's version of events was accepted by historians for many years. In 1950, Julian P. Boyd, the editor of Jefferson's papers, examined the extant drafts and determined that Jefferson's memory was faulty and that Dickinson claimed too much credit for the final text.
According to Boyd, an initial draft was reportedly written by John Rutledge, a member of a committee of five appointed to create the Declaration. Rutledge's draft was not accepted and does not survive. Jefferson and Dickinson were then added to the committee. Jefferson was appointed to write a draft; how much he drew upon the lost Rutledge draft, if at all, is unknown. Jefferson then apparently submitted his draft to Dickinson, who suggested some changes, which Jefferson, for the most part, decided not to use. The result was that Dickinson rewrote the Declaration, keeping some passages written by Jefferson. Contrary to Jefferson's recollection in his old age, Dickinson's version was not less radical; according to Boyd, in some respects Dickinson's draft was more blunt. The bold statement near the end was written by Dickinson: "Our cause is just. Our union is perfect. Our internal resources are great, and, if necessary, foreign assistance is undoubtedly attainable." The disagreement in 1775 between Dickinson and Jefferson appears to have been primarily a matter of style, not content.
[edit] References
Boyd, Julian P., ed. The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 1. Princeton University Press, 1950. Includes two drafts by Jefferson, one by Dickinson, and the version adopted by Congress.
DECLARATION OF TAKING UP ARMS:
RESOLUTIONS OF THE SECOND CONTINENTAL CONGRESS
JULY 6, 1775 1
[Since the colonial governors had taken steps to prevent the assemblies from naming delegates to the Second Continental Congress, the representatives to that body were chosen by irregular conventions. For this reason the Second Continental Congress was, from the beginning, an extra-legal, if not a revolutionary, assembly rather than a constitutionally authorized gathering. While it took steps to defend the colonies, it did not gather in a mood to declare immediate independence. To clarify its position, Congress adopted the Declaration reproduced below. The first draft is said to have been written by John Rutledge, but no copy of it has been found (for a brief sketch of the life of Rutledge see p. 258). An early draft of this document, written by Jefferson, proved too strong for the committee (Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789, II, 128 n.). It was redrafted and toned down by John Dickinson (cf. p. 261) and adopted after debate, on July 6, in order that Washington might publish it on his arrival at the camp before Boston.]
A declaration by the representatives of the United Colonies of North America, now met in general Congress at Philadelphia, setting forth the causes and necessity of their taking up arms.
If it was possible for men, who exercise their reason, to believe, that the Divine Author of our existence intended a part of the human race to hold an absolute property in, and an unbounded power over others, marked out by his infinite goodness and wisdom, as the objects of a legal domination never rightfully resistible, however severe and oppressive, the inhabitants of these colonies might at least require from the Parliament of Great Britain some evidence that this dreadful authority over them has been granted to that body. But a reverence for our great Creator, principles of humanity, and the dictates of common sense must convince all those who reflect upon the subject that government was instituted to promote the welfare of mankind and ought to be administered for the attainment of that end. The legislature of Great Britain, however, stimulated by an inordinate passion for a power, not only unjustifiable, but which they know to be peculiarly reprobated by the very constitution of that kingdom, and desperate of success in any mode of contest, where regard should be had to truth, law, or right, have at length, deserting those, attempted to effect their cruel and impolitic purpose of enslaving these colonies by violence, and have thereby rendered it necessary for us to close with their last appeal from reason to arms.
Yet, however blinded that assembly may be, by their intemperate rage for unlimited domination, so to slight justice and the opinion of mankind, we esteem ourselves bound, by obligations of respect to the rest of the world, to make known the justice of our cause.
Our forefathers, inhabitants of the island of Great Britain, left their native land to seek on these shores a residence for civil and religious freedom. At the expense of their blood, at the hazard of their fortunes, without the least charge to the country from which they removed, by unceasing labor, and an unconquerable spirit, they effected settlements in the distant and inhospitable wilds of America, then filled with numerous and warlike nations of barbarians. Societies or governments, vested with perfect legislatures, were formed under charters from the crown, and a harmonious intercourse was established between the colonies and the kingdom from which they derived their origin. The mutual benefits of this union became in a short time so extraordinary as to excite astonishment. It is universally confessed that the amazing increase of the wealth, strength, and navigation of the realm arose from this source; and the minister, who so wisely and successfully directed the measures of Great Britain in the late war, publicly declared that these colonies enabled her to triumph over her enemies.
Toward the conclusion of that war, it pleased our sovereign to make a change in his counsels. From that fatal moment, the affairs of the British Empire began to fall into confusion, and gradually sliding from the summit of glorious prosperity, to which they had been advanced by the virtues and abilities of one man, are at length distracted by the convulsions that now shake it to its deepest foundations. The new ministry finding the brave foes of Britain, though frequently defeated, yet still contending, took up the unfortunate idea of granting them a hasty peace and of then subduing her faithful friends.
These devoted colonies were judged to be in such a state, as to present victories without bloodshed, and all the easy emoluments of statutable plunder. The uninterrupted tenor of their peaceable and respectful behavior from the beginning of colonization, their dutiful, zealous, and useful services during the war, though so recently and amply acknowledged in the most honorable manner by His Majesty, by the late king, and by Parliament, could not save them from the meditated innovations.
Parliament was influenced to adopt the pernicious project, and assuming a new power over them, have, in the course of eleven years, given such decisive specimens of the spirit and consequences attending this power, as to leave no doubt concerning the effects of acquiescence under it. They have undertaken to give and grant our money without our consent, though we have ever exercised an exclusive right to dispose of our own property; statutes have been passed for extending the jurisdiction of courts of admiralty and vice-admiralty beyond their ancient limits; for depriving us of the accustomed and inestimable privilege of trial by jury, in cases affecting both life and property; for suspending the legislature of one of the colonies; for interdicting all commerce to the capital of another; and for altering fundamentally the form of government established by charter and secured by acts of its own legislature solemnly confirmed by the crown; for exempting the "murderers" of colonists from legal trial and, in effect, from punishment; for erecting in a neighboring province, acquired by the joint arms of Great Britain and America, a despotism dangerous to our very existence; and for quartering soldiers upon the colonists in time of profound peace. It has also been resolved in Parliament that colonists charged with committing certain offenses shall be transported to England to be tried.
But why should we enumerate our injuries in detail? By one statute it is declared, that Parliament can "of right make laws to bind us IN ALL CASES WHATSOEVER." What is to defend us against so enormous, so unlimited a power? Not a single man of those who assume it is chosen by us or is subject to our control or influence; but, on the contrary, they are all of them exempt from the operation of such laws, and an American revenue, if not diverted from the ostensible purposes for which it is raised, would actually lighten their own burdens in proportion as they increase ours. We saw the misery to which such despotism would reduce us. We for ten years incessantly and ineffectually besieged the throne as supplicants; we reasoned, we remonstrated with Parliament, in the most mild and decent language. But administration, sensible that we should regard these oppressive measures as freemen ought to do, sent over fleets and armies to enforce them. The indignation of the Americans was roused, it is true; but it was the indignation of a virtuous, loyal, and affectionate people. A Congress of Delegates from the United Colonies was assembled at Philadelphia, on the fifth day of last September. We resolved again to offer a humble and dutiful petition to the king, and also addressed our fellow-subjects of Great Britain. We have pursued every temperate, every respectful, measure: we have even proceeded to break off our commercial intercourse with our fellow-subjects, as the last peaceable admonition, that our attachment to no nation upon earth should supplant our attachment to liberty. This, we flattered ourselves, was the ultimate step of the controversy. But subsequent events have shown how vain was this hope of finding moderation in our enemies.
Several threatening expressions against the colonies were inserted in His Majesty's speech; our petition, though we were told it was a decent one, and that His Majesty had been pleased to receive it graciously, and to promise laying it before his Parliament, was huddled into both houses amongst a bundle of American papers, and there neglected. The Lords and Commons in their address, in the month of February, said, that "a rebellion at that time actually existed within the province of Massachusetts Bay; and that those concerned in it, had been countenanced and encouraged by unlawful combinations and engagements, entered into by His Majesty's subjects in several of the other colonies; and therefore they besought His Majesty, that he would take the most effectual measures to enforce due obedience to the laws and authority of the supreme legislature." Soon after, the commercial intercourse of whole colonies, with foreign countries, and with each other, was cut off by an act of Parliament; by another, several of them were entirely prohibited from the fisheries in the seas near their coasts, on which they always depended for their sustenance; and large reinforcements of ships and troops were immediately sent over to General Gage.
Fruitless were all the entreaties, arguments, and eloquence of an illustrious band of the most distinguished Peers, and Commoners, who nobly and strenuously asserted the justice of our cause, to stay, or even to mitigate the heedless fury with which these accumulated and unexampled outrages were hurried on. Equally fruitless was the interference of the city of London, of Bristol, and many other respectable towns in our favor. Parliament adopted an insidious maneuver calculated to divide us, to establish a perpetual auction of taxations where colony should bid against colony, all of them uninformed what ransom would redeem their lives; and thus to extort from us, at the point of the bayonet, the unknown sums that should be sufficient to gratify, if possible to gratify, ministerial rapacity, with the miserable indulgence left to us of raising, in our own mode, the prescribed tribute. What terms more rigid and humiliating could have been dictated by remorseless victors to conquered enemies? In our circumstances to accept them would be to deserve them.
Soon after the intelligence of these proceedings arrived on this continent, General Gage, who in the course of the last year had taken possession of the town of Boston, in the province of Massachusetts Bay, and still occupied it as a garrison, on the 19th day of April, sent out from that place a large detachment of his army, who made an unprovoked assault on the inhabitants of the said province, at the town of Lexington, as appears by the affidavits of a great number of persons, some of whom were officers and soldiers of that detachment, murdered eight of the inhabitants, and wounded many others. From thence the troops proceeded in warlike array to the town of Concord, where they set upon another party of the inhabitants of the same province, killing several and wounding more, until compelled to retreat by the country people suddenly assembled to repel this cruel aggression. Hostilities, thus commenced by the British troops, have been since prosecuted by them without regard to faith or reputation. The inhabitants of Boston being confined within that town by the General, their Governor, and having, in order to procure their dismission, entered into a treaty with him, it was stipulated that the said inhabitants, having deposited their arms with their own magistrates, should have liberty to depart, taking with them their other effects. They accordingly delivered up their arms, but in open violation of honor, in defiance of the obligation of treaties, which even savage nations esteemed sacred, the Governor ordered the arms deposited as aforesaid, that they might be preserved for their owners, to be seized by a body of soldiers; detained the greatest part of the inhabitants in the town, and compelled the few who were permitted to retire to leave their most valuable effects behind.
By this perfidy wives are separated from their husbands, children from their parents, the aged and the sick from their relations and friends, who wish to attend and comfort them; and those who have been used to live in plenty and even elegance are reduced to deplorable distress.
The General, further emulating his ministerial masters, by a proclamation bearing date on the 12th day of June, after venting the grossest falsehoods and calumnies against the good people of these colonies, proceeds to "declare them all, either by name or description, to be rebels and traitors, to supersede the course of the common law, and instead thereof to publish and order the use and exercise of the law martial." His troops have butchered our countrymen, have wantonly burned Charles-Town, besides a considerable number of houses in other places; our ships and vessels are seized; the necessary supplies of provisions are intercepted, and he is exerting his utmost power to spread destruction and devastation around him.
We have received certain intelligence that General Carleton, the Governor of Canada, is instigating the people of that province and the Indians to fall upon us; and we have but too much reason to apprehend that schemes have been formed to excite domestic enemies against us. In brief, a part of these colonies now feels, and all of them are sure of feeling, as far as the vengeance of administration can inflict them, the complicated calamities of fire, sword, and famine. We are reduced to the alternative of choosing an unconditional submission to the tyranny of irritated ministers, or resistance by force. The latter is our choice. We have counted the cost of this contest and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary slavery. Honor, justice, and humanity forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot endure the infamy and guilt of resigning succeeding generations to that wretchedness which inevitably awaits them, if we basely entail hereditary bondage upon them.
Our cause is just. Our union is perfect. Our internal resources are great, and, if necessary, foreign assistance is undoubtedly attainable. We gratefully acknowledge, as signal instances of the Divine favor toward us, that his Providence would not permit us to be called into this severe controversy, until we were grown up to our present strength, had been previously exercised in warlike operation, and possessed of the means of defending ourselves. With hearts fortified with these animating reflections, we most solemnly, before God and the world, declare that, exerting the utmost energy of those powers which our beneficent Creator hath graciously bestowed upon us, the arms we have been compelled by our enemies to assume we will, in defiance of every hazard, with unabating firmness and perseverance, employ for the preservation of our liberties; being with our [one] mind resolved to die free men rather than live slaves.
Lest this declaration should disquiet the minds of our friends and fellow- subjects in any part of the Empire, we assure them that we mean not to dissolve that union which has so long and so happily subsisted between us, and which we sincerely wish to see restored. Necessity has not yet driven us into that desperate measure, or induced us to excite any other nation to war against them. We have not raised armies with ambitious designs of separating from Great Britain establishing independent states. We fight not for glory or for conquest. We exhibit to mankind the remarkable spectacle of a people attacked by unprovoked enemies, without any imputation or even suspicion of offense. They boast of their privileges and civilization and yet proffer no milder conditions than servitude or death.
In our own native land, in defense of the freedom that is our birthright, and which we ever enjoyed till the late violation of it -- for the protection of our property, acquired solely by the honest industry of our forefathers and ourselves, against violence actually offered, we have taken up arms. We shall lay them down when hostilities shall cease on the part of the aggressors, and all danger of their being renewed shall be removed, and not before.
With a humble confidence in the mercies of the supreme and impartial Judge and Ruler of the universe, we most devoutly implore his divine goodness to protect us happily through this great conflict, to dispose our adversaries to reconciliation on reasonable terms, and thereby to relieve the Empire from the calamities of civil war.
By order of Congress,
JOHN HANCOCK,
President
Attested,
CHARLES THOMSON,
Secretary
PHILADELPHIA, July 6th, 1775
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Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms was a document issued by the Second Continental Congress on July 6, 1775, to explain why the Thirteen Colonies had taken up arms in what had become the American Revolutionary War. The final draft of the Declaration was written by John Dickinson, who incorporated language from an earlier draft by Thomas Jefferson.
Contents
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1 Content
2 Authorship
3 References
4 Further reading
5 External links
[edit] Content
Wikisource has original text related to this article:
Declaration of the causes and necessities of taking up arms
The Declaration describes what colonists viewed as the unconstitutional effort of the British Parliament to extend its jurisdiction into the colonies following the Seven Years' War. Objectionable policies listed in the Declaration include taxation without representation, extended use of vice admiralty courts, the several Coercive Acts, and the Declaratory Act. The Declaration describes how the colonists had, for ten years, repeatedly petitioned for the redress of their grievances, only to have their pleas ignored or rejected by the British government. Even though British troops have been sent to enforce these unconstitutional acts, the Declaration insists that the colonists do not yet seek independence from the mother country. They have taken up arms "in defence of the Freedom that is our Birthright and which we ever enjoyed until the late Violation of it", and will "lay them down when Hostilities shall cease on the part of the Aggressors".
