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Why does Magna Carta matter 800 years after it was first sealed?
Magna Carta is a cornerstone of the individual liberties that we enjoy, and it presents an ongoing challenge to arbitrary rule. But over time, while not envisaged at the time of its drafting, Magna Carta has for many been seen not only as a foundation of liberty, but also one of democracy. The Magna Carta can be seen in two ways: first, as a document of historical and legal significance; and secondly, as a principle underlying how we live, through equality under the rule of law and through accountability. Magna Carta matters both for what it said in 1215 and, perhaps more significantly now, for what it has come to symbolize.
Magna Carta as a source of liberty
The continuing importance of the Magna Carta as a source of freedom is well established. One of the key provisions of the 1215 Charter was that imprisonment should not have taken place without due legal process.
This also established the idea of the jury trial. Clause 39 of the 1215 Charter states that: "No free man may be arrested or imprisoned ... or exiled or in any way ruined ... except by the legitimate judgment of his peers or by the law of the land." Of course, this does not mean that all men were free. At that time there was the feudal system so there were slaves and there was a social ladder.
But, as with many aspects of the Magna Carta, it is what this principle subsequently helped to inspire that makes the Great Charter still relevant today.
From this principle of the rule of law and equality before the law derives the inspiration for the declarations of human rights, such as the Charter of Rights of 1689 in Great Britain, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of 1789 in France and the Charter of Rights of the United States of 1791. In the 20th century there were many other examples. The most famous, of course, is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) adopted in 1948 and in 1951 Great Britain was the first signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). And, while British parliamentarians, draftsmen and judges have long held the European Convention into account, it was finally incorporated into British law with the Human Rights Act of 1998. The Magna Carta forms the basis of the freedoms we now enjoy.
The broader relevance of the Magna Carta
The Magna Carta can also be seen as a foundation of accountability, popular democracy and even the importance of committed citizens. Historians have shown that, over time, different generations have reinterpreted the meaning of the Magna Carta to fit the dominant ideas of their era. The Magna Carta was fundamentally about the rule of law at the time of the arbitrary rule of a monarch. But as the sovereignty of the elected Parliament developed after 1688, the question of the balance of power inevitably arose. A sovereign parliament should be free to repeal laws that reflect the will of the people, or it should be bound by law. From the 19th century onwards, it became clear in Britain that this emphasis was shifting towards Parliament and many provisions of the Magna Carta were deleted from the book of laws as being considered obsolete.
The brass doors
Modern America and Magna Carta
The United States is sometimes called a nation of lawyers, given its litigious culture. It certainly places a special weight on the laws and documents that founded it, such as the Declaration of Independence to the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Also the Magna carta holds a special place as a historical source of the rule of law and the preservation of freedom.
Magna Carta continued to underpin legal training and, on occasion, legal arguments during the 19th century. By the 20th century, medieval events at Runnymede were firmly rooted as part of the American national backstory: a status underscored by its inclusion as one of the historical scenes included on the great brass doors installed at the entrance to the Supreme Court in 1935.
The focus on American values and way of life during the hot and cold wars of the 20th century ensured that Magna Carta gathered a cultural weight as a symbol of the special characteristics of the land of the free.
Magna Carta and popular culture
800 years after its sealing on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, Magna Carta’s place in American popular culture is such that it could be discussed by the Late Show host David Letterman when he interviewed the British Prime Minister, David Cameron in 2012. Tellingly, the host and Prime Minister agreed that Magna Carta contained the ‘seeds of democracy’.
The magna carta has often been quoted in modern culture.
In one episode of The Simpsons, Homer visits a library denuded of books and which had been transformed into a multi-media center in an attempt to assist with some history homework. Marge helps out by telling the children some historical stories, with Homer playing the part of a gluttonous Henry VIII who wipes his greasy lips on the historic document. Although Homer has no idea the importance of his role, viewers are expected to understand the joke. In addition his daughter, Lisa, surely knows the Magna Carta and mentions it in a song on another episode
The Magna Carta remains a political and cultural touchstone, one whose cultural cachet was made use of by Jay-Z in the naming of his 2013 album Magna Carta; the launch of the album included a visit to the copy of the 1215 Charter held at Salisbury Cathedral. We have travelled a long way from Runnymede, to lyrical attack of Jay-Z on the racial legacy of slavery and the need to tell different history lessons.
