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Magna Carta ( Latin for "Great Charter", literally "Great Paper"), also called '''Magna Carta Libertatum''' ("Great Charter of Freedoms"), is an English Charter originally issued in 1215 . Magna Carta was the most significant early influence on the extensive historical process that led to the rule of Constitutional Law today. Magna Carta influenced many Common Law and other documents, such as the United States Constitution and Bill Of Rights , and is considered one of the most important legal documents in the History Of Democracy . Magna Carta was originally written because of disagreements between Pope Innocent III , King John and the English Barons about the Right s of the King . Magna Carta required the king to renounce certain rights, respect certain Legal Procedure s and accept that his Will could be Bound By The Law . It explicitly protected certain rights of the king's subjects, whether free or fettered — most notably the right of Habeas Corpus , meaning that they had rights against unlawful imprisonment. Many clauses were renewed throughout the Middle Ages, and further during the Tudor and Stuart periods, and the 17th and 18th centuries. By the late 19th century most clauses in their original form had been Repeal ed from English Law . There are a number of popular misconceptions about Magna Carta, such as that it was the first document to limit the power of an English king by law (it was not the first, and was partly based on the Charter Of Liberties ); that it in practice limited the power of the king (it mostly did not in the Middle Ages ); and that it is a single static document (it is a variety of documents referred to under a common name). EVENTS LEADING TO MAGNA CARTA After the Norman Conquest Of England in 1066 and advances in the 12th Century , the English king had by 1199 become the most powerful Monarch in Europe. This was due to a number of factors including the sophisticated centralised government created by the procedures of the new Anglo-Saxon systems of governance, and extensive Anglo-Norman land holdings in Normandy . But after King John Of England was crowned in the early 13th century, a series of failures at home and abroad, combined with perceived abuses of the king's power, led the English Baron s to revolt and attempt to restrain what the king could legally do. France King John's actions in France were a major cause of discontent in the realm. At the time of his accession to the throne after Richard's death, there were no set rules to define the line of succession. King John, as Richard's younger brother, was crowned over Richard's nephew, Arthur Of Brittany . As Arthur still had a claim over the Anjou empire, however, John needed the approval of the French king, Philip Augustus . To get it, John gave to Philip large tracts of the French-speaking Anjou territories. When John later married Isabella Of Angoulême , her previous fiancé ( Hugh IX Of Lusignan , one of John's Vassal s) appealed to Philip, who then declared Forfeit all of John's French lands, including the rich Normandy. Philip declared Arthur as the true ruler of the Anjou throne and invaded John's French holdings in mid-1202 to give it to him. John had to act to save face, but his eventual actions did not achieve this—he ended up killing Arthur in suspicious circumstances, thus losing the little support he had from his French barons. After the defeat of John's allies at the Battle Of Bouvines , Philip retained all of John's northern French territories, including Normandy (although Aquitaine remained in English hands for a time). These serious military defeats, which lost to the French a major source of income, made John unpopular at home. Worse, to recoup his expenses, he had to further tax the already unhappy barons. The Church At the time of John’s reign there was still a great deal of controversy as to how the Archbishop Of Canterbury was to be elected, although it had become traditional that the monarch would appoint a candidate with the approval of the monks of Canterbury. But in the early 13th century, the Bishop s began to want a say. To retain control, the monks elected one of their number to the role. But John, incensed at his lack of involvement in the proceedings, sent John De Gray , the Bishop Of Norwich , to Rome, as his choice. Pope Innocent III declared both choices as invalid and persuaded the monks to elect Stephen Langton . But John refused to accept this choice and exiled the monks from the realm. Infuriated, Innocent ordered an Interdict (prevention of public worship — mass, marriages, the ringing of church bells, etc.) in England in 1208, Excommunicated John in 1209, and encouraged Philip to invade England in 1212. John finally backed down and agreed to endorse Langton and allow the exiles to return. To completely placate the pope, he gave England and Ireland as papal territories and rented them back as a Fiefdom for 1,000 marks per annum. This surrender of Autonomy to a foreign power further enraged the barons. Taxes King John needed money for armies, but the loss of the French territories, especially Normandy, greatly reduced the state income, and a huge tax would have to be raised in order to attempt to reclaim these territories. Yet it was difficult to raise taxes due to the tradition of keeping them at the same level. Novel efforts to raise income included a Forest law, a set of regulations about the king’s forest which were easily broken and severely punished. John also increased the pre-existing Scutage (feudal payment to an overlord replacing direct military service) eleven times in his seventeen years as king, as compared to eleven times in twice that period covering three monarchs before him. The last two of these increases were double the increase of their predecessors. He also imposed the first income tax which raised what was, at the time, the extortionate sum of £60,000. Rebellion and civil war By 1215, some of the most important barons in England had had enough, and they entered s and bishops. The most significant clause for King John at the time was clause 61, known as the "security clause", the longest portion of the document. This established a committee of 25 barons who could at any time meet and over-rule the will of the King, through force by seizing his castles and possessions if needed. This was based on a medieval legal practice known as '' Distraint '', but it was the first time it had been applied to a monarch. In addition, the King was to take an oath of loyalty to the committee. Clause 61 essentially neutered John's power as a monarch, making him King in name only. He renounced it as soon as the barons left London, plunging England into a Civil War , called the First Barons' War . 