[edit] Authorship
In the 19th century, the authorship of the Declaration was disputed. In a collection of his works first published in 1801, John Dickinson took credit for writing the Declaration. This claim went unchallenged by Thomas Jefferson until many years later, when Jefferson was nearly 80 years old. In his autobiography, Jefferson claimed that he wrote the first draft, but Dickinson objected that it was too radical, and so Congress allowed Dickinson to write a more moderate version, keeping only the last four-and-a-half paragraphs of Jefferson's draft. Jefferson's version of events was accepted by historians for many years. In 1950, Julian P. Boyd, the editor of Jefferson's papers, examined the extant drafts and determined that Jefferson's memory was faulty and that Dickinson claimed too much credit for the final text.
According to Boyd, an initial draft was reportedly written by John Rutledge, a member of a committee of five appointed to create the Declaration. Rutledge's draft was not accepted and does not survive. Jefferson and Dickinson were then added to the committee. Jefferson was appointed to write a draft; how much he drew upon the lost Rutledge draft, if at all, is unknown. Jefferson then apparently submitted his draft to Dickinson, who suggested some changes, which Jefferson, for the most part, decided not to use. The result was that Dickinson rewrote the Declaration, keeping some passages written by Jefferson. Contrary to Jefferson's recollection in his old age, Dickinson's version was not less radical; according to Boyd, in some respects Dickinson's draft was more blunt. The bold statement near the end was written by Dickinson: "Our cause is just. Our union is perfect. Our internal resources are great, and, if necessary, foreign assistance is undoubtedly attainable." The disagreement in 1775 between Dickinson and Jefferson appears to have been primarily a matter of style, not content.
[edit] References
Boyd, Julian P., ed. The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 1. Princeton University Press, 1950. Includes two drafts by Jefferson, one by Dickinson, and the version adopted by Congress.
DECLARATION OF TAKING UP ARMS:
RESOLUTIONS OF THE SECOND CONTINENTAL CONGRESS
JULY 6, 1775 1
[Since the colonial governors had taken steps to prevent the assemblies from naming delegates to the Second Continental Congress, the representatives to that body were chosen by irregular conventions. For this reason the Second Continental Congress was, from the beginning, an extra-legal, if not a revolutionary, assembly rather than a constitutionally authorized gathering. While it took steps to defend the colonies, it did not gather in a mood to declare immediate independence. To clarify its position, Congress adopted the Declaration reproduced below. The first draft is said to have been written by John Rutledge, but no copy of it has been found (for a brief sketch of the life of Rutledge see p. 258). An early draft of this document, written by Jefferson, proved too strong for the committee (Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789, II, 128 n.). It was redrafted and toned down by John Dickinson (cf. p. 261) and adopted after debate, on July 6, in order that Washington might publish it on his arrival at the camp before Boston.]
A declaration by the representatives of the United Colonies of North America, now met in general Congress at Philadelphia, setting forth the causes and necessity of their taking up arms.
If it was possible for men, who exercise their reason, to believe, that the Divine Author of our existence intended a part of the human race to hold an absolute property in, and an unbounded power over others, marked out by his infinite goodness and wisdom, as the objects of a legal domination never rightfully resistible, however severe and oppressive, the inhabitants of these colonies might at least require from the Parliament of Great Britain some evidence that this dreadful authority over them has been granted to that body. But a reverence for our great Creator, principles of humanity, and the dictates of common sense must convince all those who reflect upon the subject that government was instituted to promote the welfare of mankind and ought to be administered for the attainment of that end. The legislature of Great Britain, however, stimulated by an inordinate passion for a power, not only unjustifiable, but which they know to be peculiarly reprobated by the very constitution of that kingdom, and desperate of success in any mode of contest, where regard should be had to truth, law, or right, have at length, deserting those, attempted to effect their cruel and impolitic purpose of enslaving these colonies by violence, and have thereby rendered it necessary for us to close with their last appeal from reason to arms.
Yet, however blinded that assembly may be, by their intemperate rage for unlimited domination, so to slight justice and the opinion of mankind, we esteem ourselves bound, by obligations of respect to the rest of the world, to make known the justice of our cause.
Our forefathers, inhabitants of the island of Great Britain, left their native land to seek on these shores a residence for civil and religious freedom. At the expense of their blood, at the hazard of their fortunes, without the least charge to the country from which they removed, by unceasing labor, and an unconquerable spirit, they effected settlements in the distant and inhospitable wilds of America, then filled with numerous and warlike nations of barbarians. Societies or governments, vested with perfect legislatures, were formed under charters from the crown, and a harmonious intercourse was established between the colonies and the kingdom from which they derived their origin. The mutual benefits of this union became in a short time so extraordinary as to excite astonishment. It is universally confessed that the amazing increase of the wealth, strength, and navigation of the realm arose from this source; and the minister, who so wisely and successfully directed the measures of Great Britain in the late war, publicly declared that these colonies enabled her to triumph over her enemies.
Toward the conclusion of that war, it pleased our sovereign to make a change in his counsels. From that fatal moment, the affairs of the British Empire began to fall into confusion, and gradually sliding from the summit of glorious prosperity, to which they had been advanced by the virtues and abilities of one man, are at length distracted by the convulsions that now shake it to its deepest foundations. The new ministry finding the brave foes of Britain, though frequently defeated, yet still contending, took up the unfortunate idea of granting them a hasty peace and of then subduing her faithful friends.
These devoted colonies were judged to be in such a state, as to present victories without bloodshed, and all the easy emoluments of statutable plunder. The uninterrupted tenor of their peaceable and respectful behavior from the beginning of colonization, their dutiful, zealous, and useful services during the war, though so recently and amply acknowledged in the most honorable manner by His Majesty, by the late king, and by Parliament, could not save them from the meditated innovations.
Parliament was influenced to adopt the pernicious project, and assuming a new power over them, have, in the course of eleven years, given such decisive specimens of the spirit and consequences attending this power, as to leave no doubt concerning the effects of acquiescence under it. They have undertaken to give and grant our money without our consent, though we have ever exercised an exclusive right to dispose of our own property; statutes have been passed for extending the jurisdiction of courts of admiralty and vice-admiralty beyond their ancient limits; for depriving us of the accustomed and inestimable privilege of trial by jury, in cases affecting both life and property; for suspending the legislature of one of the colonies; for interdicting all commerce to the capital of another; and for altering fundamentally the form of government established by charter and secured by acts of its own legislature solemnly confirmed by the crown; for exempting the "murderers" of colonists from legal trial and, in effect, from punishment; for erecting in a neighboring province, acquired by the joint arms of Great Britain and America, a despotism dangerous to our very existence; and for quartering soldiers upon the colonists in time of profound peace. It has also been resolved in Parliament that colonists charged with committing certain offenses shall be transported to England to be tried.
But why should we enumerate our injuries in detail? By one statute it is declared, that Parliament can "of right make laws to bind us IN ALL CASES WHATSOEVER." What is to defend us against so enormous, so unlimited a power? Not a single man of those who assume it is chosen by us or is subject to our control or influence; but, on the contrary, they are all of them exempt from the operation of such laws, and an American revenue, if not diverted from the ostensible purposes for which it is raised, would actually lighten their own burdens in proportion as they increase ours. We saw the misery to which such despotism would reduce us. We for ten years incessantly and ineffectually besieged the throne as supplicants; we reasoned, we remonstrated with Parliament, in the most mild and decent language. But administration, sensible that we should regard these oppressive measures as freemen ought to do, sent over fleets and armies to enforce them. The indignation of the Americans was roused, it is true; but it was the indignation of a virtuous, loyal, and affectionate people. A Congress of Delegates from the United Colonies was assembled at Philadelphia, on the fifth day of last September. We resolved again to offer a humble and dutiful petition to the king, and also addressed our fellow-subjects of Great Britain. We have pursued every temperate, every respectful, measure: we have even proceeded to break off our commercial intercourse with our fellow-subjects, as the last peaceable admonition, that our attachment to no nation upon earth should supplant our attachment to liberty. This, we flattered ourselves, was the ultimate step of the controversy. But subsequent events have shown how vain was this hope of finding moderation in our enemies.
Several threatening expressions against the colonies were inserted in His Majesty's speech; our petition, though we were told it was a decent one, and that His Majesty had been pleased to receive it graciously, and to promise laying it before his Parliament, was huddled into both houses amongst a bundle of American papers, and there neglected. The Lords and Commons in their address, in the month of February, said, that "a rebellion at that time actually existed within the province of Massachusetts Bay; and that those concerned in it, had been countenanced and encouraged by unlawful combinations and engagements, entered into by His Majesty's subjects in several of the other colonies; and therefore they besought His Majesty, that he would take the most effectual measures to enforce due obedience to the laws and authority of the supreme legislature." Soon after, the commercial intercourse of whole colonies, with foreign countries, and with each other, was cut off by an act of Parliament; by another, several of them were entirely prohibited from the fisheries in the seas near their coasts, on which they always depended for their sustenance; and large reinforcements of ships and troops were immediately sent over to General Gage.
Fruitless were all the entreaties, arguments, and eloquence of an illustrious band of the most distinguished Peers, and Commoners, who nobly and strenuously asserted the justice of our cause, to stay, or even to mitigate the heedless fury with which these accumulated and unexampled outrages were hurried on. Equally fruitless was the interference of the city of London, of Bristol, and many other respectable towns in our favor. Parliament adopted an insidious maneuver calculated to divide us, to establish a perpetual auction of taxations where colony should bid against colony, all of them uninformed what ransom would redeem their lives; and thus to extort from us, at the point of the bayonet, the unknown sums that should be sufficient to gratify, if possible to gratify, ministerial rapacity, with the miserable indulgence left to us of raising, in our own mode, the prescribed tribute. What terms more rigid and humiliating could have been dictated by remorseless victors to conquered enemies? In our circumstances to accept them would be to deserve them.
Soon after the intelligence of these proceedings arrived on this continent, General Gage, who in the course of the last year had taken possession of the town of Boston, in the province of Massachusetts Bay, and still occupied it as a garrison, on the 19th day of April, sent out from that place a large detachment of his army, who made an unprovoked assault on the inhabitants of the said province, at the town of Lexington, as appears by the affidavits of a great number of persons, some of whom were officers and soldiers of that detachment, murdered eight of the inhabitants, and wounded many others. From thence the troops proceeded in warlike array to the town of Concord, where they set upon another party of the inhabitants of the same province, killing several and wounding more, until compelled to retreat by the country people suddenly assembled to repel this cruel aggression. Hostilities, thus commenced by the British troops, have been since prosecuted by them without regard to faith or reputation. The inhabitants of Boston being confined within that town by the General, their Governor, and having, in order to procure their dismission, entered into a treaty with him, it was stipulated that the said inhabitants, having deposited their arms with their own magistrates, should have liberty to depart, taking with them their other effects. They accordingly delivered up their arms, but in open violation of honor, in defiance of the obligation of treaties, which even savage nations esteemed sacred, the Governor ordered the arms deposited as aforesaid, that they might be preserved for their owners, to be seized by a body of soldiers; detained the greatest part of the inhabitants in the town, and compelled the few who were permitted to retire to leave their most valuable effects behind.
By this perfidy wives are separated from their husbands, children from their parents, the aged and the sick from their relations and friends, who wish to attend and comfort them; and those who have been used to live in plenty and even elegance are reduced to deplorable distress.
The General, further emulating his ministerial masters, by a proclamation bearing date on the 12th day of June, after venting the grossest falsehoods and calumnies against the good people of these colonies, proceeds to "declare them all, either by name or description, to be rebels and traitors, to supersede the course of the common law, and instead thereof to publish and order the use and exercise of the law martial." His troops have butchered our countrymen, have wantonly burned Charles-Town, besides a considerable number of houses in other places; our ships and vessels are seized; the necessary supplies of provisions are intercepted, and he is exerting his utmost power to spread destruction and devastation around him.
We have received certain intelligence that General Carleton, the Governor of Canada, is instigating the people of that province and the Indians to fall upon us; and we have but too much reason to apprehend that schemes have been formed to excite domestic enemies against us. In brief, a part of these colonies now feels, and all of them are sure of feeling, as far as the vengeance of administration can inflict them, the complicated calamities of fire, sword, and famine. We are reduced to the alternative of choosing an unconditional submission to the tyranny of irritated ministers, or resistance by force. The latter is our choice. We have counted the cost of this contest and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary slavery. Honor, justice, and humanity forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot endure the infamy and guilt of resigning succeeding generations to that wretchedness which inevitably awaits them, if we basely entail hereditary bondage upon them.
Our cause is just. Our union is perfect. Our internal resources are great, and, if necessary, foreign assistance is undoubtedly attainable. We gratefully acknowledge, as signal instances of the Divine favor toward us, that his Providence would not permit us to be called into this severe controversy, until we were grown up to our present strength, had been previously exercised in warlike operation, and possessed of the means of defending ourselves. With hearts fortified with these animating reflections, we most solemnly, before God and the world, declare that, exerting the utmost energy of those powers which our beneficent Creator hath graciously bestowed upon us, the arms we have been compelled by our enemies to assume we will, in defiance of every hazard, with unabating firmness and perseverance, employ for the preservation of our liberties; being with our [one] mind resolved to die free men rather than live slaves.
Lest this declaration should disquiet the minds of our friends and fellow- subjects in any part of the Empire, we assure them that we mean not to dissolve that union which has so long and so happily subsisted between us, and which we sincerely wish to see restored. Necessity has not yet driven us into that desperate measure, or induced us to excite any other nation to war against them. We have not raised armies with ambitious designs of separating from Great Britain establishing independent states. We fight not for glory or for conquest. We exhibit to mankind the remarkable spectacle of a people attacked by unprovoked enemies, without any imputation or even suspicion of offense. They boast of their privileges and civilization and yet proffer no milder conditions than servitude or death.
In our own native land, in defense of the freedom that is our birthright, and which we ever enjoyed till the late violation of it -- for the protection of our property, acquired solely by the honest industry of our forefathers and ourselves, against violence actually offered, we have taken up arms. We shall lay them down when hostilities shall cease on the part of the aggressors, and all danger of their being renewed shall be removed, and not before.
With a humble confidence in the mercies of the supreme and impartial Judge and Ruler of the universe, we most devoutly implore his divine goodness to protect us happily through this great conflict, to dispose our adversaries to reconciliation on reasonable terms, and thereby to relieve the Empire from the calamities of civil war.
By order of Congress,
JOHN HANCOCK,
President
Attested,
CHARLES THOMSON,
Secretary
PHILADELPHIA, July 6th, 1775
MAYFLOWER COMPACT
MAYFLOWER COMPACT
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Mayflower Compact
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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This bas-relief depicting the signing of the Mayflower Compact is on Bradford Street in Provincetown directly below the Pilgrim Monument.
The Mayflower Compact, a painting by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris which was widely reproduced through much of the 20th century
The Mayflower Compact was the first governing document of Plymouth Colony. It was written by the colonists, later together known to history as the Pilgrims, who crossed the Atlantic aboard the Mayflower. Almost half of the colonists were part of a separatist group seeking the freedom to practice Christianity according to their own determination and not the will of the Anglican Church.[citation needed] It was signed on November 11, 1620 (OS),[1] by 41 of the ship's 101 passengers,[2][3] while the Mayflower was anchored in what is now Provincetown Harbor within the hook at the northern tip of Cape Cod.[4]
Contents
[hide]
1 Reasons for the Compact
2 Text
3 Signers
4 See also
5 References
6 External links
Reasons for the Compact
The Mayflower was originally bound for the mouth of the Hudson River, in land granted in a patent from the Crown to the London Virginia Company. The decision was made instead to land farther north, in what is now Massachusetts. This inspired some of the "strangers" (colonists who were not members of the congregation of religious dissenters leading the expedition) to proclaim that since the settlement would not be made in the agreed-upon Virginia territory, they "would use their own liberty; for none had power to command them...."[5] To prevent this, many of the other colonists decided to establish a government. The Mayflower Compact was based simultaneously upon a majoritarian model (even though the signers were not in the majority) and the settlers' allegiance to the king. It was in essence a social contract in which the settlers consented to follow the compact's rules and regulations for the sake of survival.[citation needed]
In November 1620, the Mayflower landed at Plymouth, named after the major port city in Devon, England from which the Mayflower sailed. The settlers named their settlement "Plimoth" or "Plimouth", old English spellings of the name.
