I was prompted to ask myself this question when reading
Zachary Gorman’s recently published book, Summoning
Magna Carta, Freedom’s symbol over a millennium.
“The supposed laws of Edward the Confessor became a living
Great Charter of liberties; the ancient constitution became the current working
constitution.” (238)
My conclusion, after reading Gorman’s book, is that the
Magna Carta is a worthy symbol of the ongoing struggle for freedom.
King John signed the Magna Carta in 1215 - at Runnymede
which is on the Thames, west of London (not far from the location of Heathrow
airport). He probably perceived that the alternatives to signing were unpalatable.
He had been waging war in France in an attempt to recover lost territory. A
large number of barons refused to provide troops as requested, claiming that
their obligations extended only to the Anglo-Norman heartland of England,
Normandy, and Brittany. Eventually, the rebel barons captured London, with the
help of local townsfolk. King John did not have the funds required to hire
mercenaries to reverse the situation, so he agreed to meet the rebels at
Runnymede. Magna Carta was negotiated between King John and the barons with the
help of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Stephen Langton (although Pope Innocent
III sided with King John and opposed the Magna Carta).
With the benefit of hindsight, the most important provisions
of the Magna Carta were those that required the barons to be consulted before
taxes were raised (a step in the direction of “no taxation without
representation”) and those establishing some fundamental legal rights. The
document stipulated that freemen were not to be “taken or imprisoned or disseised
or exiled … except by the lawful judgement of his peers or by the law of the
land”. That provision had limited application at the time because serfdom was
common, but was a step in the direction of rule of law.
I learned about the Magna Carta at school, but at
that time it just seemed to be one of many boring incidents in English history.
My more recent reading led me to think of it as evidence that England had
retained some of the Classical Roman tradition which viewed law as evolving via judicial
processes (in which precedents were seen to provide guidance) rather than as
being created by the edicts of kings (or emperors). Gorman’s book provides the historical
background to development of the narrative that the Magna Carta reaffirmed ancient
rights, that were observed to some extent during the reign of Edward the
Confessor – about 150 years earlier, prior to the Norman Conquest. The book
documents how the Magna Carta was re-affirmed and extended, and became a symbol
of the ongoing struggle for freedom.
Highlights of Gorman’s book include his account of the
central role played by William Penn in bringing the Magna Carta to the American
colonies and the role of the Magna Carta in the fight for self-government in Australia. Gorman
notes that after Imperial legislation of 1850 failed to provide self-government
to New South Wales (NSW), William Charles Wentworth got the NSW Legislative
Council to cite the Magna Carta in declaring that the Imperial parliament does
not have any right “to tax the people of this Colony”. The argument that
taxation required consent, both in its raising and spending, was no doubt
intended to remind the British government of the American Revolution, which had occurred
because many American colonists perceived that the British Government was
violating their ancient rights.
In Australia, the Magna Carta still shapes how the High
Court interprets the constitution through the common law. In 1925, High Court
Justice, Isaac Isaacs, declared that it is the Magna Carta, rather than the
Australian Constitution, that ensures everyone “has an inherent right to his
life, liberty, property and citizenship”. However, the ongoing influence of the
Magna Carta seems likely to depend on citizens continuing the tradition
of viewing it as a worthy symbol of the ongoing struggle for freedom.
On Anzac Day (April 25) when Australians commemorate those
who served and lost their lives in past wars, speechmakers often tell us that
they were fighting for freedom. It is worth remembering that the freedom they
fought for has strong links to the Magna Carta.
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