Читать книгу Magna Carta: A Commentary on the Great Charter of King John. With an Historical Introduction онлайн

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Thus it is not sufficient to describe Magna Carta merely as a declaratory enactment; it is necessary to distinguish between the different sources of what it declared. A fourfold division may be suggested. (1) Magna Carta embodied and handed down to future ages some of the usages of the old customary law of Anglo-Saxon England, unchanged by the Conqueror or his successors, now confirmed and purified from abuses. (2) In defining feudal incidents and services, it confirmed many rules of the feudal law brought into England by the Normans subsequently to 1066. (3) It also embodied many provisions of which William I. and even Henry I. knew no more than did the Anglo-Saxon kings—innovations introduced for his own purposes by Henry of Anjou, but, after half a century of experience, now accepted loyally even by the most bitter opponents of the Crown. In the words of Mr. Prothero, “We find ... the judicial and administrative system established by Henry II. preserved almost intact in Magna Carta, though its abuse was carefully guarded against.”^[198] Finally, (4) in some few points, the Charter actually aimed at going farther than Henry II., great reformer as he was, had intended to go. Thus, to mention only two particulars, the Petty Assizes are to be taken in every county four times a year, while sheriffs and other local magistrates are entirely prohibited from holding pleas of the Crown.