Text
Although the original document has been lost,[6] three versions exist from the 17th century: printed in Mourt's Relation (1622),[7][8] which was reprinted in Purchas his Pilgrimes (1625),[9] hand written by William Bradford in his journal Of Plimoth Plantation (1646),[10] and printed by Bradford's nephew Nathaniel Morton in New-Englands Memorial (1669).[6] The three versions differ slightly in wording and significantly in spelling, capitalization and punctuation.[8] William Bradford wrote the first part of Mourt's Relation, including the compact, so he wrote two of the three versions. The wording of those two versions is indeed quite similar, unlike that of Morton. Bradford's hand written manuscript is kept in a vault at the State Library of Massachusetts.[11]
Modern version
In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the Faith, etc.
Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith and honor of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia, do by these presents, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic; for our better ordering, and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.
In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, 1620.[12]
Comparison of three 17th-century versions 1622 IN the name of God, Amen. We whose names are vnder-written, the loyall Subiects of our dread soveraigne
1646 In ye name of God Amen· We whose names are vnderwriten, the loyall subjects of our dread soueraigne
1669 In the Name of God, Amen. We whose Names are under-written, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Soveraign
1622 Lord King IAMES, by the grace of God of Great Britaine, France, and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, &c.
1646 Lord King James by ye grace of God, of great Britaine, franc, & Ireland king, defender of ye faith, &c.
1669 Lord King James, by the grace of God of Great Britain, France and Ireland, King, Defendor of the Faith, &c.
1622 Having vnder-taken for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian Faith, and honour of our King and Countrey,
1646 haueing vndertaken, for ye glorie of God, and aduancemente of ye Christian faith and honour of our king & countrie,
1669 Having undertaken for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian Faith, and the Honour of our K[i]ng and Countrey,
1622 a Voyage to plant the first Colony in the Northerne parts of VIRGINIA, doe by these presents solemnly & mutually in the
1646 a voyage to plant ye first colonie in ye Northerne parts of Virginia· doe by these presents solemnly & mutualy in ye
1669 a Voyage to plant the first Colony in the Northern parts of Virginia; Do by these Presents solemnly and mutually, in the
1622 presence of God and one of another, covenant, and combine our selues together into a civill body politike, for our better
1646 presence of God, and one of another, couenant & combine our selues togeather into a ciuill body politick; for our better
1669 presence of God and one another, Covenant and Combine our selves together into a Civil Body Politick, for our better
1622 ordering and preservation, and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by vertue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame
1646 ordering & preseruation & furtherance of ye ends aforesaid; and by vertue hearof, to enacte, constitute, and frame
1669 ordering and preservation, and furtherance of the ends aforesaid: and by virtue hereof do enact, constitute and frame
1622 such iust and equall Lawes, Ordinances, acts, constitutions, offices from time to time, as shall be thought most meet
1646 such just & equall lawes, ordinances, Acts, constitutions, & offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meete
1669 such just and equal Laws, O[r]dinances, Acts, Constitutions and Officers, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet
1622 and convenient for the generall good of the Colony: vnto which wee promise all due submission and obedience.
1646 & conuenient for ye generall good of ye colonie: vnto which we promise all due submission and obedience.
1669 and convenient for the general good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.
1622 In witnesse whereof we haue here·vnder suscribed our names. Cape Cod 11. of November, in the yeare of the raigne of our
1646 In witnes wherof we haue herevnder subscribed our names at Cap-Codd ye ·11· of Nouember, in ye year of ye raigne of our
1669 In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our Names at Cape Cod, the eleventh of November, in the Reign of our
1622 soveraigne Lord King IAMES, of England, France, and Ireland 18. and of Scotland 54. Anno Domino 1620.[6]
1646 soueraigne Lord king James, of England, france, & Ireland ye eighteenth and of Scotland ye fiftie fourth. Ano: Dom. ·1620·[13]
1669 Soveraign Lord King James, of England, France and Ireland the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty fourth, Anno Dom. 1620.[6]
Note All occurrences of long s, ſ or \textstyle\int, have been replaced by modern s.
Bradford's transcription of the compact
Differences in wording Mourt (1622) Bradford (1646) Morton (1669)
and honour and honour and the honour
one of another one of another one another
to enact to enacte do enact
offices and offices and Officers
here vnder hereunder hereunto
Cape Cod 11. at Cap-Codd ye 11. at Cape Cod the eleventh
in the yeare of the raigne in ye year of ye raigne in the Reign
18. ye eighteenth the eighteenth
54. ye fiftie fourth the fifty fourth
The 'dread sovereign' referred to in the document used the archaic definition of dread—meaning awe and reverence (for the King), not fear. Also, as noted above, the document was signed under the Old Style Julian calendar, since England did not adopt the Gregorian calendar until 1752. The Gregorian date would be November 21.
Signers
The following list of 41 male passengers who signed was supplied by Bradford's nephew Nathaniel Morton in his 1669 New England's Memorial.[14] The two earlier versions of the compact, Mourt's Relation (1622) and Bradford's manuscript Of Plimoth Plantation (1646), do not give a list of signers.
John Carver
William Bradford
Edward Winslow
William Brewster
Isaac Allerton
Miles Standish
John Alden
Samuel Fuller
Christopher Martin
William Mullins
William White
Richard Warren
John Howland
Stephen Hopkins
Edward Tilly
John Tilly
Francis Cooke (sic)
Thomas Rogers
Thomas Tinker
John Ridgdale
Edward Fuller
John Turner
Francis Eaton
James Chilton
John Craxton (sic)
John Billington
Joses Fletcher (sic)
John Goodman
Digery Priest (sic)
Thomas Williams
Gilbert Winslow
Edmund Margeson
Peter Brown
Richard Bitteridge (sic)
George Soule
Richard Clark (sic)
Richard Gardiner
John Allerton
Thomas English
Edward Doten (sic)
Edward Leister
The same list in the same order but with some corrections was provided by Thomas Prince in his 1736 A Chronological History of New-England in the form of Annals.[2] Prince added the title Mr. to ten names, which he found in a list at the end of Governor Bradford's folio manuscript: Carver, Winslow, Brewster, Isaac Allerton, Samuel Fuller, Martin, Mullins, White, Warren, and Hopkins. He attributed the lack of Mr. Bradford to Bradford's modesty. He also added Capt. to Standish. He corrected the spelling of five names: John Crackston, Moses Fletcher, Degory Priest, Richard Briterige, and Ed Dotey. In addition, he spelled Francis Cook and Richard Clarke. However William Bradford's journal Of Plymouth Plantation is definitive that both Francis Cooke and Richard Clarke had an "e" at the end of their last names.
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Mayflower Compact
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Page semi-protected
This bas-relief depicting the signing of the Mayflower Compact is on Bradford Street in Provincetown directly below the Pilgrim Monument.
The Mayflower Compact, a painting by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris which was widely reproduced through much of the 20th century
The Mayflower Compact was the first governing document of Plymouth Colony. It was written by the colonists, later together known to history as the Pilgrims, who crossed the Atlantic aboard the Mayflower. Almost half of the colonists were part of a separatist group seeking the freedom to practice Christianity according to their own determination and not the will of the Anglican Church.[citation needed] It was signed on November 11, 1620 (OS),[1] by 41 of the ship's 101 passengers,[2][3] while the Mayflower was anchored in what is now Provincetown Harbor within the hook at the northern tip of Cape Cod.[4]
Contents
[hide]
1 Reasons for the Compact
2 Text
3 Signers
4 See also
5 References
6 External links
Reasons for the Compact
The Mayflower was originally bound for the mouth of the Hudson River, in land granted in a patent from the Crown to the London Virginia Company. The decision was made instead to land farther north, in what is now Massachusetts. This inspired some of the "strangers" (colonists who were not members of the congregation of religious dissenters leading the expedition) to proclaim that since the settlement would not be made in the agreed-upon Virginia territory, they "would use their own liberty; for none had power to command them...."[5] To prevent this, many of the other colonists decided to establish a government. The Mayflower Compact was based simultaneously upon a majoritarian model (even though the signers were not in the majority) and the settlers' allegiance to the king. It was in essence a social contract in which the settlers consented to follow the compact's rules and regulations for the sake of survival.[citation needed]
In November 1620, the Mayflower landed at Plymouth, named after the major port city in Devon, England from which the Mayflower sailed. The settlers named their settlement "Plimoth" or "Plimouth", old English spellings of the name.
Text
Although the original document has been lost,[6] three versions exist from the 17th century: printed in Mourt's Relation (1622),[7][8] which was reprinted in Purchas his Pilgrimes (1625),[9] hand written by William Bradford in his journal Of Plimoth Plantation (1646),[10] and printed by Bradford's nephew Nathaniel Morton in New-Englands Memorial (1669).[6] The three versions differ slightly in wording and significantly in spelling, capitalization and punctuation.[8] William Bradford wrote the first part of Mourt's Relation, including the compact, so he wrote two of the three versions. The wording of those two versions is indeed quite similar, unlike that of Morton. Bradford's hand written manuscript is kept in a vault at the State Library of Massachusetts.[11]
Modern version
In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the Faith, etc.
Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith and honor of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia, do by these presents, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic; for our better ordering, and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.
In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, 1620.[12]
Comparison of three 17th-century versions 1622 IN the name of God, Amen. We whose names are vnder-written, the loyall Subiects of our dread soveraigne
1646 In ye name of God Amen· We whose names are vnderwriten, the loyall subjects of our dread soueraigne
1669 In the Name of God, Amen. We whose Names are under-written, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Soveraign
1622 Lord King IAMES, by the grace of God of Great Britaine, France, and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, &c.
1646 Lord King James by ye grace of God, of great Britaine, franc, & Ireland king, defender of ye faith, &c.
1669 Lord King James, by the grace of God of Great Britain, France and Ireland, King, Defendor of the Faith, &c.
1622 Having vnder-taken for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian Faith, and honour of our King and Countrey,
1646 haueing vndertaken, for ye glorie of God, and aduancemente of ye Christian faith and honour of our king & countrie,
1669 Having undertaken for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian Faith, and the Honour of our K[i]ng and Countrey,
1622 a Voyage to plant the first Colony in the Northerne parts of VIRGINIA, doe by these presents solemnly & mutually in the
1646 a voyage to plant ye first colonie in ye Northerne parts of Virginia· doe by these presents solemnly & mutualy in ye
1669 a Voyage to plant the first Colony in the Northern parts of Virginia; Do by these Presents solemnly and mutually, in the
1622 presence of God and one of another, covenant, and combine our selues together into a civill body politike, for our better
1646 presence of God, and one of another, couenant & combine our selues togeather into a ciuill body politick; for our better
1669 presence of God and one another, Covenant and Combine our selves together into a Civil Body Politick, for our better
1622 ordering and preservation, and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by vertue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame
1646 ordering & preseruation & furtherance of ye ends aforesaid; and by vertue hearof, to enacte, constitute, and frame
1669 ordering and preservation, and furtherance of the ends aforesaid: and by virtue hereof do enact, constitute and frame
1622 such iust and equall Lawes, Ordinances, acts, constitutions, offices from time to time, as shall be thought most meet
1646 such just & equall lawes, ordinances, Acts, constitutions, & offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meete
1669 such just and equal Laws, O[r]dinances, Acts, Constitutions and Officers, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet
1622 and convenient for the generall good of the Colony: vnto which wee promise all due submission and obedience.
1646 & conuenient for ye generall good of ye colonie: vnto which we promise all due submission and obedience.
1669 and convenient for the general good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.
1622 In witnesse whereof we haue here·vnder suscribed our names. Cape Cod 11. of November, in the yeare of the raigne of our
1646 In witnes wherof we haue herevnder subscribed our names at Cap-Codd ye ·11· of Nouember, in ye year of ye raigne of our
1669 In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our Names at Cape Cod, the eleventh of November, in the Reign of our
1622 soveraigne Lord King IAMES, of England, France, and Ireland 18. and of Scotland 54. Anno Domino 1620.[6]
1646 soueraigne Lord king James, of England, france, & Ireland ye eighteenth and of Scotland ye fiftie fourth. Ano: Dom. ·1620·[13]
1669 Soveraign Lord King James, of England, France and Ireland the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty fourth, Anno Dom. 1620.[6]
Note All occurrences of long s, ſ or \textstyle\int, have been replaced by modern s.
Bradford's transcription of the compact
Differences in wording Mourt (1622) Bradford (1646) Morton (1669)
and honour and honour and the honour
one of another one of another one another
to enact to enacte do enact
offices and offices and Officers
here vnder hereunder hereunto
Cape Cod 11. at Cap-Codd ye 11. at Cape Cod the eleventh
in the yeare of the raigne in ye year of ye raigne in the Reign
18. ye eighteenth the eighteenth
54. ye fiftie fourth the fifty fourth
The 'dread sovereign' referred to in the document used the archaic definition of dread—meaning awe and reverence (for the King), not fear. Also, as noted above, the document was signed under the Old Style Julian calendar, since England did not adopt the Gregorian calendar until 1752. The Gregorian date would be November 21.
Signers
The following list of 41 male passengers who signed was supplied by Bradford's nephew Nathaniel Morton in his 1669 New England's Memorial.[14] The two earlier versions of the compact, Mourt's Relation (1622) and Bradford's manuscript Of Plimoth Plantation (1646), do not give a list of signers.
John Carver
William Bradford
Edward Winslow
William Brewster
Isaac Allerton
Miles Standish
John Alden
Samuel Fuller
Christopher Martin
William Mullins
William White
Richard Warren
John Howland
Stephen Hopkins
Edward Tilly
John Tilly
Francis Cooke (sic)
Thomas Rogers
Thomas Tinker
John Ridgdale
Edward Fuller
John Turner
Francis Eaton
James Chilton
John Craxton (sic)
John Billington
Joses Fletcher (sic)
John Goodman
Digery Priest (sic)
Thomas Williams
Gilbert Winslow
Edmund Margeson
Peter Brown
Richard Bitteridge (sic)
George Soule
Richard Clark (sic)
Richard Gardiner
John Allerton
Thomas English
Edward Doten (sic)
Edward Leister
The same list in the same order but with some corrections was provided by Thomas Prince in his 1736 A Chronological History of New-England in the form of Annals.[2] Prince added the title Mr. to ten names, which he found in a list at the end of Governor Bradford's folio manuscript: Carver, Winslow, Brewster, Isaac Allerton, Samuel Fuller, Martin, Mullins, White, Warren, and Hopkins. He attributed the lack of Mr. Bradford to Bradford's modesty. He also added Capt. to Standish. He corrected the spelling of five names: John Crackston, Moses Fletcher, Degory Priest, Richard Briterige, and Ed Dotey. In addition, he spelled Francis Cook and Richard Clarke. However William Bradford's journal Of Plymouth Plantation is definitive that both Francis Cooke and Richard Clarke had an "e" at the end of their last names.