Jay-Z album Magna Carta
Simpson, Realty Bites ep. n. 187
Magna Carta and the special relationship
In the 1930s and 1940s, the British government attempted to cultivate strong relationships with successive American administrations by exploiting the high regard with which Americans hold the Magna Carta.The British Pavilion at the 1939 New York Universal Exposition had a "Hall of Democracy" at its center, displaying a copy of the 1215 Magna Carta to the public on loan from Lincoln Cathedral. Next to it was a genealogy of George Washington, which implicitly linked the document to the 150th anniversary of American independence. A copy of the text of the magna carta was also sent to all schools in America. A 1215 copy of the Magna Carta returned to the United States in 1976 to celebrate the bicentennial of American independence, also helping to underline the historic strength of Anglo-American relations during the Cold War.
Law
The Magna Carta is repeatedly deployed in legal arguments and it is regularly cited in American courts. Until a New York ruling in 1899, courts regularly stated the right to trial by jury lay in the Charter, and as late as 1968, the Supreme Court felt it wise to note that the historians did not recognise this legal pedigree. It appears in over a hundred Supreme Court judgments, and is cited in other courts, most often in arguing that a case has to be brought to trial and be subject to law.
In United States law, habeas corpus (also called “The Great Writ") is a recourse challenging the reasons or conditions of a person's detention under color of law. The Guantanamo Bay detention camp is a United States military prison located within Guantanamo Bay Naval Base.
A persistent standard of indefinite detention without trial and incidents of torture led the operations of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp to be challenged internationally as an affront to international human rights, and challenged domestically as a violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth and Fourteenth amendments of the United States Constitution, including the right of petition for habeas corpus.
In Boumediene v. Bush (2008) it was established that Guantanamo detainees have a right to habeas corpus and are able to bring petition to U.S courts. It also held that the Guantanamo detainees were entitled to the legal protections of the US Constitution and from then on, the Combatant Status Review Tribunal would be inadequate. The result of this case has seen many habeas corpus cases refiled.
Magna Carta : more than a legal instrument
Magna Carta is not only a legal instrument but it is also considered a symbol of freedom and democracy. The Magna Carta underscores the lineage of property rights and the importance of the rule of law to ensure reliability that are essential to capitalism and at the same time is vaunted as a document securing civil rights for the citizen against arbitrary government. By the mid-20th century, Magna Carta had come to stand as an early – and still powerful – statement of freedom and the rule of law, and became closely associated with the newer concept of human rights.The Magna Carta of the 20th century is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) is referred to all the people. As Eleanor Roosevelt stated, the United Nations Declaration was to be "the international Magna Carta of all men everywhere".
Magna Carta’s influence today
Magna Carta offers an easy shorthand with which to talk about rights, no matter of what kind. For example, when New York City introduced a Bill of Rights for taxi riders, a New York Times journalist quickly called this a ‘Magna Carta of hack hirers’.
The rare sales of subsequent editions of the Charter hit record numbers in auction houses and are coveted for trophies by the ultra-rich, for example when David Rubenstein bought a copy of the 1297 issue of the Charter for $ 21.3 million. That 1297 copy (kindly loaned by Rubenstein) now sits next to the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution in the rotunda of the National Archives in Washington, D.C. of visitors.
As a physical object, copies of the Magna Carta have retained, and intensified their power as objects of curiosity. The meaning of the Charter remains a little more fluid, offering something for both the left and right of the political spectrum. As Jay-Z has demonstrated, the Magna Carta is a totem pole of authority and a means of drawing attention to historical abuses of power, many of which are still with us today.
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