The 809th anniversary of the Magna Carta, a document signed by King John and an assembly of rebellious barons, is this June, and the anniversary of the historic Great Charter is little noted in America each year — but it should be.
Perhaps with Donald Trump’s guilty verdict in his New York jury trial fresh in the country’s mind, this year’s anniversary presents an occasion to revisit the Magna Carta’s continuing relevance.
The Magna Carta is the most significant document in the development of the rule of law in English and American jurisprudence. By placing limits on the sovereign’s power — forcing King John to acknowledge in writing that his power was not absolute and could not be exercised arbitrarily — the foundation was laid for the beginning of constitutional government.
Indeed, a direct line can be traced from the Magna Carta of 1215 to the English Bill of Rights of 1689 and America’s Bill of Rights ratified in 1791. There is no dispute that the document was a principal inspiration for our founders in drafting our Bill of Rights.
Magna Carta’s Clause 39, one of the most oft-cited, states, “No free man is to be arrested, or imprisoned, or disseised, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any other way ruined, nor will we go against him or send against him, except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.”
Clause 39’s reference to “lawful judgment of his peers” is the foundation for the
