Our Legal Heritage: King AEthelbert - King George III, 600 A.D. - 1776: June 2011 (Sixth) EditionReilly, S. A.
History
Our Legal Heritage: King AEthelbert - King George III, 600 A.D. - 1776: June 2011 (Sixth) Edition
Reilly, S. A.
Law -- England -- History
Regulation of trade became national instead of local. Trade was
relatively free; almost the only internal transportation tolls were
petty portages and viages levied to recoup the expense of a bridge or
road which had been built by private enterprise. Responsibility for the
coinage was transferred from the individual moneyers working in
different boroughs to a central official who was to become Master of the
Mint. The round half penny and farthing [1/4 penny] were created so that
the penny needn't be cut into halves and quarters anymore.
Edward I called meetings of representatives from all social and
geographic sectors of the nation at one Parliament to determine taxes
due to the Crown. He declared that "what touches all, should be approved
by all". He wanted taxes from the burgesses in the towns and the
clergy's ecclesiastical property as well as from landholders. He argued
to the clergy that if barons had to both fight and pay, they who could
do no fighting must at least pay. When the clergy refused to pay, he put
them outside the royal protection and threatened outlawry and
confiscation of their lands. Then they agreed to pay and to renounce all
papal orders contrary to the King's authority.
The Model Parliament of 1295 was composed of the three communities. The
first were the lords, which included seven earls and forty-one barons.
Because of the increase of lesser barons due to a long national peace
and prosperity, the lords attending were reduced in numbers and peerage
became dependent not on land tenure, but on royal writ of summons. The
great barons were chosen by the king and received a special summons in
their own names to the council or Parliament. Others were called by a
general summons. The second community was the clergy, represented by the
two archbishops, bishops from each of eighteen dioceses, and sixty-seven
abbots. The third community was the commons. It was composed of two
knights elected by the suitors who were then present at the county
court, two burgesses elected by principal burgesses of each borough, and
two representatives from each city. The country knights had a natural
affinity with the towns in part because their younger sons sought their
occupation, wife, and estate there. Also, great lords recruited younger
brothers of yeoman families for servants and fighting men, who
ultimately settled down as tradesmen in the towns. The country people
and the town people also had a community of interest by both being
encompassed by the county courts. The peasants were not represented in
the county courts nor in Parliament. One had to have land to be entitled
to vote because the landowner had a stake in the country, a material
security for his good behavior.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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