The Magna Carta Celebrates Its 800 Year Anniversary

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Summary: This week marks the 800 year anniversary of the Magna Carta.

This week makes for a good lawyer holiday: the celebration of a law, the Magna Carta, which as of June 15, 2015, turns 800 years old. This law, which was the culmination of a stand barons took against King John in 1215, with the help of the Archbishop of Canterbury, established, fundamentally, a limitation on the sovereignty of the king.

  

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The seed was placed, and sprouted to extend rights for the barons, initially, and then to a popularly elected parliament, and finally, in our day and age, to all citizens equally. This is the principle of “rule of law” which more or less means people should be secure in their person and property, and that government interference in these should be limited.

With a population equal under the law, and which knows what to expect, legally, from the government, they can build a stable population able to create all the innovations and freedoms that characterize countries with high standards of living.

The growing seed continues to blossom in new areas, with America extending equal rights to women, and with the Civil Rights Acts, to blacks, and lately, increasingly, to homosexuals. The idea, the inception, began in 1215 with the clipping of the king’s absolute power.