Magna Carta 15 June

King John appended his Royal Seal to Magna Carta on this day in 1215 at Runnymeade. Unfortunately, King John, obviously somewhat less than impressed, utterly repudiated the charter as soon as the barons left London a few days later. Pope Innocent III also immediately annulled the "shameful and demeaning agreement’, saying it impaired King John’s dignity. (Dignity of a man who murdered his own brother, Arthur, in order to grab the throne? - nice one Pope.) Widely considered to be the first step in a long historical process leading to the rule of constitutional law, Magna Carta, was above all else a statement that the monarch was subject to law and a statement of the rights of free men. The only problem, of course, was that in 1215 almost no one was free. Nevertheless, the idea stuck and Magna Carta was amended and re-issued by John’s descendants, the final version being issued by Edward I’s Parliament on 12 October 1297 as part of a statute known as Confirmatio cartarum. The version of Magna Carta from 1297 is still part of English law, although only parts remain in force and most of it has been repealed or superseded. The articles currently in force are articles one, nine and twenty-nine of the 1297 version.