NOBODY IS ABOVE THE LAW - NOT EVEN THE KING OR QUEEN OF ENGLAND

Magna Carta originated as an unsuccessful attempt to achieve peace between royalist and rebel factions in 1215, as part of the events leading to the outbreak of the First Barons' War.

England was ruled by King John, the third of the Angevin kings. Although the kingdom had a robust administrative system, the nature of government under the Angevin monarchs was ill-defined and uncertain. Much as the British system tends to deny justice to victims of local authority abuses.

John and his predecessors had ruled using the principle of vis et voluntas, or "force and will", taking executive and sometimes arbitrary decisions, often justified on the basis that a king was above the law.

Many contemporary writers believed that monarchs should rule in accordance with the custom and the law, with the counsel of the leading members of the realm, but there was no model for what should happen if a king refused to do so.

This was the beginning of a democracy where the public gain protections from the state - or at least that should be where societies all over the world are headed.

MEANING OF MAGNA CARTA

Magna Carta is Latin for ‘great charter’ and the term was first used in 1217 to distinguish it from the Charter of the Forest, a document that also set out limits on the king’s administration, this time of the royal forest, areas of the country set aside for royal hunting and subject to much harsher laws and restrictions.

Both charters set out what the king could and could not do. In other words, Magna Carta set out the laws which the king and everyone else had to follow for the first time.

Copies of Magna Carta were sent out to be read out in each county of England so that everyone knew of its existence. There was no internet or broadband in those days.

KING JOHN - The Magna Carta was signed in June 1215 between the barons of Medieval England and King John. ‘Magna Carta’ is Latin and means “Great Charter”. The Magna Carta was one of the most important documents of Medieval England.

It was signed (by royal seal) between the feudal barons and King John at Runnymede near Windsor Castle. The document was a series of written promises between the king and his subjects that he, the king, would govern England and deal with its people according to the customs of feudal law. Magna Carta was an attempt by the barons to stop a king – in this case John – abusing his power with the people of England suffering.

Why would a king – who was meant to be all powerful in his own country – agree to the demands of the barons who were meant to be below him in authority ?

England had for some years owned land in France. The barons had provided the king with both money and men to defend this territory. Traditionally, the king had always consulted the barons before raising taxes (as they had to collect it) and demanding more men for military service (as they had to provide the men). This was all part of the Feudal System.

So long as English kings were militarily successful abroad, relations with the barons were good. But John was not very successful in his military campaigns abroad. His constant demands for more money and men angered the barons. By 1204, John had lost his land in northern France. In response to this, John introduced high taxes without asking the barons. This was against feudal law and accepted custom.

John made mistakes in other areas as well. He angered the Roman Catholic Church. The pope, vexed by John’s behaviour, banned all church services in England in 1207. Religion, and the fear of Hell, were very important to the people including the barons. The Catholic Church taught the people that they could only gain entrance to Heaven if the Catholic Church believed that they were good enough to get there. How could they show their goodness and love of God if the churches were shut ? Even worse for John was the fact that the pope excommunicated him in 1209. This meant that John could never get to Heaven until the pope withdrew the excommunication. Faced with this, John climbed down and accepted the power of the Catholic Church, giving them many privileges in 1214.

1214 was a disastrous year for John for another reason. Once again, he suffered military defeat in an attempt to get back his territory in northern France. He returned to London demanding more money from taxes. This time the barons were not willing to listen. They rebelled against his power. The barons captured London. However, they did not defeat John entirely and by the Spring of 1215, both sides were willing to discuss matters. The result was the Magna Carta.

CLAUSES REMAINING IN ENGLISH LAW

Only three clauses of Magna Carta still remain on statute in England and Wales. These clauses concern 

1) the freedom of the English Church,

2) the "ancient liberties" of the City of London (clause 13 in the 1215 charter, clause 9 in the 1297 statute), and 

3) a right to due legal process (clauses 39 and 40 in the 1215 charter, clause 29 in the 1297 statute).

In detail, these clauses (using the numbering system from the 1297 statute) state that:

I. 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.

IX. 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.

XXIX. 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.

Of clause 29 (XXIX) the policy makers have been whittling this down so much in recent years that little remains of Article 6 and the right to a Level Playing Field, also known as Equality At Arms. 

THE MODERN LEGACY, IS THAT NOT MUCH REMAINS, SAVE AS SYMBOLIC MARKER

Magna Carta continues to have a powerful iconic status in British society, being cited by politicians and lawyers in support of constitutional positions - or lack of a constitution.

