vide means

Green's Short

any of these articles of peace and security, and the it was less offence be notified to four barons chosen out of the easy to profive-and-twenty before mentioned, the said four for the conbarons shall repair to us, or our justiciary, if we trol of a King whom no are out of the realm, and, laying open the grievance, man could shall petition to have it redressed without delay: and trust. if it be not redressed by us, or if we should chance History, 129. to be out of the realm, if it should not be redressed by our justiciary within forty days, reckoning from the time it has been notified to us, or to our justiciary (if we should be out of the realm), the four barons aforesaid shall lay the cause before the rest of the five-and-twenty barons; and the said fiveand-twenty barons, together with the community of the whole kingdom, shall distrain and distress us in all the ways in which they shall be able, by seizing our castles, lands, possessions, and in any other manner they can, till the grievance is redressed, according to their pleasure; saving harmless our own person, and the persons of our Queen and children; and when it is redressed, they shall behave to us as before. And any person whatsoever in the kingdom may swear that he will obey the orders of the five-and-twenty barons aforesaid in the execution of the premises, and will distress us, jointly with them, to the utmost of his power; and we give public and free liberty to any one that shall please to swear to this, and never will hinder any person from taking the same oath.

62. As for all those of our subjects who will not, of their own accord, swear to join the five-andtwenty barons in distraining and distressing us, we will issue orders to make them take the same oath as aforesaid. And if any one of the five-and-twenty barons dies, or goes out of the kingdom, or is hindered any other way from carrying the things aforesaid into execution, the rest of the said five-andtwenty barons may choose another in his room, at their discretion, who shall be sworn in like manner as the

rest.

In all things that are committed to the execution of these five-and-twenty barons, if, when they are all assembled together, they should happen to disagree about any matter, and some of them, when summoned, will not or cannot come, whatever is agreed upon, or enjoined, by the major part of those that are present shall be reputed as firm and valid as if all the five-and-twenty had given their consent; and the aforesaid five-and-twenty shall swear that all the premises they shall faithfully observe, and cause with all their power to be observed. And we will procure nothing from any one, by ourselves nor by another, whereby any of these concessions and liberties may be revoked or lessened; and if any such thing shall have been obtained, let it be null and void; neither will we ever make use of it either by ourselves or any other. And all the ill-will, indignations, and rancours that have arisen between us and our subjects, of the clergy and laity, from the first breaking out of the dissensions between us, we do fully remit and forgive: moreover, all trespasses occasioned by the said dissensions, from Easter in the sixteenth year of our reign till the restoration of peace and tranquillity, we hereby entirely remit to all, both clergy and laity, and as far as in us lies do fully forgive. We have, moreover, caused to be made for them the letters patent testimonial of Stephen, Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, Henry, Lord Archbishop of Dublin, and the bishops aforesaid, as also of Master Pandulph, for the security and concessions aforesaid.

63. Wherefore we will and firmly enjoin, that the Church of England be free, and that all men in our kingdom have and hold all the aforesaid liberties, rights, and concessions, truly and peaceably, freely and quietly, fully and wholly to themselves and their heirs, of us and our heirs, in all things and places, for ever, as is aforesaid. It is also sworn, as well on our part as on the part of the barons, that all

the things aforesaid shall be observed in good faith, and without evil subtilty. Given under our hand, in the presence of the witnesses above named, and many others, in the meadow called Runingmede, between Windsor and Staines, the 15th day of June, in the 17th year of our reign.

CONTEMPORARY EXPOSITION

ROGER OF WENDOVER (1235)

A. D. 1215, which was the seventeenth year of the reign of King John; he held his court at Winchester at Christmas 'for one day, after which he hurried to London, and took up his abode at the New Temple, and at that place the abovementioned nobles came to him in gay military array, and demanded the confirmation of the liberties and laws of King Edward (the Confessor), with other liberties granted to them and to the kingdom and church of England, as were contained in the charter, and above mentioned laws of Henry the First; they also asserted that, at the time of his absolution at Winchester, he had promised to restore those laws and ancient liberties, and was bound by his own oath to observe them. The king, hearing the bold tone of the barons in making this demand, much feared an attack from them, as he saw that they were prepared to battle; he, however, made answer that their demands were a matter of importance and difficulty, and he therefore asked a truce till the end of Easter, that he might, after due deliberation, be able to satisfy them as well as the dignity of his crown.

