Posted on 10/17/2014 7:57:14 AM PDT by Academiadotorg
A venerable enumeration of the rights of man is barely taught anymore, resulting in record low recognition of same.
“I went to see the Magna Carta when it was on display a few years ago,” British Conservative MP Daniel Hannan remembered in a speech in Grand Rapids, Michigan last week. “You can get right up to it: Nobody comes.”
“When it was on display in New York City in 1939, 14 million people came to see it.” Hannan was the keynote dinner speaker at the Philadelphia Society’s regional meeting on Friday, October 10th. The Society of leading conservative intellectuals was formed in 1964 in the wake of the Goldwater defeat. Author M. Stan Evans at one of our Author's Night events.
“I took my mother to Runnymede Fields to see where the Magna Carta was signed,” author M. Stanton Evans recalled when promoting his book, The Theme is Freedom: The Religious Roots of American Liberty, in 1995. “On the ride over, the cab driver said, ‘and this is the home of Elton John.’ My mother said, ‘who is Elton John?’ Later when I told that story to a group of recent college graduates, they said, ‘what is the Magna Carta?’”
After my Zimbabwean-born and raised wife heard that story, she said, “I can’t believe your schools don’t teach the Magna Carta. We learn about the Magna Carta.”
Granted by King John in 1215, “Magna Carta is a lengthy catalogue of safeguards against the abuse of power, guarantees of religious liberties, legal rights, taxation by consent, and so on,” Evans wrote in The Theme is Freedom.
“Abuses by King John caused a revolt by nobles who compelled him to execute this recognition of rights for both noblemen and ordinary Englishmen,” the Constitution Society notes.” It established the principle that no one, including the king or a lawmaker, is above the law.”
Hmm, maybe that’s why they don’t want to teach it.
“The democratic aspiration is no mere recent phase in human history,” President Franklin D. Roosevelt said in his 1941 Inaugural address. “It was written in the Magna Carta.”
“No freeman shall be taken, imprisoned, disseised, outlawed, banished, or in any way destroyed, nor will We proceed against or prosecute him, except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land, “ the Magna Carta reads. “To no one will We sell, to no one will We deny or delay, right or justice.” The free dictionary defines disseised as “to deprive (a person) of the possession of land, esp. wrongfully or by force.”
It figures that scumbag FDR would quote the Magna Carta that he was under no obligation to adhere to instead of the Constitution which like obola he tried to destroy.
There are several copies of the Magna Carta on display; I was fortunate to see one in Lincoln (England) last year. A great piece of history, asserting the rights of the people and limiting the power of the ruler, and something that needs to be more widely known in England and abroad.
One correction: Daniel Hannan is an MEP (Member of the European Parliament), and has (unfortunately) never been an MP. Hannan’s a former speechwriter for William Hague MP, and possibly one of the Conservative party’s best thinkers.
I just recently went to see it here in Houston. Although the rest of the display wasn’t much, the actual Magna Carta was very nice to see in person. Even though I couldn’t read it, just knowing what it says makes me proud that such men existed to get this written.
No man/woman is above the law. EVER!
I’m guessing it has something to do with leftist educationalists, who I have read of disparaging the MC as an elitist document between nobles and the king on who had the most right to exploit the poor.
“I went to see the Magna Carta when it was on display a few years ago,” British Conservative MP Daniel Hannan remembered in a speech in Grand Rapids, Michigan last week. “You can get right up to it: Nobody comes.”
I went to see it twice when an original copy was on display here in Houston. Both times I went the exhibit was packed. Then again, this is Texas, not England.
That’s true, like I just wrote in another post I’ve seen the Magna Carta twice, but haven’t seen my own nation’s Constitution in person. However, the US constitution is well over a thousand miles away, nobody in England has that excuse. I would be willing to bet that if the U.S. Constitution was put on a traveling museum exhibit, tons of people would come and see it. If I didn’t have to travel to our “National Cesspit” to go see the Constitution, I probably would have seen it by now.
that is great to hear. Actually, he saw it in Philly which is even more distressing.
I didn’t think the rest of the exhibit was “all that” either, however, my two year old (now three) son just loved everything in the exhibit. . . except that “boring piece of parchment” that we actually went to go see.
I must admit, I did learn quite a bit more than I ever wanted to know about medieval uses for urine in that exhibit.
“Granted by King John in 1215 . . . .”
More like “wrested from.”
Indeed.
The exhibit is apparently coming to Philthadelphia at the end of April, in connection with an ABA meeting but I have not been able to ascertain if it will be open to the public. :(
That’s good news to me. At the time I went, it was billed as only coming to Houston, which I thought was odd, but apparently the reasoning was Houston was chosen is that the Houston Museum of Natural Science is one of the most trusted museums in the world when it comes to the handling of other Nations’ “National Treasures”. I have no idea what criteria foreign governments/entities base that on, but I’d like to see as many American museums as possible meeting that standard because I think as many people as possible should have the opportunity to see things like Magna Carta (or the numerous other exhibits from across the world I’ve seen come here).
I just looked up the Philadelphia exhibit, apparently the copy coming to Philadelphia is privately owned by Ross Perot. The one that came to Houston was brought here in cooperation with the British Government. I find it slightly amusing that the copy going to Philadelphia is coming from Texas and the copy that was recently on display in Texas came all the way from Britain.
:)
I saw the Magna Carta when it was here in Houston; took my children, too.
I have replicas of the US Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and the original 12 Amendments for the Constitution I purchased in DC in 1999/2000.
When I explained to my wife that these were the original amendments, and that the first two were not ratified at the same time as the other ten (IIRC, the first one was ratified much much later, but the 2nd never has been), and those 10 became the Bill of Rights. That’s why on my replica the Freedom of Speech, free exercise of religion, etc. is #3, and the right to bear arms is #4. She didn’t believe me. And she’s “educated” with three degrees. Me? Heck, I’ve taken 1 class in college (Spanish), and failed it.
Don't bother. I went to see it (I traveled to DC many times between 1990 and 1994,) and you would do better to buy and frame a facsimile of it.
At the National Archives what you ger to see is an optical image of it, sort of looking through a view camera or a regular camera viewfinder.
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