Its perceived guarantee of trial by jury and other civil liberties, for example, led to Tony Benn's reference to the debate in 2008 over whether to increase the maximum time terrorism suspects could be held without charge from 28 to 42 days as "the day Magna Carta was repealed". Although rarely invoked in court in the modern era, in 2012 the Occupy London protestors attempted to use Magna Carta in resisting their eviction from St. Paul's Churchyard by the City of London. In his judgment the Master of the Rolls gave this short shrift, noting somewhat drily that although clause 29 was considered by many the foundation of the rule of law in England, he did not consider it directly relevant to the case, and the two other surviving clauses actually concerned the rights of the Church and the City of London.

Magna Carta carries little legal weight in modern Britain, as most of its clauses have been repealed and relevant rights ensured by other statutes, but the historian James Holt remarks that the survival of the 1215 charter in national life is a "reflexion of the continuous development of English law and administration" and symbolic of the many struggles between authority and the law over the centuries. The historian W. L. Warren has observed that "many who knew little and cared less about the content of the Charter have, in nearly all ages, invoked its name, and with good cause, for it meant more than it said".

It also remains a topic of great interest to historians; Natalie Fryde characterised the charter as "one of the holiest of cows in English medieval history", with the debates over its interpretation and meaning unlikely to end. In many ways still a "sacred text", Magna Carta is generally considered part of the uncodified constitution of the United Kingdom; in a 2005 speech, the Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales, Lord Woolf, described it as the "first of a series of instruments that now are recognised as having a special constitutional status".

Magna Carta was reprinted in New Zealand in 1881 as one of the Imperial Acts in force there. Clause 29 of the document remains in force as part of New Zealand law.

The document also continues to be honoured in the United States as an antecedent of the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights. In 1976, the UK lent one of four surviving originals of the 1215 Magna Carta to the United States for their bicentennial celebrations and also donated an ornate display case for it. The original was returned after one year, but a replica and the case are still on display in the United States Capitol Crypt in Washington, D.C.

THE CLAUSES OF THE MAGNA CARTA

There are 63 clauses in Magna Carta. For the main part, the clauses do not deal with legal principles but instead relate to the regulation of feudal customs and the operation of the justice system. There are clauses on the granting of taxes, towns and trade, the extent and regulation of the royal forest, debt, the Church and the restoration of peace.

Only four of the 63 clauses in Magna Carta are still valid today - 1 (part), 13, 39 and 40. Of enduring importance to people appealing to the charter over the last 800 years are the famous clauses 39 and 40:

“No free man shall be seized, imprisoned, dispossessed, outlawed, exiled or ruined in any way, nor in any way proceeded against, except by the lawful judgement of his peers and the law of the land.

“To no one will we sell, to no one will we deny or delay right or justice.”

These clauses remain law today, and provided the basis for important principles in English law developed in the fourteenth through to the seventeenth century, and which were exported to America and other English-speaking countries. Their phrasing, ‘to no one’ and ‘no free man’ gave these provisions a universal quality that is still applicable today in a way that many of the clauses relating specifically to feudal custom are not.

Magna Carta was not intended to be a great charter of rights for all people, but designed by the barons to ensure that their rights were protected against the king's power.

800TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATIONS

The 800th anniversary of the original charter occurred on 15 June 2015, and organisations and institutions planned celebratory events. The British Library brought together the four existing copies of the 1215 manuscript in February 2015 for a special exhibition. British artist Cornelia Parker was commissioned to create a new artwork, Magna Carta (An Embroidery), which was shown at the British Library between May and July 2015. The artwork is a copy of the Wikipedia article about the Magna Carta (as it appeared on the document's 799th anniversary, 15 June 2014), hand-embroidered by over 200 people.

On 15 June 2015, a commemoration ceremony was conducted in Runnymede at the National Trust park, attended by British and American dignitaries.

The copy held by Lincoln Cathedral was exhibited in the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., from November 2014 until January 2015. A new visitor centre at Lincoln Castle was opened for the anniversary. The Royal Mint released two commemorative two-pound coins.

In 2014, Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk celebrated the 800th anniversary of the barons' Charter of Liberties, said to have been secretly agreed there in November 1214.

CANBERRA AUSTRALIA - A replica of the is seen here in Parliament House, Canberra, Australia. The Magna Carta was issued in June 1215 and was the first document to put into writing the principle that the king and his government was not above the law. It sought to prevent the king from exploiting his power, and placed limits of royal authority by establishing law as a power in itself. The document is a fitting reminder that Australian law derives from English law, by way of a throwback to the days of the British Empire. Australia is now part of the Commonwealth.

In 2015 the Houses of Parliament and the people of the UK commemorated 800 years since the sealing of Magna Carta (1215).