MAGNA CARTA
MAGNA CARTA
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Magna Carta
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the English charter originally issued on 15 June 1215, and later modified. For other uses, see Magna Carta (disambiguation).
"Great Charter" redirects here. For the Irish law, see Great Charter of Ireland.
Magna Carta
One of only 4 surviving exemplifications of the 1215 text, Cotton MS. Augustus II. 106, property of the British Library
One of only 4 surviving exemplifications of the 1215 text, Cotton MS. Augustus II. 106, property of the British Library
Created 1215
Location Various copies
Author(s) Barons of King John of England
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Magna Carta is an English charter, originally issued in the year 1215 and reissued later in the 13th century in modified versions, which included the most direct challenges to the monarch's authority to date. The charter first passed into law in 1225. The 1297 version, with the long title (originally in Latin) The Great Charter of the Liberties of England, and of the Liberties of the Forest, still remains on the statute books of England and Wales.
The 1215 Charter required King John of England to proclaim certain liberties, and accept that his will was not arbitrary, for example by explicitly accepting that no "freeman" (in the sense of non-serf) could be punished except through the law of the land, a right which is still in existence today.
Magna Carta was the first document forced onto an English King by a group of his subjects, the feudal barons, in an attempt to limit his powers by law and protect their privileges. It was preceded and directly influenced by the Charter of Liberties in 1100, in which King Henry I had specified particular areas wherein his powers would be limited.
Despite its recognised importance, by the second half of the 19th century nearly all of its clauses had been repealed in their original form. Three clauses remain part of the law of England and Wales, however, and it is generally considered part of the uncodified constitution. Lord Denning described it as "the greatest constitutional document of all times – the foundation of the freedom of the individual against the arbitrary authority of the despot".[1] In a 2005 speech, Lord Woolf described it as "first of a series of instruments that now are recognised as having a special constitutional status",[2] the others being the Habeas Corpus Act, the Petition of Right, the Bill of Rights, and the Act of Settlement.
The charter was an important part of the extensive historical process that led to the rule of constitutional law in the English speaking world, and it was this particular granting of liberties which survived to become a "sacred text".[3] In practice, Magna Carta in the medieval period did not in general limit the power of kings, but by the time of the English Civil War it had become an important symbol for those who wished to show that the King was bound by the law. It influenced the early settlers in New England[4] and inspired later constitutional documents, including the United States Constitution.[5]
Contents
[hide]
1 The Great Charter of 1215
1.1 Rebellion and creation of the document
1.2 Clause 61
1.2.1 Participant list
1.3 Magna Carta of Chester
2 The Great Charter 1216–1369
2.1 The Charter 1216
2.2 The Charters 1217: the origins of the name Magna Carta
2.3 The Great Charter 1225
2.4 The Great Charter 1297: Statute
2.4.1 Confirmatio Cartarum and Articuli super Cartas
2.4.2 The Six Statutes
3 Later History of the Charter
3.1 Reconfirmations of the Charter
3.2 Repeal of articles of the Charter
4 Content of the Charters
4.1 Clauses still in force today
4.2 Clauses in Runnymede Charter but not in later Charters
4.3 Challenges to the King's power
4.4 Clauses in Runnymede Charter and in 1216/1217 Charter but not in 1225/1297 Charter
4.5 Clauses in Runnymede Charter and 1225/1297 Charter but since repealed
4.6 Clauses in the 1225/1297 Charter but not in the Runnymede Charter
5 Medieval and Tudor period
6 Edward Coke's opinions
7 17th and 18th Centuries
7.1 The United States of America
8 Nineteenth Century and beyond
9 Influences on later constitutions
10 Exemplifications
11 Usage of the definite article, spelling "Magna Carta"
12 Popular perceptions
12.1 Symbol and practice
12.2 Many documents form Magna Carta
12.3 The document was unsigned
12.4 Perception in America
12.5 21st-century Britain
13 See also
14 References
15 External links
[edit] The Great Charter of 1215
[edit] Rebellion and creation of the document
Main article: John, King of England
Over the course of his reign a combination of higher taxes, unsuccessful wars, and conflict with the Pope had made King John unpopular with his barons. Some barons began to conspire against him in 1209 and 1212; promises made to the northern barons and John's submission to the papacy in 1213 delayed a French invasion.[6]
In 1215 some of the most important barons engaged in open rebellion against their King. Such rebellions were not particularly unusual in this period. Every king since William the Conqueror had faced rebellions. However, in every previous case there had been an obvious alternative monarch around whom the rebellion could rally. In 1215, however, John had no obvious replacement. Arthur of Brittany would have been a possibility, if he had not disappeared (widely believed to have been murdered on the orders of John). The next closest possible alternative was Prince Louis of France, but as the husband of Henry II's granddaughter, his claim was tenuous, and the English had been at war with the French for thirty years. Instead of a claimant to the throne, the barons decided to base their rebellion around John's oppressive government. In January 1215, the barons made an oath that they would "stand fast for the liberty of the church and the realm", and they demanded that King John confirm the Charter of Liberties, from what they viewed as a golden age.[7]
John of England signs Magna Carta. Illustration from Cassell's History of England (1902)
John prevaricated. During negotiations between January and June 1215, a document was produced, which historians have termed 'The Unknown Charter of Liberties',[8] seven of the articles of which would later appear in the 'Articles of the Barons' and the Runnymede Charter.[9] In May, King John offered to submit issues to a committee of arbitration with the Pope as supreme arbiter,[10] but the barons continued in their defiance. With the support of Prince Louis the French Heir and of King Alexander II of the Scots, they entered London in force on 10 June 1215,[11] with the city showing its sympathy with their cause by opening its gates to them. They, and many of the moderates not in overt rebellion, forced King John to agree to a document later known as the 'Articles of the Barons', to which his Great Seal was attached in the meadow at Runnymede on 15 June 1215. In return, the barons renewed their oaths of fealty to King John on 19 June 1215. The contemporary, but unreliable[12] chronicler, Roger of Wendover, recorded the events in his Flores Historiarum.[13] A formal document to record the agreement was created by the royal chancery on 15 July: this was the original Magna Carta, though it was not known by that name at the time. An unknown number of copies of it were sent out to officials, such as royal sheriffs and bishops.
[edit] Clause 61
The 1215 document contained a large section that is now called clause 61 (the original document was not actually divided into clauses). This section established a committee of 25 barons who could at any time meet and overrule the will of the King if he defied the provisions of the Charter, seizing his castles and possessions if it was considered necessary.[14] This was based on a medieval legal practice known as distraint, but it was the first time it had been applied to a monarch.
Distrust between the two sides was overwhelming. What the barons really sought was the overthrow of the King; the demand for a charter was a "mere subterfuge".[15] Clause 61 was a serious challenge to John's authority as a ruling monarch. He renounced it as soon as the barons left London; Pope Innocent III also annulled the "shameful and demeaning agreement, forced upon the King by violence and fear." He rejected any call for restraints on the King, saying it impaired John's dignity. He saw it as an affront to the Church's authority over the King and the 'papal territories' of England and Ireland, and he released John from his oath to obey it. The rebels knew that King John could never be restrained by Magna Carta and so they sought a new King.[16]
England was plunged into a civil war, known as the First Barons' War. With the failure of Magna Carta to achieve peace or restrain John, the barons reverted to the more traditional type of rebellion by trying to replace the monarch they disliked with an alternative. In a measure of some desperation, despite the tenuousness of his claim and despite the fact that he was French, they offered the crown of England to Prince Louis of France.[17]
As a means of preventing war the Magna Carta was a failure, rejected by most of the barons,[18] and was legally valid for no more than three months.[19] It was the death of King John in 1216 which secured the future of Magna Carta.[20]
[edit] Participant list
Barons, Bishops and Abbots who were party to Magna Carta.[21]
Barons – surety for the enforcement of Magna Carta Bishops – witnessess Abbots – witnessess
William d'Aubigny, Lord of Belvoir Castle Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church the Abbot of St Edmunds
Roger Bigod, Earl of Norfolk and Suffolk Henry de Loundres, Archbishop of Dublin the Abbot of St Albans
Hugh Bigod, Heir to the Earldoms of Norfolk and Suffolk E., Bishop of London the Abbot of Bello
Henry de Bohun, Earl of Hereford Jocelin of Wells, Bishop of Bath and Wells the Abbot of St Augustine's in Canterbury
Richard de Clare, Earl of Hertford Peter des Roches, Bishop of Winchester the Abbot of Evesham
Gilbert de Clare, heir to the earldom of Hertford Hugh de Wells, Bishop of Lincoln the Abbot of Westminster
John FitzRobert, Lord of Warkworth Castle Herbert Poore (aka "Robert"), Bishop of Salisbury the Abbot of Peterborough
Robert Fitzwalter, Lord of Dunmow Castle W., Bishop of Rochester the Abbot of Reading
William de Fortibus, Earl of Albemarle Walter de Gray, Bishop of Worcester the Abbot of Abingdon
William Hardel, **Mayor of the City of London Geoffrey de Burgo, Bishop of Ely the Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey
William de Huntingfield, Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk Hugh de Mapenor, Bishop of Hereford the Abbot of Winchcomb
John de Lacy, Lord of Pontefract Castle Richard Poore, Bishop of Chichester (brother of Herbert/Robert above) the Abbot of Hyde
William de Lanvallei, Lord of Standway Castle W., Bishop of Exeter the Abbot of Chertsey
William Malet, Sheriff of Somerset and Dorset the Abbot of Sherborne
Geoffrey de Mandeville, Earl of Essex and Gloucester the Abbot of Cerne
William Marshall Jr, heir to the earldom of Pembroke the Abbot of Abbotebir
Roger de Montbegon, Lord of Hornby Castle, Lancashire the Abbot of Middleton
Richard de Montfichet, Baron the Abbot of Selby
William de Mowbray, Lord of Axholme Castle the Abbot of Cirencester
Richard de Percy, Baron the Abbot of Hartstary
Saire/Saher de Quincy, Earl of Winchester
Robert de Roos, Lord of Hamlake Castle
Geoffrey de Saye, Baron
Robert de Vere, heir to the earldom of Oxford
Eustace de Vesci, Lord of Alnwick Castle
Others
Llywelyn the Great. Also the other Welsh Princes[who?]
Master Pandulff, subdeacon and member of the Papal Household
Brother Aymeric, Master of the Knights Templar in England
Alexander II of Scotland
[edit] Magna Carta of Chester
The Runnymede Charter of Liberties did not apply to Chester, which at the time was a separate feudal domain. Earl Ranulf granted his own Magna Carta.[22] Some of its articles were similar to the Runnymede Charter.[23]
[edit] The Great Charter 1216–1369
[edit] The Charter 1216
King John's nine-year-old son Henry was crowned King of England in Gloucester Abbey, though much of England lay under the usurper Prince Louis. The papal legate Guala Bicchieri declared the struggle against Louis and the Barons a holy war,[24] and the loyalists led by William Marshal rallied around the new King. Earl Ranulf of Chester left the Regency to Marshall. Marshall and Guala issued a Charter of Liberties, based on the Runnymede Charter, in the King's name on 12 November 1216 as a Royal concession, in an attempt to undermine the rebels.[25]
The Charter differed from that of 1215 in only having 42 as compared to 61 clauses; most notably the infamous article 61 of the Runnymede Charter was removed. The Charter was also issued separately for Ireland.
[edit] The Charters 1217: the origins of the name Magna Carta
Following the end of the First Barons War and the Treaty of Lambeth, the Charter of Liberties (carta libertatum) was issued again in the manner of 1216, again amended and issued separately for Ireland. The 42 clauses of the 1216 issue were expanded to 47.
Significantly, a fragment of the original charter would be expanded with new material to form a complementary charter, the Charter of the Forest; the two Charters would thereafter be linked. Magna carta libertatum was then used by scribes to differentiate the larger and more important charter of common liberties from the Forest Charter.[26] The term was used retrospectively to describe the previous Charters, with what had previously been described as carta libertatum becoming known simply as Magna Carta.
[edit] The Great Charter 1225
Having reached the age of majority, King Henry III was called upon to confirm the Charters. Henry reissued Magna Carta in a shorter version with only 37 articles, as a concession of liberties in return for a fifteenth part of moveable goods.[4] This was the first version of the Charter to enter English law.[27] The Charter of Liberties included a new statement that the Charter had been issued spontaneously and of the King's own free will. In 1227, Henry III declared all future charters had to be issued under his own seal and state under what warrant they were claimed; this proclamation questioned the validity of all previous acts done in his name or his predecessors.[28] It was not until 1237, and the carta parva, that both of the 1225 Charters were confirmed and granted in perpetuity.[29]
[edit] The Great Charter 1297: Statute
Edward I of England reissued the Charters of 1225 in 1297 in return for a new tax.[30] "Constitutionally, the Magna Carta of Edward I is the most important".[31] This version remains in Statute today (albeit with most articles now repealed—see below).[32] [33]
[edit] Confirmatio Cartarum and Articuli super Cartas
The Confirmatio Cartarum (Confirmation of Charters) was issued by Edward I in 1297, and was similar to the parva carta issued by Henry III in 1237. In the Confirmation, Edward reaffirmed Magna Carta and the Forest Charter[34] as a concession for tax money. As part of the Remonstrances the nobles sought to add another document the De Tallagio to the Charters but without success.[35] The principle of taxation by consent was reinforced, however the precise manner of that consent was not laid down.[36]
Pope Clement V annulled the Confirmatio Cartarum in 1305.[37]
As part of the reconfirmation of the Charters in 1300 an additional document was granted, the Articuli super Cartas (The Articles upon the Charters). It was composed of 20 articles and sought in part to deal with the problem of enforcing the Charters.[38] In 1305 Edward I took Clement V's Papal bull annulling the Confirmatio Cartarum to effectively apply to the Articuli super Cartas though it was not specifically mentioned.[39]
[edit] The Six Statutes
During the reign of Edward III six measures were passed between 1331 and 1369 which were later known as the 'Six Statutes'. They sought to clarify certain parts of the Charters. In particular, the third statute, of 1354, redefined clause 29, with 'free man' becoming "no man, of whatever estate or condition he may be", and introduced the phrase "due process of law" for 'lawful judgement of his peers or the law of the land'.[40]
[edit] Later History of the Charter
[edit] Reconfirmations of the Charter
The impermanence of the Charter required successive generations to petition the King to reconfirm his Charter, and hopefully abide by it. Between the 13th and 15th centuries the Magna Carta would have a history of being reconfirmed, 32 times according to Sir Edward Coke, but possibly as many as 45 times.[41] The Charter was last confirmed in 1423 by Henry VI.
