11. THE MAGNA CARTA AND THE FIRST ENGLISH PARLIAMENT In 1215, king John hoped to recapture Normandy.

He called on his lords to fight for him, but they no longer trusted him. They marched to London, where they were joined by angry merchants. Outside London, John was forced to sign a new agreement. This new agreement was known as Magna Carta (a collection of 37 laws), or the Great Charter, and was an important symbol of political freedom, which showed that the power of the king could be limited by a written grant. The king promised all freemen protection from his officers and the right to a fair anf legal trial. At the time,perhaps less than one quarter of the English were freemen, most were not free, they were serfs. When the king went to war he had the right to 40-days fighting service from each of his lords, but the 40 days werent enough to fight a war in France,so he had to pay soldiers to fight for him, because the nobles refused to fight for longer. The nobles did not allow Johns successors to forge this charter and its promises. After king Johns death, his nine-year old son, Henry III was crowned king. Henry was forced to hand over most of his power to a council, led by Simon Montfort,who was practically the ruler of England. He held a Great Council, composed only by the nobles. This sort of assembly later came to be called a Parliament. It took control of the treasury and forced Henry to get rid of his foreign advisors. With some nobles help Henry was finally able to defeat and kill Simon Montfort. Once again he had full royal authority. When he died, his son Edward I took the throne without question.Edward I brought together the first real Parliament, compose by The House of Commons( knights ,wealthy freemen and merchants) and The House of Lords. Each shire was asked to send 2 knights and each town was asked to send 2 citizens as being their representants into the Parliament. Hundreds years later, Magna Carta was used by Parliament to protect itself from a powerful king. In fact, Magna Carta gave no real freedom to the majority of people in England. The nobles who wrote it and forced king John to sign it, had no such thing in mind. They had one main aim: to make sure John did not go beyondhid rights as feudal lord. Magna Carta marks a clear stage in the collapse of English feudalism. The particular elements from Magna Carta were: that the Church was to be free from royal interference, especially in the election of bishops; no taxes except the regular feudal dues were to be levied, except by the consent of the Great Council or Parliament; everyone had the right to due process of law, which led to trial by the jury; all weights and measures were to be kept uniform throughout the realm.