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 released John from his oath to obey it. Magna Carta re-issued John died during the war, from Dysentery , on October 18 , 1216 , and this quickly changed the nature of the war. His nine-year-old son, Henry III , was next in line for the throne. The royalists believed the rebel barons would find the idea of loyalty to the child Henry more palatable, so the boy was swiftly crowned in late October 1216 and the war ended. Henry's Regent s reissued Magna Carta in his name on November 12 , 1216 , omitting some clauses, such as clause 61, and again in 1217 . When he turned 18 in 1225 , Henry III himself reissued Magna Carta, this time in a shorter version with only 37 articles. Henry III ruled for 56 years (the longest reign of an English Monarch in the Medieval period) so that by the time of his death in 1272 , Magna Carta had become a settled part of English legal precedent. Henry III's son and heir Edward I 's Parliament reissued Magna Carta for the final time on 12 October , 1297 as part of a Statute called ''Confirmatio cartarum'' (25 Edw. I), reconfirming Henry III's shorter version of Magna Carta from 1225. CONTENT OF MAGNA CARTA The Magna Carta was originally written in Latin. A large part of Magna Carta was copied, nearly word for word, from the Charter Of Liberties of Henry I , issued when Henry I ascended to the throne in 1100, which bound the king to certain laws regarding the treatment of church officials and nobles, effectively granting certain civil liberties to the church and the English nobility. Rights still in force today For modern times, the most enduring legacy of the Magna Carta is considered the right of Habeas Corpus . This right arises from what we now call Clauses 36, 38, 39, and 40 of the 1215 Magna Carta. The impact of the Magna Carta worldwide is great in its influence, for example on US and Commonwealth law. The following material refers to UK law and stands apart from a broader appreciation of the wider impact of the Magna Carta. Three clauses of the 1297 version of Magna Carta still remain in force in current English law. Clause 1 guarantees the freedom of the English Church. Although this originally meant freedom from the King, later in history it was used for different purposes (see below). Clause 9 of the 1297 Magna Carta guarantees the “ancient liberties” of the city of London. Clause 29 guarantees a right to due process.
The repeal of clause 26 in 1829 (by 9 Geo. 4 c. 31 s. 1) was the first time a clause of Magna Carta was repealed. With the document's perceived protected status broken, in one hundred and fifty 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 . Feudal rights still in place in 1225 These clauses were present in the 1225 charter but are no longer in force, and would have no real place in the post-feudal world. Clauses 2 to 7 refer to the feudal death duties; defining the amounts and what to do if an heir to a fiefdom is underage or is a widow. Clause 23 provides no town or person should be forced to build a bridge across a river. Clause 33 demands the removal of all fish weirs. Clause 43 gives special provision for tax on reverted estates and Clause 44 states that forest law should only apply to those in the King’s forest. Feudal rights not in the 1225 charter These provisions have no bearing in the world today, as they are feudal rights, and were not even included in the 1225 charter. Clauses 9 to 12, 14 to 16, and 25 to 26 deal with debt and taxes and Clause 27 with Intestacy . The other clauses state that no one may seize land in debt except as a last resort, that underage heirs and widows should not pay interest on inherited loans, that county rents will stay at their ancient amounts and that the crown may only seize the value owed in payment of a debt, that aid (taxes for warfare or other emergency) must be reasonable, and that scutage (literally, shield-payment, payment in lieu of actual military service used to finance warfare) may only be sought with the consent of the kingdom. These clauses were not present in the 1225 document, but still this led to the first parliament. Clause 14 provided that the common consent of the kingdom was to be sought from a council of the archbishops, bishops, earls and greater Barons. This later became the great council (see below). Judicial rights (also in 1225 Charter) These rights were the beginning of English judicial rights. Clauses 17 to 22 allowed for a fixed law court, which became the chancellery, and defines the scope and frequency of county assizes. They also said that fines should be proportionate to the offence, that they should not be influenced by ecclesiastical property in clergy trials, and that people should be tried by their peers. Many think that this gave rise to jury and magistrate trial, but its only manifestation in the modern world was the right of a Lord to a criminal trial in the House of Lords at first instance (abolished in 1948). Clause 24 states that crown officials (such as sheriffs) may not try a crime in place of a judge. Clause 34 forbids repossession without a Writ precipe. Clauses 36 to 38 state that writs for loss of life or limb are to be free, that someone may use reasonable force to secure their own land and that no one can be tried on their own testimony alone. Clauses 36, 38, 39 and 40 collectively defined the right of Habeas Corpus . Clause 36 required courts to make inquiries as to the whereabouts of a prisoner, and to do so without charging any fee. Clause 38 required more than the mere word of an official, before any person could be put on trial. Clause 39 gave the courts exclusive rights to punish anyone. Clause 40 disallowed the selling or the delay of justice. Clauses 36 and 38 were removed from the 1225 version, but were reinstated in later versions. The right of Habeas Corpus as such, was first invoked in court in the year 1305. Clause 54 says that no man may be imprisoned on the testimony of a woman except on the death of her husband. Anti-corruption and fair trade (also in 1225 Charter) Clauses 28 to 32 say that no royal officer may take any commodity such as corn, 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. Clause 25 sets out a list of standard measures and Clauses 41 and 42 guarantee the safety and right of entry and exit of foreign merchants. Clause 45 says that the king should only appoint royal officers where they are suitable for the post. Clause 46 provides for the guardianship of monasteries. Temporary provisions These provisions were for immediate effect, and were not in any later charter. Clauses 47 and 48 abolish most of Forest Law. Clauses 49, 52 to 53 and 55 to 59 provide for the return of hostages, land and fines taken in John’s reign. Article 50 says that no member of the D’Athèe family may be a royal officer. Article 51 called for all foreign knights and mercenaries to leave the realm. Articles 60, 62 and 63 provide for the application and observation of the Charter and say that the Charter is binding on the Kings and his heirs forever, but this was soon deemed to be dependent on each succeeding King reaffirming the Charter under his own seal. 1226–1495 |
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