[edit] Repeal of articles of the Charter
The repeal of clause 26 in 1829, by the Offences against the Person Act 1828 (9 Geo. 4 c. 31 s. 1),[42] was the first time a clause of Magna Carta was repealed. With the document's perceived inviolability broken, in the next 140 years nearly the whole charter was repealed, leaving just Clauses 1, 9, and 29 still in force after 1969. Most of it was repealed in England and Wales by the Statute Law Revision Act 1863, and in Ireland by the Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872.[42]
Magna Carta 1225 Clause Runnymede Charter Clause Date Repealed
1 I extant
2 II Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
3 III Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
4 IV Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
5 V Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
6 VI Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
7 VII, VIII Administration of Estates Act 1925, Administration of Estates Act (Northern Ireland) 1955 and Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
8 IX Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
9 XIII extant
10 XVI Statute Law Revision Act 1948
11 XVII Civil Procedure Acts Repeal Act 1879
12 XVIII Civil Procedure Acts Repeal Act 1879
13 Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
14 XX, XXI, XXII Criminal Law Act 1967 and Criminal Law Act (Northern Ireland) 1967
15 XXIII Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
16 XXXXVII Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
17 XXIV Statute Law Revision Act 1892
18 XXVI Crown Proceedings Act 1947
19 XXVIII Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
20 XIX Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
21 XXX, XXXI Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
22 XXXII Statute Law Revision Act 1948
23 XXXIII Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
24 XXXIV Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
25 XXXV Statute Law Revision Act 1948
26 XXXVI Offences against the Person Act 1828 and Offences against the Person (Ireland) Act 1829
27 XXXVII Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
28 XXXVIII Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
29 XXXIX,XXXX extant
30 XXXXI Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
31 XXXXIII Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
32 Statute Law Revision Act 1887
33 XXXXVI Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
34 LIV Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
35 Sheriffs Act 1887
36 Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
37 LX Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
[edit] Content of the Charters
Magna carta cum statutis angliae, (Great Charter with English Statutes) page 1 of manuscript, fourteenth century.
Magna Carta was originally written in Latin. A large part of the Charter at Runnymede was copied, nearly word for word, from the Charter of Liberties of Henry I, issued when Henry became king in 1100, in which he said he would respect certain rights of the Church and the barons, for example not forcing heirs to purchase their inheritances.
As the Charter went through various issues many of the clauses included in the Runnymede charter were removed. Some clauses would form a supplementary Charter in 1217, the Charter of the forest.
It is worth emphasising that the 1215 charter was not numbered and was not divided into paragraphs or separate clauses. The numbering system used today was created by Sir William Blackstone in 1759,[43] and therefore should not be used to draw any conclusions regarding the intentions of the original creators of the charter.
[edit] Clauses still in force today
The clauses of the 1297 Magna Carta which are still on statute are
Clause 1, the freedom of the English Church.
Clause 9 (clause 13 in the 1215 charter), the "ancient liberties" of the City of London.
Clause 29 (clause 39 in the 1215 charter), a right to due process.
1. FIRST, We have granted to God, and by this our present Charter have confirmed, for Us and our Heirs for ever, that the Church of England shall be free, and shall have all her whole Rights and Liberties inviolable. We have granted also, and given to all the Freemen of our Realm, for Us and our Heirs for ever, these Liberties under-written, to have and to hold to them and their Heirs, of Us and our Heirs for ever.
9. THE City of London shall have all the old Liberties and Customs which it hath been used to have. Moreover We will and grant, that all other Cities, Boroughs, Towns, and the Barons of the Five Ports, as with all other Ports, shall have all their Liberties and free Customs.
29. NO Freeman shall be taken or imprisoned, or be disseised of his Freehold, or Liberties, or free Customs, or be outlawed, or exiled, or any other wise destroyed; nor will We not pass upon him, nor condemn him, but by lawful judgment of his Peers, or by the Law of the land. We will sell to no man, we will not deny or defer to any man either Justice or Right.[42]
[edit] Clauses in Runnymede Charter but not in later Charters
Clauses 10 and 11 related to money lending and Jews in England. Jews were particularly involved in money lending because Christian teachings on usury did not apply to them. Clause 10 said that children would not pay interest on a debt they had inherited while they were under age. Clause 11 said that the widow and children should be provided for before paying an inherited debt. The charter concludes this section with the words "Debts owing to other than Jews shall be dealt with likewise", so it is debatable the extent to which Jews were being singled out by these clauses.
Clauses 12 and 14 state that taxes (in the language of the time, "scutage or aid") can only be levied and assessed by the common counsel of the realm. See Challenges to the King's power for more detail.
Clause 15 stated that the King would not grant anyone the right to take an aid (i.e. money) from his free men
Clauses 25 and 26 dealt with debt and taxes
Clause 27 with intestacy.
Clause 42 stated that it was lawful for subjects to leave the kingdom without prejudicing their allegiance (except for outlaws and during war)
Clause 45 said that the King should only appoint as "justices, constables, sheriffs, or bailiffs" those who knew the law and would keep it well. In the United States, the Supreme Court of California interpreted clause 45 in 1974 as establishing a requirement at common law that a defendant faced with the potential of incarceration is entitled to a trial overseen by a legally trained judge.[44]
Clause 48 stated that all evil customs connected with forests were to be abolished
Clause 49 provided for the return of hostages held by the King. (John held hostages from the families of important nobles he wished to ensure remained loyal, as other English monarchs had before him.)
Clause 50 stated that no member of the d'Athée family could be a royal officer.
Clause 51 called for all foreign knights and mercenaries to leave the realm.
Clause 52 dealt with restoration of those "disseised" (i.e. those dispossessed of property. See (for example) Assize of novel disseisin )
Clause 53 was similar to 52 but relating to forests
Clause 55 regarded remittance of unjust fines
Clauses 57 concerned restoration of disseised Welshmen
Clauses 58 and 59 provided for the return of Welsh and Scottish hostages
Clauses 61 provided for the application and observation of the Charter by twenty-five of the rebellious barons. See Challenges to the King's power for more on clause 61.
Clause 62 pardoned those who had rebelled against the king
Clause 63 said that the charter was binding on King John and his heirs. However this version of the charter was renounced by John, with the support of the Pope. The smaller 1225/1297 charters (which actually became law) contain similar text, stating that the monarch and their heirs would not seek to infringe or damage the liberties in the charter, and that the charter is to be observed "in perpetuity".
[edit] Challenges to the King's power
Clauses 12 and 14 of the 1215 charter state that the king will accept the "common counsel of our realm" when levying and assessing an aid or a scutage. Clause 14 goes into detail about how exactly the archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls and greater barons should be consulted. These clauses effectively meant that the monarch had to ask before raising new taxes. The later charters merely said that "Scutage furthermore is to be taken as it used to be", although in practice the convention arose after Magna Carta that Parliament would be consulted by the monarch before raising new taxes.
Clause 61 of the 1215 charter states: "The barons shall choose any twenty-five barons of the realm they wish, who with all their might are to observe, maintain and cause to be observed the peace and liberties which we have granted and confirmed to them by this our present charter". The clause goes on to say that if the king does not keep to the charter, the twenty five barons shall seize "castles, lands and possessions... until, in their judgement, amends have been made". "Anyone in the land" would be permitted by the king to swear an oath to the twenty five to obey them in these matters, and the king was in fact supposed to order people to do so even if they didn't want to swear an oath to the twenty five barons.
The barons were trying to stop John going back on his word after agreeing to the charter, but if those who rebelled against him were able to choose a group who would have the power to seize his castles if they thought it necessary, "then the king had in effect been dethroned". No king would have agreed to this except as a manoeuvre to gain time, and the inclusion of this clause destroyed any chance of the original Magna Carta keeping the peace in the long term.[45]
Clause 61 was removed from all later versions of the charter. Forty years later, after another confrontation between king and barons, the Provisions of Oxford forced on the king a council of twenty four members, 12 selected by the crown, 12 by the barons, which would then elect a king's council of fifteen members; this however was also annulled when Henry III finally won that power struggle.
[edit] Clauses in Runnymede Charter and in 1216/1217 Charter but not in 1225/1297 Charter
Clauses 2 to 3 refer to relief, specifically the regulation of the charging of excessive relief, in effect a form of "succession duty" or "death duty" payable by an heir.
Clauses 4 to 5 refer to the duties of wardship, specifically forbidding the practice of the over-exploitation of a ward's property by his warder (or guardian).
Clause 6 refers to a warder's power over the marriage of his ward. He was forbidden from forcing a marriage to a partner of lower social standing (possibly therefore to one such who may have been willing to pay a higher price for it).
Clause 7 refers to the rights of a widow to receive promptly her dowry and inheritance.
Clause 8 stated that a widow could not be compelled to marry.
Clause 9 stated that a debtor should not have his lands seized as long as he had other means to pay the debt.
Clause 16 was regarding a knight's fee.
Clauses 17 to 19 allowed for a fixed law court, which became the chancellery, and defined the scope and frequency of county assizes.
Clause 44 (1216 only) relating to forest law
Clause 56 (1216 only) relating to disseised Welshmen
[edit] Clauses in Runnymede Charter and 1225/1297 Charter but since repealed
All of the remaining parts of the 1215 charter appear substantially unchanged in the 1225/1297 charter which became law and is still on the statute book. All except the three clauses which are still in force today were eventually repealed however, most in the 19th century. Many provisions have no bearing in the world today, since they deal with feudal liberties. Some clauses remained relevant but were replaced by later legislation which gave similar rights. Using the 1215 clause numbers:
Clause 20 stated that fines ("amercements", in the language of the day), should be proportionate to the offence, but even for a serious offence the fine should not be so heavy as to deprive a man of his livelihood. No fines should be imposed except by the oath of honest local men.
Clause 21 stated that earls and barons should only be fined by their peers, i.e. other earls and barons. Until 1948 this meant that members of the House of Lords had the right to a criminal trial in the House of Lords at first instance.
Clause 22 stated that fines should not be influenced by ecclesiastical property in clergy trials.
Clause 23 provided that no town or person should be forced to build a bridge across a river.
Clause 24 stated that crown officials (such as sheriffs) must not try a crime in place of a judge.
Clauses 28 to 32 stated that no royal officer might take any commodity such as grain, wood or transport without payment or consent or force a knight to pay for something the knight could do himself, and that the king must return any lands confiscated from a felon within a year and a day to the felon's feudal lord ("the lords of the fees concerned").
Clause 33 required the removal of all fish weirs.
Clause 34 forbade repossession without a "writ precipe".
Clause 35 set out a list of standard measures
Clause 36 stated that writs for loss of life or limb were to be free
Clause 37 concerns inheritance when a "fee-farm" (fee as in knight's fee) was involved.
Clause 38 stated that no-one could be put on trial based solely on the unsupported word of an official.
Clause 40 disallowed the selling of justice, or its denial or delay.
Clauses 41 and 42 guaranteed the safety and right of entry and exit of foreign merchants.
Clause 43 gave special provision for tax on reverted estates
Clause 46 provided for the guardianship of monasteries.
Clauses 47 and 48 abolished most of Forest Law (these clauses were split out of the main charter and formed part of a separate charter, the Charter of the Forest).[46]
Clause 54 said that no man may be imprisoned on the testimony of a woman except on the death of her husband.
[edit] Clauses in the 1225/1297 Charter but not in the Runnymede Charter
There are a few clauses which are in the 1225/1297 charter but not in the 1215 charter. These have also since been repealed. Using the 1297 clause numbers:
Clause 13 concerned the Assize of darrein presentment.
Clause 32 said that a free man should not give away or sell so much of his land that he would not be able to meet his feudal obligations to his lord.
Clause 35 concerned the county court, the frankpledge and tithes.
Clause 36 said that it was not permitted to give land to a religious house and then receive it back; in such a case the land would revert to the feudal lord.
[edit] Medieval and Tudor period
The judgement of 1387 confirmed the supremacy of the Royal Prerogative within the constitution.[47] By the mid 15th century Magna Carta ceased to occupy a central role in English political life.[40] In part this was also due to the rise of an early version of Parliament and to further statutes, some which were based on the principle of Magna Carta. The Charter, however remained a text for scholars of law. The Charter in the statute books was correctly thought to have arisen from the reign of Henry III and was seen as no more special than any other statute and could be amended and removed. It was not seen (as it was later) as an entrenched set of liberties guaranteed for the people against the Government. Rather, it was an ordinary statute, which gave a certain level of liberties, most of which could not be relied on, least of all against the king. Therefore the Charter had little effect on the governance of the early Tudor period.
The Tudor period would see a growing interest in history. Tudor historians would rediscover the Barnwell chronicler who was more favourable to King John than other contemporary texts. John Bale and Shakespeare would both write plays on King John. Tudor historians were not inclined to regard rebellion as anything but a crime. Those who supported Henry VIII’s break with Rome “viewed King John in a positive light as a hero struggling against the papacy, they showed little sympathy for the Great Charter or the rebel barons”.[48]
The first printed edition of the Magna Carta was probably the Magna Carta cum aliis Antiquis Statutis of 1508 by Richard Pynson.[49] George Ferrers would publish the first unabridged English language edition of the Magna Carta in 1534, and effectively established the numbering of the Charter into 37 chapters; an abridged English language edition had previously been published by John Rastell in 1527.[50] By the end of the 16th century editions of the 1215 Charter would also be printed.
The Charter had no real effect until the Elizabethan era (1558–1603). Magna Carta again began to occupy legal minds, and it again began to shape how that government was run, but in a manner entirely different to that of earlier ages. William Lambarde published “what he thought were law codes of the Anglo-Saxon kings and William the conqueror”.[51] Lambarde would begin the process of misinterpreting English history, soon taken up by others, incorrectly dating documents and giving parliament a false antiquity. Francis Bacon would claim that Clause 39 of the 1215 Charter was the basis of the jury system and due process in a trial. Robert Beale, James Morice, Richard Cosin and the Puritans[52] began to misperceive Magna Carta as a ‘statement of liberty’, a 'fundamental law' above all law and government. In 1581 Arthur Hall, MP would be one of the first to suffer under this emerging new ideology, when he correctly questioned the antiquity of the House of Commons[53][54] and was without precedent expelled from Parliament.
[edit] Edward Coke's opinions
Jurist Edward Coke interpreted Magna Carta to apply not only to the protection of nobles but to all subjects of the crown equally.
One of the first respected jurists to write seriously about the great charter was Edward Coke. He was influential in the way Magna Carta was perceived throughout the Tudor and Stuart periods though his views were challenged during his lifetime by Lord Ellesmere and later in the century by Robert Brady. Coke used the 1225 issue of the Charter.
Coke "reinterpreted or misinterpreted" Magna Carta "misconstruing its clauses anachronistically and uncritically".[55] He would interpret liberties to be much the same as individual liberty.[56] The historian J.C. Holt excused Coke on the grounds that the Charter and its history had itself become 'distorted'.[57]
Coke would be instrumental in framing the Petition of Right, which would be a substantial supplement to Magna Carta's liberties. During the debates on the matter Coke famously sought to deny the King's sovereign rights with the claim that "Magna Carta is such a fellow, that he will have no 'sovereign'"; he believed the statutes (not the King) were absolute.[58]
[edit] 17th and 18th Centuries
Whilst Sir Edward Coke would take the lead in reinterpreting Magna Carta he would soon be joined by others with a similar ideological stance, resulting in the concept of an 'ancient constitution' which entailed belief in fundamental laws supposedly existing since time immemorial and a belief in the antiquity of Parliament.[59] These beliefs would be used to challenge the constitution as it existed under the Stuart Kings.
John Selden would link habeas corpus to Magna Carta[60] during Darnell's Case. Sir Henry Spelman, who can be largely credited with first formulating a concept of feudalism (which would ironically be later used to attack the idea of an ancient constitution, notably by Robert Brady), sought to place the origins of Common Law in Anglo-Saxon laws.[61] Antiquarians would seek out documents to support the views of their compatriots, such as Sir Robert Cotton, whose collection of manuscripts would later form the basis for the British Library, and who discovered two original copies of King John’s Charter.
