King John of England the Research Proposal

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This story is chronicled by Anthony Beadles in the journal History Today, who makes clear on page 280 of his journal essay that there was a "dearth of records" during King John's reign which leaves historians with less data (names, dates, and other specifics) than they would like to have had. Both his father and his brother Richard had "close companions" who wrote their histories and catalogued their decisions. The writings that did survive and tell King John's story were monks who "...were often as much concerned with local gossip as with national news" (Beadles, 1979). That having been said, Beadles obviously does have a fairly good grasp of how the Magna Carta came to be put into official law in England. A movement began against King John's policies "over a number of years," Beadles writes. King John "subdued Ireland and Scotland in 1210," and took Wales in 1211. Then he began to annoy and even cause rage among barons and in 1214 John's misadventures abroad were serious enough to have important barons and others begin to plot against him.

In May 1215, serious military opposition lined up against him and on May 17 in fact the rebels who hated King John captured London. "No doubt he was surprised by the extent and rapidity of the rebellion," Beadles write on page 282. The upshot of this rebellion - which became a civil war - was that in the June of 1215 he was forced to sign the Magna Carta (which was originally called the "Articles of the Barons").

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He signed it and as a result the English Parliament was launched (democracy rather than autocratic rule) and 37 old English laws that had prevailed prior to the Norman invasion were put back into place. Archbishop Stephen Langton who was one of the most powerful barons in England wrote the Magna Carta.

According to the Web site Middle Ages (www.middle-ages.org.uk) KingJohn had so alienated the barons in England by playing hardball politics that the uprising by the rebels had backing from important people. And the Magna Carta - "considered the founding document of English liberties and hence American liberties" - became the wellspring for the concepts behind the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Rights in the Maryland Constitution of 1776. From the Maryland Constitution (Article 21) one can clearly see the influence of the Magna Carta: "That no freeman ought to be taken, or imprisoned, or disseized of his freehold, liberties, or privileges...but by the judgment of his peers, or by the law of the land" (www.middle-ages.org.uk).

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