...

The barons then delivered to the messengers a paper, containing in great measure the laws and ancient customs of the kingdom, and declared that, unless the king immediately granted them and confirmed them under his own seal, they would, by taking possession of his fortresses, force him to give them sufficient satisfaction as to their before-named demands. The archbishop with his fellow-messengers then carried the paper to the king, and read to him the heads of the paper one by one throughout. The king, when he heard the purport of these heads, derisively said, with the greatest indignation, "Why,

amongst these unjust demands, did not the barons ask for my kingdom also? Their demands are vain and visionary, and are unsupported by any plea of reason whatever." And at length he angrily declared with an oath, that he would never grant them such liberties as would render him their slave. The principal of these laws and liberties, which the nobles required to be confirmed to them, are partly described above in the charter of King Henry, and partly are extracted from the old laws of King Edward, as the following history will show in due time. . . .

King John, when he saw that he was deserted by almost all, so that out of his regal superabundance of followers he scarcely retained seven knights, was much alarmed lest the barons would attack his castles and reduce them without difficulty, as they would find no obstacle to their doing so; and he deceitfully pretended to make peace for a time with the aforesaid barons, and sent William Marshal, earl of Pembroke, with other trustworthy messengers, to them, and told them that, for the sake of peace, and for the exaltation and honour of the kingdom, he would willingly grant them the laws and liberties they required; he also sent word to the barons by these same messengers, to appoint a fitting day and place to meet and carry all these matters into effect. The king's messengers then came in all haste to London, and without deceit reported to the barons all that had been deceitfully imposed on them; they in their great joy appointed the 15th of June for the king to meet them, at a field lying between Staines and Windsor. Accordingly, at the time and place pre-agreed on, the king and nobles came to the appointed conference, and when each party had stationed themselves apart from the other, they began a long discussion about terms of peace and the aforesaid liberties.

At length, after various points on both sides had been discussed, King John, seeing that he was inferior in strength to the barons, without raising any difficulty, granted the underwritten laws and liberties, and confirmed them by his charter as follows.

ROGER WENDOVER, Flowers of History (Giles's translation, 1849). II. 304.

....

CRITICAL COMMENT

COKE (1628).

This parliamentary charter hath divers appellations in law. It is called Magna Charta, not for the length or largeness of it . . . . but it is called the Great Charter, in respect of the great weightiness and weighty greatness of the matter contained in it in few words, being the fountain of all fundamental law; and therefore it may truly be said of it, that it is magnum in parvo.

SIR EDWARD COKE, First Institute of the Laws of England. I. 22.

BURKE (1774)

Magna Charta, if it did not give us originally the House of Commons, gave us at least a House of Commons of weight and consequence.

EDMUND BURKE, Works. II. 53.

HALLAM (1818)

As this was the first effort towards a legal government, so is it beyond comparison the most important event in our history, except that revolution without which its benefits would rapidly have been annihilated. . . . It (the Great Charter) is still the keystone of English liberty. All that has since been obtained is little more than as confirmation or commentary. . . . The essential clauses of Magna Charta are those which protect the personal liberty and property of all freemen by giving security from arbitrary imprisonment and arbitrary spoliation. . . . From this era a new soul was infused into the people of England. Her liberties at the best long in, abeyance, became a tangible possession, and those indefinite aspirations for the laws of Edward the Confessor, were changed into a steady regard for the Great Charter.

HENRY HALLAM, Europe during the Middle Ages. Chap. VIII. 341–342.

PALGRAVE (1832)

By far the greatest portions of the written or statute laws of England consist of the declaration, the reassertion, repetition,