The Petition of Right of 1628 sought to add to Magna Carta in the manner of the Articuli super Cartas or the Six Statutes. Charles I however, did not grant it as law and he was under no legal restriction.[62] The problem as before in history was that the King was not bound by the law as adherents of Magna Carta believed. As before in history armed force would be used, first in 1642–49 and again in 1689.
With the advent of the republic it was questionable whether Magna Carta still applied. John Milton called for “great actions, above the form of law and custom”. Whilst Oliver Cromwell had much disdain for Magna Carta, at one point describing it as "Magna Farta" to a defendant who sought to rely on it[63] he agreed to rule with the advice and consent of his council.[64]
Different radical groups held differing opinions of Magna Carta. The Levellers rejected history and law as presented by their contemporaries, holding instead to an ‘anti-Normanism’ viewpoint.[65]John Lilburne regarded Magna Carta as being less than the freedoms which supposedly existed under the Anglo-Saxons before being crushed by the Norman yoke. Richard Overton would describe Magna Carta as a “a beggarly thing containing many marks of intolerable bondage”.[66] Both however saw Magna Carta as a valuable declaration of liberties which could be used against governments they disagreed with. Lilburne said "the ground of my freedom, I build upon the Grand Charter of England", while Overton said that when arrested, he hung on to his copy of Coke on Magna Carta, shouting "murder, murder, murder" as they wrested "the Great Charter of England's Liberties and Freedoms from me".[67] Gerrard Winstanley leader of the more extreme Diggers stated “The best lawes that England hath, [viz., the Magna Carta] were got by our Forefathers importunate petitioning unto the kings that still were their Task-masters; and yet these best laws are yoaks and manicles, tying one sort of people to be slaves to another; Clergy and Gentry have got their freedom, but the common people still are, and have been left servants to work for them.”
The first attempt at a proper Historiography was undertaken by Robert Brady (writer)[68] who refuted the supposed antiquity of parliament and the belief in the immutable continuity of the law, and realised the liberties of the Charter were limited and were effective only because it was the grant of the King; by putting Magna Carta in historical context he questioned its contemporary political relevance.[69] However, Brady’s history would not survive the Glorious Revolution which “marked a setback for the course of English historiography”.[70]
The Glorious Revolution reinforced the century’s ideological interpretations of history, which would later become known as the Whig interpretation of history. Reinforced with Lockean concepts the Whigs believed England’s constitution to be a Social contract, based on documents such as the Magna Carta, the Petition of Right and The Bill of Rights.[71] Ideas about the nature of law in general were beginning to change. In 1716 the Septennial Act was passed, which had a number of consequences. Firstly, it showed that Parliament no longer considered its previous statutes unassailable, as this act provided that the parliamentary term was to be seven years, whereas fewer than twenty-five years had passed since the Triennial Act (1694), which provided that a parliamentary term was to be three years. It also greatly extended the powers of Parliament. Under this new constitution Monarchal absolutism was replaced by Parliamentary supremacy. It was quickly realised that Magna Carta stood in the same relation to the King-in-Parliament as it had to the King without Parliament. This supremacy would be challenged by the likes of Granville Sharp. Sharp regarded Magna Carta to be a fundamental part of the constitution, and that it would be treason to repeal any part of it. Sharp also held that the Charter prohibited slavery.[72]
Sir William Blackstone published a critical edition of the 1215 Charter in 1759, and gave it the numbering system still used today.[43]
In 1763 an MP, John Wilkes was arrested for writing an inflammatory pamphlet, No. 45, 23 April 1763; he cited Magna Carta incessantly. Lord Camden denounced the treatment of Wilkes as a contravention of Magna Carta.
Prophet of a new revolutionary age, Thomas Paine in his Rights of Man would disregard the Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights on the grounds they were not a written constitution devised by elected representatives.
[edit] The United States of America
When Englishmen left their homeland for the new world, they brought with them charters establishing the colonies. The Massachusetts Bay Company charter for example stated the colonists would "have and enjoy all liberties and immunities of free and natural subjects." The Virginia Charter of 1606 (which was largely drafted by Sir Edward Coke) stated the colonists would have all "liberties, franchises and immunities" as if they had been born in England. The Massachusetts Body of Liberties contained similarities to clause 29 of the Magna Carta, and the Massachusetts General Court in drawing it up viewed Magna Carta as the chief embodiment of English common law.[73] The other colonies would follow their example. In 1638 Maryland sought to recognise Magna Carta as part of the law of the province but it was not granted by the King.[74]
In 1687 William Penn published The Excellent Privilege of Liberty and Property: being the birth-right of the Free-Born Subjects of England which contained the first copy of Magna Carta printed on American soil. Penn's comments reflected Coke's, indicating a belief that Magna Carta was a fundamental law.[75] The colonists drew on English lawbooks leading them to an anachronistic interpretation of the Magna Carta, believing it guaranteed trial by jury and habeas corpus.[76]
The development of Parliamentary sovereignty in the British Isles did not constitutionally affect the Thirteen Colonies, which retained an adherence to English common law, but it would come to directly affect the relationship between Britain and the colonies.[77] When American colonists raised arms against Britain, they were fighting not so much for new freedom, but to preserve liberties and rights, as believed to be enshrined in the Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights. American Revolutionaries would supplement this with ideas of natural right.
In 1787 when the revolutionaries gathered to draft a constitution they built upon the legal system they knew and admired, English common law, and on Lockean philosophy.
The American Constitution is the "supreme law of the land", recalling the manner in which Magna Carta had come to be regarded as fundamental law. This heritage is quite apparent. In comparing Magna Carta with the Bill of Rights: the Fifth Amendment guarantees: "No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law." In addition, the United States Constitution included a similar writ in the Suspension Clause, article 1, section 9: "The privilege of the writ habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may require it." Each of these proclaim no man may be imprisoned or detained without proof that they did wrong. The Ninth Amendment to the United States Constitution states that, "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." The framers of the United States Constitution wished to ensure that rights they already held, such as those provided by the Magna Carta, were not lost unless explicitly curtailed in the new United States Constitution.[78][79]
The United States Supreme Court has explicitly referenced Lord Coke's analysis of Magna Carta as an antecedent of the Sixth Amendment's right to a speedy trial.[80]
[edit] Nineteenth Century and beyond
Whilst radicals such as Sir Francis Burdett believed that Magna Carta could not be repealed, the 19th century would see the beginning of the repeal of many of the clauses of Magna Carta. The clauses were either obsolete and/or had been replaced by later legislation.
William Stubbs’s Constitutional History of England would be the high-water mark of the Whig interpretation of history. Stubbs believed that Magna Carta had been a major step in the shaping of the English people and he believed that the Barons at Runnymede were not just the Barons but the people.[81]
This view of history however, was passing. At the popular level William Howitt in Cassell's Illustrated history of England would note that it was fiction that King John’s Charter was the same Magna Carta as was on the statute books and stated that “The Barons, in fact, were amongst the greatest traitors that England ever produced”.[82] A more academic history was provided by Frederic William Maitland in History of English Law before the Time of Edward I which began to move Magna Carta away from the myth that had grown up around it and return it to its historical roots. In many literary representations of the medieval past, however, the Magna Carta remained the foundation for many diverse constructions of English national identity. Some authors instrumentalized the medieval roots of the document to preserve the social status quo while others utilized the precious national inheritance to change perceived economic injustice.[83]
In 1904 Edward Jenks published in the Independent Review an article entitled “The Myth of Magna Carta” which undermined the traditionally accepted view of the Magna Carta.[84] Historians like A. F. Pollard would agree with Jenks in considering Coke to have ‘invented’ Magna Carta, noting that the Charter at Runnymede had not meant popular liberty at all.[85]
Sellar and Yeatman in their parody 1066 and All That would play on the supposed importance of Magna Carta and its supposed universal liberty:. “Magna Charter was therefore the chief cause of Democracy in England, and thus a Good Thing for everyone (except the Common People)”.
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Magna Carta
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the English charter originally issued on 15 June 1215, and later modified. For other uses, see Magna Carta (disambiguation).
"Great Charter" redirects here. For the Irish law, see Great Charter of Ireland.
Magna Carta
One of only 4 surviving exemplifications of the 1215 text, Cotton MS. Augustus II. 106, property of the British Library
One of only 4 surviving exemplifications of the 1215 text, Cotton MS. Augustus II. 106, property of the British Library
Created 1215
Location Various copies
Author(s) Barons of King John of England
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Magna Carta is an English charter, originally issued in the year 1215 and reissued later in the 13th century in modified versions, which included the most direct challenges to the monarch's authority to date. The charter first passed into law in 1225. The 1297 version, with the long title (originally in Latin) The Great Charter of the Liberties of England, and of the Liberties of the Forest, still remains on the statute books of England and Wales.
The 1215 Charter required King John of England to proclaim certain liberties, and accept that his will was not arbitrary, for example by explicitly accepting that no "freeman" (in the sense of non-serf) could be punished except through the law of the land, a right which is still in existence today.
Magna Carta was the first document forced onto an English King by a group of his subjects, the feudal barons, in an attempt to limit his powers by law and protect their privileges. It was preceded and directly influenced by the Charter of Liberties in 1100, in which King Henry I had specified particular areas wherein his powers would be limited.
Despite its recognised importance, by the second half of the 19th century nearly all of its clauses had been repealed in their original form. Three clauses remain part of the law of England and Wales, however, and it is generally considered part of the uncodified constitution. Lord Denning described it as "the greatest constitutional document of all times – the foundation of the freedom of the individual against the arbitrary authority of the despot".[1] In a 2005 speech, Lord Woolf described it as "first of a series of instruments that now are recognised as having a special constitutional status",[2] the others being the Habeas Corpus Act, the Petition of Right, the Bill of Rights, and the Act of Settlement.
The charter was an important part of the extensive historical process that led to the rule of constitutional law in the English speaking world, and it was this particular granting of liberties which survived to become a "sacred text".[3] In practice, Magna Carta in the medieval period did not in general limit the power of kings, but by the time of the English Civil War it had become an important symbol for those who wished to show that the King was bound by the law. It influenced the early settlers in New England[4] and inspired later constitutional documents, including the United States Constitution.[5]
Contents
[hide]
1 The Great Charter of 1215
1.1 Rebellion and creation of the document
1.2 Clause 61
1.2.1 Participant list
1.3 Magna Carta of Chester
2 The Great Charter 1216–1369
2.1 The Charter 1216
2.2 The Charters 1217: the origins of the name Magna Carta
2.3 The Great Charter 1225
2.4 The Great Charter 1297: Statute
2.4.1 Confirmatio Cartarum and Articuli super Cartas
2.4.2 The Six Statutes
3 Later History of the Charter
3.1 Reconfirmations of the Charter
3.2 Repeal of articles of the Charter
4 Content of the Charters
4.1 Clauses still in force today
4.2 Clauses in Runnymede Charter but not in later Charters
4.3 Challenges to the King's power
4.4 Clauses in Runnymede Charter and in 1216/1217 Charter but not in 1225/1297 Charter
4.5 Clauses in Runnymede Charter and 1225/1297 Charter but since repealed
4.6 Clauses in the 1225/1297 Charter but not in the Runnymede Charter
5 Medieval and Tudor period
6 Edward Coke's opinions
7 17th and 18th Centuries
7.1 The United States of America
8 Nineteenth Century and beyond
9 Influences on later constitutions
10 Exemplifications
11 Usage of the definite article, spelling "Magna Carta"
12 Popular perceptions
12.1 Symbol and practice
12.2 Many documents form Magna Carta
12.3 The document was unsigned
12.4 Perception in America
12.5 21st-century Britain
13 See also
14 References
15 External links
[edit] The Great Charter of 1215
[edit] Rebellion and creation of the document
Main article: John, King of England
Over the course of his reign a combination of higher taxes, unsuccessful wars, and conflict with the Pope had made King John unpopular with his barons. Some barons began to conspire against him in 1209 and 1212; promises made to the northern barons and John's submission to the papacy in 1213 delayed a French invasion.[6]
In 1215 some of the most important barons engaged in open rebellion against their King. Such rebellions were not particularly unusual in this period. Every king since William the Conqueror had faced rebellions. However, in every previous case there had been an obvious alternative monarch around whom the rebellion could rally. In 1215, however, John had no obvious replacement. Arthur of Brittany would have been a possibility, if he had not disappeared (widely believed to have been murdered on the orders of John). The next closest possible alternative was Prince Louis of France, but as the husband of Henry II's granddaughter, his claim was tenuous, and the English had been at war with the French for thirty years. Instead of a claimant to the throne, the barons decided to base their rebellion around John's oppressive government. In January 1215, the barons made an oath that they would "stand fast for the liberty of the church and the realm", and they demanded that King John confirm the Charter of Liberties, from what they viewed as a golden age.[7]
John of England signs Magna Carta. Illustration from Cassell's History of England (1902)
John prevaricated. During negotiations between January and June 1215, a document was produced, which historians have termed 'The Unknown Charter of Liberties',[8] seven of the articles of which would later appear in the 'Articles of the Barons' and the Runnymede Charter.[9] In May, King John offered to submit issues to a committee of arbitration with the Pope as supreme arbiter,[10] but the barons continued in their defiance. With the support of Prince Louis the French Heir and of King Alexander II of the Scots, they entered London in force on 10 June 1215,[11] with the city showing its sympathy with their cause by opening its gates to them. They, and many of the moderates not in overt rebellion, forced King John to agree to a document later known as the 'Articles of the Barons', to which his Great Seal was attached in the meadow at Runnymede on 15 June 1215. In return, the barons renewed their oaths of fealty to King John on 19 June 1215. The contemporary, but unreliable[12] chronicler, Roger of Wendover, recorded the events in his Flores Historiarum.[13] A formal document to record the agreement was created by the royal chancery on 15 July: this was the original Magna Carta, though it was not known by that name at the time. An unknown number of copies of it were sent out to officials, such as royal sheriffs and bishops.
[edit] Clause 61
The 1215 document contained a large section that is now called clause 61 (the original document was not actually divided into clauses). This section established a committee of 25 barons who could at any time meet and overrule the will of the King if he defied the provisions of the Charter, seizing his castles and possessions if it was considered necessary.[14] This was based on a medieval legal practice known as distraint, but it was the first time it had been applied to a monarch.
