MagnaCarta

Abstract

Magna Carta was issued by King John on June 15, 1215 at Runnymede, England. It has been upheld as a document proclaiming the principles of individual liberty and establishing limits on governmental authority and power. It was created within the context of a long‐standing three‐way struggle between the Catholic Church, the Kings of England, and English nobility but has implications beyond that struggle. The most important clauses of Magna Carta were clauses that led to acknowledgement that governments as well as ordinary citizens were subject to the rule of law, recognition of the right to a trial by one's peers, and development of the notion of due process. While little of the original Magna Carta remains intact, and for much of its history it was ignored by the monarchs who kept reissuing or updating it, it has played a major role in the development of concepts of justice ever since. Contemporary definitions of human rights and the laws protecting these rights have been shaped by Magna Carta.