When King John inherited to throne of England, he also inherited Normandy. When, in 1204, John was forced to take up permanent residence in England, due to the loss of Normandy, he became the first King to do so since the Norman invasion. John placed extortionate taxes upon the people, especially the Barons, to raise money to conquer back the land. This among other actions, including, advances towards the Baron’s wives, outragous inheritance tax and unlawful punishments and confiscation of estates, angered the Barons. In 1215 they set about to limit King John’s power and take matters into their own hands.

In 1215, the majority of the 200 Barons in England and their men came together and took control of London. Let into the city by a few sympathisers during mass, the Barons were able to take the city peacefully and quickly. A stalemate then ensued; King John, outside of London, with his army of mercenaries, could not force the Barons to leave the city, nor could he rule having lost London. The Barons inside the city could not risk leaving and losing it, nor could they take the rest of the country from inside London. A meeting was arranged at Runnymede to discuss the terms of a peace treaty. In June the Barons met King John, finalised and signed the 3000 word document, consisting of 63 clauses, which we now know of as The Magna Carta.

The Barons inserted into this original Magna Carta an enforcement claus. This gave 24 Barons the power to hold the King to the terms of the document. The Pope, outraged, declared that no such hold could be placed over a Monarch appointed by God; the clause was therefore removed from future drafts. The Barons, now with no method of enforcing the treaty and King John ignoring and breaking its terms, invited King Louis of France to rule England. When John died in 1216, Louis ruled half of England. In order to secure his throne King John’s Son’s protectors (as he was a minor) realised that they needed to sign and accept The Magna Carta (the 1225 draft). Ironically, it was not King John, the original signer and recipient of the document, that was affected by it, but his Son, without whose acceptance the document would have failed and may have been forgotten. Also, had John’s Son not accepted the Magna Carta and the Barons continued to support Louis, it is likely that France and England would, at least for some time, have had the same ruler.

The clauses known today about trial by jury, protection for the inheritance of minors and the rights of freedmen to judgement by peers before punishment, are all from the 1225 version of the document, not the one signed by King John.

When the declaration of Human Rights was created, Eleanor Roosevelt described it as a 'Magna Carta for all Humanity.' As the British Empire developed, copies of the Magna Carta were taken, not only to America, but also to Australia, India, New Zealand and Canada, showing how a document stating the rights of freedman was so important and treasured by the people of England.