Distrust between the two sides was overwhelming. What the barons really sought was the overthrow of the King; the demand for a charter was a "mere subterfuge".[15] Clause 61 was a serious challenge to John's authority as a ruling monarch. He renounced it as soon as the barons left London; Pope Innocent III also annulled the "shameful and demeaning agreement, forced upon the King by violence and fear." He rejected any call for restraints on the King, saying it impaired John's dignity. He saw it as an affront to the Church's authority over the King and the 'papal territories' of England and Ireland, and he released John from his oath to obey it. The rebels knew that King John could never be restrained by Magna Carta and so they sought a new King.[16]
England was plunged into a civil war, known as the First Barons' War. With the failure of Magna Carta to achieve peace or restrain John, the barons reverted to the more traditional type of rebellion by trying to replace the monarch they disliked with an alternative. In a measure of some desperation, despite the tenuousness of his claim and despite the fact that he was French, they offered the crown of England to Prince Louis of France.[17]
As a means of preventing war the Magna Carta was a failure, rejected by most of the barons,[18] and was legally valid for no more than three months.[19] It was the death of King John in 1216 which secured the future of Magna Carta.[20]
[edit] Participant list
Barons, Bishops and Abbots who were party to Magna Carta.[21]
Barons – surety for the enforcement of Magna Carta Bishops – witnessess Abbots – witnessess
William d'Aubigny, Lord of Belvoir Castle Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church the Abbot of St Edmunds
Roger Bigod, Earl of Norfolk and Suffolk Henry de Loundres, Archbishop of Dublin the Abbot of St Albans
Hugh Bigod, Heir to the Earldoms of Norfolk and Suffolk E., Bishop of London the Abbot of Bello
Henry de Bohun, Earl of Hereford Jocelin of Wells, Bishop of Bath and Wells the Abbot of St Augustine's in Canterbury
Richard de Clare, Earl of Hertford Peter des Roches, Bishop of Winchester the Abbot of Evesham
Gilbert de Clare, heir to the earldom of Hertford Hugh de Wells, Bishop of Lincoln the Abbot of Westminster
John FitzRobert, Lord of Warkworth Castle Herbert Poore (aka "Robert"), Bishop of Salisbury the Abbot of Peterborough
Robert Fitzwalter, Lord of Dunmow Castle W., Bishop of Rochester the Abbot of Reading
William de Fortibus, Earl of Albemarle Walter de Gray, Bishop of Worcester the Abbot of Abingdon
William Hardel, **Mayor of the City of London Geoffrey de Burgo, Bishop of Ely the Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey
William de Huntingfield, Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk Hugh de Mapenor, Bishop of Hereford the Abbot of Winchcomb
John de Lacy, Lord of Pontefract Castle Richard Poore, Bishop of Chichester (brother of Herbert/Robert above) the Abbot of Hyde
William de Lanvallei, Lord of Standway Castle W., Bishop of Exeter the Abbot of Chertsey
William Malet, Sheriff of Somerset and Dorset the Abbot of Sherborne
Geoffrey de Mandeville, Earl of Essex and Gloucester the Abbot of Cerne
William Marshall Jr, heir to the earldom of Pembroke the Abbot of Abbotebir
Roger de Montbegon, Lord of Hornby Castle, Lancashire the Abbot of Middleton
Richard de Montfichet, Baron the Abbot of Selby
William de Mowbray, Lord of Axholme Castle the Abbot of Cirencester
Richard de Percy, Baron the Abbot of Hartstary
Saire/Saher de Quincy, Earl of Winchester
Robert de Roos, Lord of Hamlake Castle
Geoffrey de Saye, Baron
Robert de Vere, heir to the earldom of Oxford
Eustace de Vesci, Lord of Alnwick Castle
Others
Llywelyn the Great. Also the other Welsh Princes[who?]
Master Pandulff, subdeacon and member of the Papal Household
Brother Aymeric, Master of the Knights Templar in England
Alexander II of Scotland
[edit] Magna Carta of Chester
The Runnymede Charter of Liberties did not apply to Chester, which at the time was a separate feudal domain. Earl Ranulf granted his own Magna Carta.[22] Some of its articles were similar to the Runnymede Charter.[23]
[edit] The Great Charter 1216–1369
[edit] The Charter 1216
King John's nine-year-old son Henry was crowned King of England in Gloucester Abbey, though much of England lay under the usurper Prince Louis. The papal legate Guala Bicchieri declared the struggle against Louis and the Barons a holy war,[24] and the loyalists led by William Marshal rallied around the new King. Earl Ranulf of Chester left the Regency to Marshall. Marshall and Guala issued a Charter of Liberties, based on the Runnymede Charter, in the King's name on 12 November 1216 as a Royal concession, in an attempt to undermine the rebels.[25]
The Charter differed from that of 1215 in only having 42 as compared to 61 clauses; most notably the infamous article 61 of the Runnymede Charter was removed. The Charter was also issued separately for Ireland.
[edit] The Charters 1217: the origins of the name Magna Carta
Following the end of the First Barons War and the Treaty of Lambeth, the Charter of Liberties (carta libertatum) was issued again in the manner of 1216, again amended and issued separately for Ireland. The 42 clauses of the 1216 issue were expanded to 47.
Significantly, a fragment of the original charter would be expanded with new material to form a complementary charter, the Charter of the Forest; the two Charters would thereafter be linked. Magna carta libertatum was then used by scribes to differentiate the larger and more important charter of common liberties from the Forest Charter.[26] The term was used retrospectively to describe the previous Charters, with what had previously been described as carta libertatum becoming known simply as Magna Carta.
[edit] The Great Charter 1225
Having reached the age of majority, King Henry III was called upon to confirm the Charters. Henry reissued Magna Carta in a shorter version with only 37 articles, as a concession of liberties in return for a fifteenth part of moveable goods.[4] This was the first version of the Charter to enter English law.[27] The Charter of Liberties included a new statement that the Charter had been issued spontaneously and of the King's own free will. In 1227, Henry III declared all future charters had to be issued under his own seal and state under what warrant they were claimed; this proclamation questioned the validity of all previous acts done in his name or his predecessors.[28] It was not until 1237, and the carta parva, that both of the 1225 Charters were confirmed and granted in perpetuity.[29]
[edit] The Great Charter 1297: Statute
Edward I of England reissued the Charters of 1225 in 1297 in return for a new tax.[30] "Constitutionally, the Magna Carta of Edward I is the most important".[31] This version remains in Statute today (albeit with most articles now repealed—see below).[32] [33]
[edit] Confirmatio Cartarum and Articuli super Cartas
The Confirmatio Cartarum (Confirmation of Charters) was issued by Edward I in 1297, and was similar to the parva carta issued by Henry III in 1237. In the Confirmation, Edward reaffirmed Magna Carta and the Forest Charter[34] as a concession for tax money. As part of the Remonstrances the nobles sought to add another document the De Tallagio to the Charters but without success.[35] The principle of taxation by consent was reinforced, however the precise manner of that consent was not laid down.[36]
Pope Clement V annulled the Confirmatio Cartarum in 1305.[37]
As part of the reconfirmation of the Charters in 1300 an additional document was granted, the Articuli super Cartas (The Articles upon the Charters). It was composed of 20 articles and sought in part to deal with the problem of enforcing the Charters.[38] In 1305 Edward I took Clement V's Papal bull annulling the Confirmatio Cartarum to effectively apply to the Articuli super Cartas though it was not specifically mentioned.[39]
[edit] The Six Statutes
During the reign of Edward III six measures were passed between 1331 and 1369 which were later known as the 'Six Statutes'. They sought to clarify certain parts of the Charters. In particular, the third statute, of 1354, redefined clause 29, with 'free man' becoming "no man, of whatever estate or condition he may be", and introduced the phrase "due process of law" for 'lawful judgement of his peers or the law of the land'.[40]
[edit] Later History of the Charter
[edit] Reconfirmations of the Charter
The impermanence of the Charter required successive generations to petition the King to reconfirm his Charter, and hopefully abide by it. Between the 13th and 15th centuries the Magna Carta would have a history of being reconfirmed, 32 times according to Sir Edward Coke, but possibly as many as 45 times.[41] The Charter was last confirmed in 1423 by Henry VI.
[edit] Repeal of articles of the Charter
The repeal of clause 26 in 1829, by the Offences against the Person Act 1828 (9 Geo. 4 c. 31 s. 1),[42] was the first time a clause of Magna Carta was repealed. With the document's perceived inviolability broken, in the next 140 years nearly the whole charter was repealed, leaving just Clauses 1, 9, and 29 still in force after 1969. Most of it was repealed in England and Wales by the Statute Law Revision Act 1863, and in Ireland by the Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872.[42]
Magna Carta 1225 Clause Runnymede Charter Clause Date Repealed
1 I extant
2 II Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
3 III Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
4 IV Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
5 V Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
6 VI Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
7 VII, VIII Administration of Estates Act 1925, Administration of Estates Act (Northern Ireland) 1955 and Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
8 IX Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
9 XIII extant
10 XVI Statute Law Revision Act 1948
11 XVII Civil Procedure Acts Repeal Act 1879
12 XVIII Civil Procedure Acts Repeal Act 1879
13 Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
14 XX, XXI, XXII Criminal Law Act 1967 and Criminal Law Act (Northern Ireland) 1967
15 XXIII Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
16 XXXXVII Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
17 XXIV Statute Law Revision Act 1892
18 XXVI Crown Proceedings Act 1947
19 XXVIII Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
20 XIX Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
21 XXX, XXXI Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
22 XXXII Statute Law Revision Act 1948
23 XXXIII Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
24 XXXIV Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
25 XXXV Statute Law Revision Act 1948
26 XXXVI Offences against the Person Act 1828 and Offences against the Person (Ireland) Act 1829
27 XXXVII Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
28 XXXVIII Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
29 XXXIX,XXXX extant
30 XXXXI Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969
31 XXXXIII Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
32 Statute Law Revision Act 1887
33 XXXXVI Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
34 LIV Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
35 Sheriffs Act 1887
36 Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
37 LX Statute Law Revision Act 1863 and Statute Law (Ireland) Revision Act 1872
[edit] Content of the Charters
Magna carta cum statutis angliae, (Great Charter with English Statutes) page 1 of manuscript, fourteenth century.
Magna Carta was originally written in Latin. A large part of the Charter at Runnymede was copied, nearly word for word, from the Charter of Liberties of Henry I, issued when Henry became king in 1100, in which he said he would respect certain rights of the Church and the barons, for example not forcing heirs to purchase their inheritances.
As the Charter went through various issues many of the clauses included in the Runnymede charter were removed. Some clauses would form a supplementary Charter in 1217, the Charter of the forest.
It is worth emphasising that the 1215 charter was not numbered and was not divided into paragraphs or separate clauses. The numbering system used today was created by Sir William Blackstone in 1759,[43] and therefore should not be used to draw any conclusions regarding the intentions of the original creators of the charter.
[edit] Clauses still in force today
The clauses of the 1297 Magna Carta which are still on statute are
Clause 1, the freedom of the English Church.
Clause 9 (clause 13 in the 1215 charter), the "ancient liberties" of the City of London.
Clause 29 (clause 39 in the 1215 charter), a right to due process.
1. FIRST, We have granted to God, and by this our present Charter have confirmed, for Us and our Heirs for ever, that the Church of England shall be free, and shall have all her whole Rights and Liberties inviolable. We have granted also, and given to all the Freemen of our Realm, for Us and our Heirs for ever, these Liberties under-written, to have and to hold to them and their Heirs, of Us and our Heirs for ever.
9. THE City of London shall have all the old Liberties and Customs which it hath been used to have. Moreover We will and grant, that all other Cities, Boroughs, Towns, and the Barons of the Five Ports, as with all other Ports, shall have all their Liberties and free Customs.
29. NO Freeman shall be taken or imprisoned, or be disseised of his Freehold, or Liberties, or free Customs, or be outlawed, or exiled, or any other wise destroyed; nor will We not pass upon him, nor condemn him, but by lawful judgment of his Peers, or by the Law of the land. We will sell to no man, we will not deny or defer to any man either Justice or Right.[42]
[edit] Clauses in Runnymede Charter but not in later Charters
Clauses 10 and 11 related to money lending and Jews in England. Jews were particularly involved in money lending because Christian teachings on usury did not apply to them. Clause 10 said that children would not pay interest on a debt they had inherited while they were under age. Clause 11 said that the widow and children should be provided for before paying an inherited debt. The charter concludes this section with the words "Debts owing to other than Jews shall be dealt with likewise", so it is debatable the extent to which Jews were being singled out by these clauses.
Clauses 12 and 14 state that taxes (in the language of the time, "scutage or aid") can only be levied and assessed by the common counsel of the realm. See Challenges to the King's power for more detail.
Clause 15 stated that the King would not grant anyone the right to take an aid (i.e. money) from his free men
Clauses 25 and 26 dealt with debt and taxes
Clause 27 with intestacy.
Clause 42 stated that it was lawful for subjects to leave the kingdom without prejudicing their allegiance (except for outlaws and during war)
Clause 45 said that the King should only appoint as "justices, constables, sheriffs, or bailiffs" those who knew the law and would keep it well. In the United States, the Supreme Court of California interpreted clause 45 in 1974 as establishing a requirement at common law that a defendant faced with the potential of incarceration is entitled to a trial overseen by a legally trained judge.[44]
Clause 48 stated that all evil customs connected with forests were to be abolished
Clause 49 provided for the return of hostages held by the King. (John held hostages from the families of important nobles he wished to ensure remained loyal, as other English monarchs had before him.)
Clause 50 stated that no member of the d'Athée family could be a royal officer.
Clause 51 called for all foreign knights and mercenaries to leave the realm.
Clause 52 dealt with restoration of those "disseised" (i.e. those dispossessed of property. See (for example) Assize of novel disseisin )
Clause 53 was similar to 52 but relating to forests
Clause 55 regarded remittance of unjust fines
Clauses 57 concerned restoration of disseised Welshmen
Clauses 58 and 59 provided for the return of Welsh and Scottish hostages
Clauses 61 provided for the application and observation of the Charter by twenty-five of the rebellious barons. See Challenges to the King's power for more on clause 61.
Clause 62 pardoned those who had rebelled against the king
Clause 63 said that the charter was binding on King John and his heirs. However this version of the charter was renounced by John, with the support of the Pope. The smaller 1225/1297 charters (which actually became law) contain similar text, stating that the monarch and their heirs would not seek to infringe or damage the liberties in the charter, and that the charter is to be observed "in perpetuity".
[edit] Challenges to the King's power
Clauses 12 and 14 of the 1215 charter state that the king will accept the "common counsel of our realm" when levying and assessing an aid or a scutage. Clause 14 goes into detail about how exactly the archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls and greater barons should be consulted. These clauses effectively meant that the monarch had to ask before raising new taxes. The later charters merely said that "Scutage furthermore is to be taken as it used to be", although in practice the convention arose after Magna Carta that Parliament would be consulted by the monarch before raising new taxes.
Clause 61 of the 1215 charter states: "The barons shall choose any twenty-five barons of the realm they wish, who with all their might are to observe, maintain and cause to be observed the peace and liberties which we have granted and confirmed to them by this our present charter". The clause goes on to say that if the king does not keep to the charter, the twenty five barons shall seize "castles, lands and possessions... until, in their judgement, amends have been made". "Anyone in the land" would be permitted by the king to swear an oath to the twenty five to obey them in these matters, and the king was in fact supposed to order people to do so even if they didn't want to swear an oath to the twenty five barons.
The barons were trying to stop John going back on his word after agreeing to the charter, but if those who rebelled against him were able to choose a group who would have the power to seize his castles if they thought it necessary, "then the king had in effect been dethroned". No king would have agreed to this except as a manoeuvre to gain time, and the inclusion of this clause destroyed any chance of the original Magna Carta keeping the peace in the long term.[45]
Clause 61 was removed from all later versions of the charter. Forty years later, after another confrontation between king and barons, the Provisions of Oxford forced on the king a council of twenty four members, 12 selected by the crown, 12 by the barons, which would then elect a king's council of fifteen members; this however was also annulled when Henry III finally won that power struggle.
[edit] Clauses in Runnymede Charter and in 1216/1217 Charter but not in 1225/1297 Charter
Clauses 2 to 3 refer to relief, specifically the regulation of the charging of excessive relief, in effect a form of "succession duty" or "death duty" payable by an heir.
Clauses 4 to 5 refer to the duties of wardship, specifically forbidding the practice of the over-exploitation of a ward's property by his warder (or guardian).
Clause 6 refers to a warder's power over the marriage of his ward. He was forbidden from forcing a marriage to a partner of lower social standing (possibly therefore to one such who may have been willing to pay a higher price for it).