WASHINGTON DC - This is another replica of the Magna Carta. There were re-issues of 1216, 1217, and 1225

King John died on October 18/19, 1216, while Louis of France (afterward Louis VIII), supported by rebellious English barons, was trying to gain control of England.

One of the first acts of the council of John’s young successor, Henry III, was to reissue the Magna Carta on November 12 in the hope of recalling men to their allegiance to the rightful king. The charter of 1216 was considerably shorter than its predecessor—42 clauses versus 63 in the 1215 document—as the council had omitted clauses dealing with purely temporary and political matters as well as those that might limit its own power to raise money or forces to carry on the war.

The church, while keeping a general promise of freedom, lost its specific guarantee of free election to office. Even in that moment of danger, the council did not forget one main purpose of the charter: to provide a definitive statement of feudal law. It tried to address points in doubt, such as specific matters of inheritance law and the precise year at which an heir should attain his majority (age 21). Instead of the “form of security,” the council stated that all omissions were postponed for future consideration. They were never replaced.

HISTORIC BACKGROUND

King John had lost most of his ancestral lands in France to King Philip II in 1204 and had struggled to regain them for many years, raising extensive taxes on the barons to accumulate money to fight a war which ended in expensive failure in 1214. Following the defeat of his allies at the Battle of Bouvines, John had to sue for peace and pay compensation. John was already personally unpopular with many of the barons, many of whom owed money to the Crown, and little trust existed between the two sides. A triumph would have strengthened his position, but in the face of his defeat, within a few months after his return from France John found that rebel barons in the north and east of England were organising resistance to his rule.

The rebels took an oath that they would "stand fast for the liberty of the church and the realm", and demanded that the King confirm the Charter of Liberties that had been declared by King Henry I in the previous century, and which was perceived by the barons to protect their rights. The rebel leadership was unimpressive by the standards of the time, even disreputable, but were united by their hatred of John; Robert FitzWalter, later elected leader of the rebel barons, claimed publicly that John had attempted to rape his daughter, and was implicated in a plot to assassinate John in 1212.

John held a council in London in January 1215 to discuss potential reforms, and sponsored discussions in Oxford between his agents and the rebels during the spring. Both sides appealed to Pope Innocent III for assistance in the dispute. During the negotiations, the rebellious barons produced an initial document, which historians have termed "the Unknown Charter of Liberties", which drew on Henry I's Charter of Liberties for much of its language; seven articles from that document later appeared in the "Articles of the Barons" and the subsequent charter.

It was John's hope that the Pope would give him valuable legal and moral support, and accordingly John played for time; the King had declared himself to be a papal vassal in 1213 and correctly believed he could count on the Pope for help. John also began recruiting mercenary forces from France, although some were later sent back to avoid giving the impression that the King was escalating the conflict. In a further move to shore up his support, John took an oath to become a crusader, a move which gave him additional political protection under church law, even though many felt the promise was insincere.

Letters backing John arrived from the Pope in April, but by then the rebel barons had organised into a military faction. They congregated at Northampton in May and renounced their feudal ties to John, marching on London, Lincoln, and Exeter. John's efforts to appear moderate and conciliatory had been largely successful, but once the rebels held London, they attracted a fresh wave of defectors from the royalists. The King offered to submit the problem to a committee of arbitration with the Pope as the supreme arbiter, but this was not attractive to the rebels. Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury, had been working with the rebel barons on their demands, and after the suggestion of papal arbitration failed, John instructed Langton to organise peace talks.

RUNNYMEDE, LONDON - King John signing Magna Carta on June 15, 1215, at Runnymede meadow, River Thames, England. Runnymede is an otherwise obscure field lying next to the Thames in Berkshire between Windsor and Staines. Charters granting rights and liberties to individuals and groups were issued by lords throughout society, including the king. They were written records of someone’s action and were authenticated with a wax seal. Although its form was normal for the time, Magna Carta was the product of political crisis and an uprising of the leading men of England.

GREAT CHARTER OF 1215

GREAT CHARTER OF 1216

GREAT CHARTER OF 1217

GREAT CHARTER OF 1225

GREAT CHARTER OF 1297

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LINKS & REFERENCE

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Magna-Carta

https://www.parliament.uk/magnacarta

https://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/medieval-england/magna-carta/

DESCRIPTION OF ENGLAND - The Domesday Book was commissioned in December 1085 by William the Conqueror, who invaded England in 1066 at Hastings in East Sussex. This Great Survey was conducted as a means to collect taxes more effectively to further enslave the lower classes, a situation the persists all the while the United Kingdom does not have a Written Constitution, to keep British subjects under the control of the monarchy with laws that are flexible and a system that is designed to ensure that the little man is always subdued.

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