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We admit that the battle of Evesham, literally speaking, was not the
origin of the House of Commons, and wish our correspondent P.T.W. had
furnished us with the name of the "modern writer" who has made the
assertion. At the same time it must be conceded that the fall of Simon de
Montfort, at Evesham, led to the more speedy consummation of the wished
for object. Thus Sir James Mackintosh, History of England, vol. i. p. 236,
says--
"Simon de Montfort, at the very moment of his fall, set the example of an
extensive reformation in the frame of parliament, which, though his
authority was not acknowledged by the punctilious adherents to the letter
and forms of law, was afterwards legally adopted by Edward, and rendered
the parliament of that year the model of the British parliament, and in a
considerable degree affected the constitution of all other representative
assemblies. It may indeed be considered as the practical discovery of
popular representation. The particulars of the war are faintly discerned
at the distance of six or seven centuries. The reformation of parliament,
which first afforded proof from experience that liberty, order, greatness,
power, and wealth, are capable of being blended together in a degree of
harmony which the wisest men had not before believed to be possible, will
be held in everlasting remembrance. He died unconscious of the
imperishable name which he acquired by an act which he probably considered
as of very small importance--the summoning a parliament, of which the
lower house was composed, as it has ever since been formed, of knights of
the shires, and members for cities and boroughs. He thus unknowingly
determined that England was to be a free country; and he was the blind
instrument of disclosing to the world that great institution of
representation which was to introduce into popular governments a
regularity and order far more perfect than had heretofore been purchased
by submission to absolute power, and to draw forth liberty from
confinement in single cities to a fitness for being spread over
territories which, experience does not forbid us to hope, may be as vast
as have ever been grasped by the iron gripe of a despotic conqueror. The
origin of so happy an innovation is one of the most interesting objects of
inquiry which occurs in human affairs; but we have scarcely any positive
information on the subject; for our ancient historians, though they are
not wanting in diligently recording the number and the acts of national
assemblies, describe their composition in a manner too general to be
instructive, and take little note of novelty or peculiarity in the
constitution of that which was called by the Earl of Leicester.
"That assembly met at London, on the 22nd of January, 1265, according to
writs still extant, and the earliest of their kind known to us, directing
'the sheriffs to elect and return two knights for each county, two
citizens for each city, and two burgesses for every burgh in the county.'
If this assembly be supposed to be the same which is vested with the power
of granting supply by the Great Charter of John, the constitution must be
thought to have undergone an extensive, though unrecorded, revolution in
the somewhat inadequate space of only fifty years, which had elapsed since
the capitulation of Runnymede; for in the Great Charter we find the
tenants of the crown in chief alone expressly mentioned as forming with
the prelates and peers the common council for purposes of taxation; and
even they seem to have been required to give their personal attendance,
the important circumstances of election and representation not being
mentioned in the treaty with John;--neither does it contain any
stipulation of sufficient distinctness applicable to cities and boroughs,
for which the charter provides no more than the maintenance of their
ancient liberties.
"Probably conjecture is all that can now be expected respecting the rise
and progress of these changes. It is, indeed, beyond all doubt, that by
the constitution, even as subsisting under the early Normans, the great
council shared the legislative power with the king, as clearly as the
parliament have since done.[3] But these great councils do not seem to
have contained members of popular choice; and the king, who was supported
by the revenue of his demesnes, and by dues from his military tenants,
does not appear at first to have imposed, by legislative authority,
general taxes to provide for the security and good government of the
community.--These were abstract notions, not prevalent in ages when the
monarch was a lord paramount rather than a supreme magistrate. Many of the
feudal perquisites had been arbitrarily augmented, and oppressively
levied. These the Great Charter, in some cases, reduced to a certain sum;
while it limited the period of military service itself. With respect to
scutages and aids, which were not capable of being reduced to a fixed
rate, the security adopted was, that they should never be legal, unless
they were assented to at least by the majority of those who were to pay
them. Now these were not the people at large, but the military tenants of
the crown, who are accordingly the only persons entitled to be present at
the great council to be holden for taxation. Very early, however,
talliages had been exacted by the crown from those who were not military
tenants; and this imposition daily grew in importance with the relaxation
of the feudal tenures, and the increasing opulence of towns. The attempt
of the barons to include talliage, and even the vague mention of the
privileges of burghs, are decisive symptoms of this silent revolution. But
the generally feudal character of the charter and the main object of its
framers prevailed over that premature, but very honest, effort of the
barons."
[3] "Legis habet vigorem, quicquid de consilio et consensu
magnatum et reipublicæ communi sponsione, authoritate regis,
juste fuerit definitum."--_Bracton_.
We recommend the reader to turn to the pages succeeding the above extract,
where the views of the enlightened author and statesman on the origin of
our parliament are set forth in perspicuous and masterly style.
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