Clause 7 refers to the rights of a widow to receive promptly her dowry and inheritance.
Clause 8 stated that a widow could not be compelled to marry.
Clause 9 stated that a debtor should not have his lands seized as long as he had other means to pay the debt.
Clause 16 was regarding a knight's fee.
Clauses 17 to 19 allowed for a fixed law court, which became the chancellery, and defined the scope and frequency of county assizes.
Clause 44 (1216 only) relating to forest law
Clause 56 (1216 only) relating to disseised Welshmen
[edit] Clauses in Runnymede Charter and 1225/1297 Charter but since repealed
All of the remaining parts of the 1215 charter appear substantially unchanged in the 1225/1297 charter which became law and is still on the statute book. All except the three clauses which are still in force today were eventually repealed however, most in the 19th century. Many provisions have no bearing in the world today, since they deal with feudal liberties. Some clauses remained relevant but were replaced by later legislation which gave similar rights. Using the 1215 clause numbers:
Clause 20 stated that fines ("amercements", in the language of the day), should be proportionate to the offence, but even for a serious offence the fine should not be so heavy as to deprive a man of his livelihood. No fines should be imposed except by the oath of honest local men.
Clause 21 stated that earls and barons should only be fined by their peers, i.e. other earls and barons. Until 1948 this meant that members of the House of Lords had the right to a criminal trial in the House of Lords at first instance.
Clause 22 stated that fines should not be influenced by ecclesiastical property in clergy trials.
Clause 23 provided that no town or person should be forced to build a bridge across a river.
Clause 24 stated that crown officials (such as sheriffs) must not try a crime in place of a judge.
Clauses 28 to 32 stated that no royal officer might take any commodity such as grain, wood or transport without payment or consent or force a knight to pay for something the knight could do himself, and that the king must return any lands confiscated from a felon within a year and a day to the felon's feudal lord ("the lords of the fees concerned").
Clause 33 required the removal of all fish weirs.
Clause 34 forbade repossession without a "writ precipe".
Clause 35 set out a list of standard measures
Clause 36 stated that writs for loss of life or limb were to be free
Clause 37 concerns inheritance when a "fee-farm" (fee as in knight's fee) was involved.
Clause 38 stated that no-one could be put on trial based solely on the unsupported word of an official.
Clause 40 disallowed the selling of justice, or its denial or delay.
Clauses 41 and 42 guaranteed the safety and right of entry and exit of foreign merchants.
Clause 43 gave special provision for tax on reverted estates
Clause 46 provided for the guardianship of monasteries.
Clauses 47 and 48 abolished most of Forest Law (these clauses were split out of the main charter and formed part of a separate charter, the Charter of the Forest).[46]
Clause 54 said that no man may be imprisoned on the testimony of a woman except on the death of her husband.
[edit] Clauses in the 1225/1297 Charter but not in the Runnymede Charter
There are a few clauses which are in the 1225/1297 charter but not in the 1215 charter. These have also since been repealed. Using the 1297 clause numbers:
Clause 13 concerned the Assize of darrein presentment.
Clause 32 said that a free man should not give away or sell so much of his land that he would not be able to meet his feudal obligations to his lord.
Clause 35 concerned the county court, the frankpledge and tithes.
Clause 36 said that it was not permitted to give land to a religious house and then receive it back; in such a case the land would revert to the feudal lord.
[edit] Medieval and Tudor period
The judgement of 1387 confirmed the supremacy of the Royal Prerogative within the constitution.[47] By the mid 15th century Magna Carta ceased to occupy a central role in English political life.[40] In part this was also due to the rise of an early version of Parliament and to further statutes, some which were based on the principle of Magna Carta. The Charter, however remained a text for scholars of law. The Charter in the statute books was correctly thought to have arisen from the reign of Henry III and was seen as no more special than any other statute and could be amended and removed. It was not seen (as it was later) as an entrenched set of liberties guaranteed for the people against the Government. Rather, it was an ordinary statute, which gave a certain level of liberties, most of which could not be relied on, least of all against the king. Therefore the Charter had little effect on the governance of the early Tudor period.
The Tudor period would see a growing interest in history. Tudor historians would rediscover the Barnwell chronicler who was more favourable to King John than other contemporary texts. John Bale and Shakespeare would both write plays on King John. Tudor historians were not inclined to regard rebellion as anything but a crime. Those who supported Henry VIII’s break with Rome “viewed King John in a positive light as a hero struggling against the papacy, they showed little sympathy for the Great Charter or the rebel barons”.[48]
The first printed edition of the Magna Carta was probably the Magna Carta cum aliis Antiquis Statutis of 1508 by Richard Pynson.[49] George Ferrers would publish the first unabridged English language edition of the Magna Carta in 1534, and effectively established the numbering of the Charter into 37 chapters; an abridged English language edition had previously been published by John Rastell in 1527.[50] By the end of the 16th century editions of the 1215 Charter would also be printed.
The Charter had no real effect until the Elizabethan era (1558–1603). Magna Carta again began to occupy legal minds, and it again began to shape how that government was run, but in a manner entirely different to that of earlier ages. William Lambarde published “what he thought were law codes of the Anglo-Saxon kings and William the conqueror”.[51] Lambarde would begin the process of misinterpreting English history, soon taken up by others, incorrectly dating documents and giving parliament a false antiquity. Francis Bacon would claim that Clause 39 of the 1215 Charter was the basis of the jury system and due process in a trial. Robert Beale, James Morice, Richard Cosin and the Puritans[52] began to misperceive Magna Carta as a ‘statement of liberty’, a 'fundamental law' above all law and government. In 1581 Arthur Hall, MP would be one of the first to suffer under this emerging new ideology, when he correctly questioned the antiquity of the House of Commons[53][54] and was without precedent expelled from Parliament.
[edit] Edward Coke's opinions
Jurist Edward Coke interpreted Magna Carta to apply not only to the protection of nobles but to all subjects of the crown equally.
One of the first respected jurists to write seriously about the great charter was Edward Coke. He was influential in the way Magna Carta was perceived throughout the Tudor and Stuart periods though his views were challenged during his lifetime by Lord Ellesmere and later in the century by Robert Brady. Coke used the 1225 issue of the Charter.
Coke "reinterpreted or misinterpreted" Magna Carta "misconstruing its clauses anachronistically and uncritically".[55] He would interpret liberties to be much the same as individual liberty.[56] The historian J.C. Holt excused Coke on the grounds that the Charter and its history had itself become 'distorted'.[57]
Coke would be instrumental in framing the Petition of Right, which would be a substantial supplement to Magna Carta's liberties. During the debates on the matter Coke famously sought to deny the King's sovereign rights with the claim that "Magna Carta is such a fellow, that he will have no 'sovereign'"; he believed the statutes (not the King) were absolute.[58]
[edit] 17th and 18th Centuries
Whilst Sir Edward Coke would take the lead in reinterpreting Magna Carta he would soon be joined by others with a similar ideological stance, resulting in the concept of an 'ancient constitution' which entailed belief in fundamental laws supposedly existing since time immemorial and a belief in the antiquity of Parliament.[59] These beliefs would be used to challenge the constitution as it existed under the Stuart Kings.
John Selden would link habeas corpus to Magna Carta[60] during Darnell's Case. Sir Henry Spelman, who can be largely credited with first formulating a concept of feudalism (which would ironically be later used to attack the idea of an ancient constitution, notably by Robert Brady), sought to place the origins of Common Law in Anglo-Saxon laws.[61] Antiquarians would seek out documents to support the views of their compatriots, such as Sir Robert Cotton, whose collection of manuscripts would later form the basis for the British Library, and who discovered two original copies of King John’s Charter.
The Petition of Right of 1628 sought to add to Magna Carta in the manner of the Articuli super Cartas or the Six Statutes. Charles I however, did not grant it as law and he was under no legal restriction.[62] The problem as before in history was that the King was not bound by the law as adherents of Magna Carta believed. As before in history armed force would be used, first in 1642–49 and again in 1689.
With the advent of the republic it was questionable whether Magna Carta still applied. John Milton called for “great actions, above the form of law and custom”. Whilst Oliver Cromwell had much disdain for Magna Carta, at one point describing it as "Magna Farta" to a defendant who sought to rely on it[63] he agreed to rule with the advice and consent of his council.[64]
Different radical groups held differing opinions of Magna Carta. The Levellers rejected history and law as presented by their contemporaries, holding instead to an ‘anti-Normanism’ viewpoint.[65]John Lilburne regarded Magna Carta as being less than the freedoms which supposedly existed under the Anglo-Saxons before being crushed by the Norman yoke. Richard Overton would describe Magna Carta as a “a beggarly thing containing many marks of intolerable bondage”.[66] Both however saw Magna Carta as a valuable declaration of liberties which could be used against governments they disagreed with. Lilburne said "the ground of my freedom, I build upon the Grand Charter of England", while Overton said that when arrested, he hung on to his copy of Coke on Magna Carta, shouting "murder, murder, murder" as they wrested "the Great Charter of England's Liberties and Freedoms from me".[67] Gerrard Winstanley leader of the more extreme Diggers stated “The best lawes that England hath, [viz., the Magna Carta] were got by our Forefathers importunate petitioning unto the kings that still were their Task-masters; and yet these best laws are yoaks and manicles, tying one sort of people to be slaves to another; Clergy and Gentry have got their freedom, but the common people still are, and have been left servants to work for them.”
The first attempt at a proper Historiography was undertaken by Robert Brady (writer)[68] who refuted the supposed antiquity of parliament and the belief in the immutable continuity of the law, and realised the liberties of the Charter were limited and were effective only because it was the grant of the King; by putting Magna Carta in historical context he questioned its contemporary political relevance.[69] However, Brady’s history would not survive the Glorious Revolution which “marked a setback for the course of English historiography”.[70]
The Glorious Revolution reinforced the century’s ideological interpretations of history, which would later become known as the Whig interpretation of history. Reinforced with Lockean concepts the Whigs believed England’s constitution to be a Social contract, based on documents such as the Magna Carta, the Petition of Right and The Bill of Rights.[71] Ideas about the nature of law in general were beginning to change. In 1716 the Septennial Act was passed, which had a number of consequences. Firstly, it showed that Parliament no longer considered its previous statutes unassailable, as this act provided that the parliamentary term was to be seven years, whereas fewer than twenty-five years had passed since the Triennial Act (1694), which provided that a parliamentary term was to be three years. It also greatly extended the powers of Parliament. Under this new constitution Monarchal absolutism was replaced by Parliamentary supremacy. It was quickly realised that Magna Carta stood in the same relation to the King-in-Parliament as it had to the King without Parliament. This supremacy would be challenged by the likes of Granville Sharp. Sharp regarded Magna Carta to be a fundamental part of the constitution, and that it would be treason to repeal any part of it. Sharp also held that the Charter prohibited slavery.[72]
Sir William Blackstone published a critical edition of the 1215 Charter in 1759, and gave it the numbering system still used today.[43]
In 1763 an MP, John Wilkes was arrested for writing an inflammatory pamphlet, No. 45, 23 April 1763; he cited Magna Carta incessantly. Lord Camden denounced the treatment of Wilkes as a contravention of Magna Carta.
Prophet of a new revolutionary age, Thomas Paine in his Rights of Man would disregard the Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights on the grounds they were not a written constitution devised by elected representatives.
[edit] The United States of America
When Englishmen left their homeland for the new world, they brought with them charters establishing the colonies. The Massachusetts Bay Company charter for example stated the colonists would "have and enjoy all liberties and immunities of free and natural subjects." The Virginia Charter of 1606 (which was largely drafted by Sir Edward Coke) stated the colonists would have all "liberties, franchises and immunities" as if they had been born in England. The Massachusetts Body of Liberties contained similarities to clause 29 of the Magna Carta, and the Massachusetts General Court in drawing it up viewed Magna Carta as the chief embodiment of English common law.[73] The other colonies would follow their example. In 1638 Maryland sought to recognise Magna Carta as part of the law of the province but it was not granted by the King.[74]
In 1687 William Penn published The Excellent Privilege of Liberty and Property: being the birth-right of the Free-Born Subjects of England which contained the first copy of Magna Carta printed on American soil. Penn's comments reflected Coke's, indicating a belief that Magna Carta was a fundamental law.[75] The colonists drew on English lawbooks leading them to an anachronistic interpretation of the Magna Carta, believing it guaranteed trial by jury and habeas corpus.[76]
The development of Parliamentary sovereignty in the British Isles did not constitutionally affect the Thirteen Colonies, which retained an adherence to English common law, but it would come to directly affect the relationship between Britain and the colonies.[77] When American colonists raised arms against Britain, they were fighting not so much for new freedom, but to preserve liberties and rights, as believed to be enshrined in the Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights. American Revolutionaries would supplement this with ideas of natural right.
In 1787 when the revolutionaries gathered to draft a constitution they built upon the legal system they knew and admired, English common law, and on Lockean philosophy.
The American Constitution is the "supreme law of the land", recalling the manner in which Magna Carta had come to be regarded as fundamental law. This heritage is quite apparent. In comparing Magna Carta with the Bill of Rights: the Fifth Amendment guarantees: "No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law." In addition, the United States Constitution included a similar writ in the Suspension Clause, article 1, section 9: "The privilege of the writ habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may require it." Each of these proclaim no man may be imprisoned or detained without proof that they did wrong. The Ninth Amendment to the United States Constitution states that, "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." The framers of the United States Constitution wished to ensure that rights they already held, such as those provided by the Magna Carta, were not lost unless explicitly curtailed in the new United States Constitution.[78][79]
The United States Supreme Court has explicitly referenced Lord Coke's analysis of Magna Carta as an antecedent of the Sixth Amendment's right to a speedy trial.[80]
[edit] Nineteenth Century and beyond
Whilst radicals such as Sir Francis Burdett believed that Magna Carta could not be repealed, the 19th century would see the beginning of the repeal of many of the clauses of Magna Carta. The clauses were either obsolete and/or had been replaced by later legislation.
William Stubbs’s Constitutional History of England would be the high-water mark of the Whig interpretation of history. Stubbs believed that Magna Carta had been a major step in the shaping of the English people and he believed that the Barons at Runnymede were not just the Barons but the people.[81]
This view of history however, was passing. At the popular level William Howitt in Cassell's Illustrated history of England would note that it was fiction that King John’s Charter was the same Magna Carta as was on the statute books and stated that “The Barons, in fact, were amongst the greatest traitors that England ever produced”.[82] A more academic history was provided by Frederic William Maitland in History of English Law before the Time of Edward I which began to move Magna Carta away from the myth that had grown up around it and return it to its historical roots. In many literary representations of the medieval past, however, the Magna Carta remained the foundation for many diverse constructions of English national identity. Some authors instrumentalized the medieval roots of the document to preserve the social status quo while others utilized the precious national inheritance to change perceived economic injustice.[83]
In 1904 Edward Jenks published in the Independent Review an article entitled “The Myth of Magna Carta” which undermined the traditionally accepted view of the Magna Carta.[84] Historians like A. F. Pollard would agree with Jenks in considering Coke to have ‘invented’ Magna Carta, noting that the Charter at Runnymede had not meant popular liberty at all.[85]
Sellar and Yeatman in their parody 1066 and All That would play on the supposed importance of Magna Carta and its supposed universal liberty:. “Magna Charter was therefore the chief cause of Democracy in England, and thus a Good Thing for everyone (except the Common People)”.
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