Henry, finding that the barons indulged in the most unbridled tyranny towards their own vassals, without observing the laws they had imposed upon the crown, unhesitatingly followed the evil example set before him. In his administration the Great Charter was continually violated—a course of conduct which not only lessened his authority in the kingdom, but multiplied the sources of discontent against him, exposed him to affront and danger, and provoked resistance to his remaining prerogatives.
Matthew Paris relates that, in 1244, when he desired a supply from parliament, the barons, complaining of the frequent violations of the Charter, demanded that in return for the money, he should resign the right of nominating the chancellor and great justiciary of the kingdom to them; and, if we may credit the same historian, they had formed further plans which, if successfully carried out, would have reduced the crown to a state of pupilage and dependence. The king, however, would consent to nothing but a renewal of the Great Charter, and a general permission to excommunicate all who might hereafter violate it. All he could obtain in return for his concession was a scutage of twenty shillings on each knight's fee for the marriage of his eldest daughter with the King of Scotland—an impost which was expressly provided for by their feudal tenures.
Four years afterwards, in full parliament, he was reproached for having broken his word and again violated his promises, and was asked if he did not blush to ask aid from his people—whom he openly professed to despise and hate, and to whom he on all occasions preferred strangers and aliens—from a people who groaned under the exactions which he either exercised over them or permitted others to inflict? He was told that, in addition to insulting his nobility, by forcing them to contract unequal marriages with foreigners, no class of his subjects was too obscure to escape the tyranny of himself and his ministers; that even the food he consumed in his household, the clothes which himself and his servants wore, and the wine they drank, were all taken by violence from their lawful owners, and no kind of compensation ever offered; that foreign merchants, to the shame of the kingdom, shunned the English harbours as if they were infested by pirates; and that all commerce was being gradually destroyed by these acts of unprincipled violence.
Unhappily, this was no exaggerated picture. In his reckless proceedings Henry even added insult to injury, by forcing the traders whom he despoiled of their goods to carry them at their own expense to whatever place he chose to appoint. Even the poor fishermen could not escape his rapacity and that of his foreign favourites, till, finding they could not dispose of the fruit of their labours at home, they carried them to foreign ports.
The king, says Matthew Paris, gave the parliament only good words and fair promises in answer to these remonstrances, accompanied with the most humble submissions—which, however, they had too often found deceitful to be gulled by any longer; the consequence was, that they unanimously refused the supply he asked, to the great disappointment of his rapacious favourites.
In 1253 he again found himself obliged to apply to parliament, which he did under pretence of having made a vow to undertake a crusade.
The parliament hesitated to comply, and the ecclesiastical order sent a deputation to Henry, consisting of four prelates—the primate, and the Bishops of Winchester, Salisbury, and Carlisle—to remonstrate with him on his frequent violation of their privileges, the oppressions with which he had loaded them as well as the rest of his subjects, and the uncanonical and forced elections made to the vacant dignities in the Church. "It is true," replied the king, "I have been somewhat faulty in this particular: I obtruded you, my lord of Canterbury, on your see; I was obliged to employ both entreaties and menaces, my lord of Winchester, to have you elected; my proceedings, I confess, were very irregular, my lords of Salisbury and Carlisle, when I raised you from the lowest stations to your present dignities. I am determined henceforth to correct these abuses; and it will also become you, in order to make a thorough reformation, to resign your present benefices, and try to enter again in a more regular and canonical manner." The bishops, surprised at these unexpected sarcasms, replied that the question was not at present how to correct past errors, but to avoid them for the future. The king promised redress, both of ecclesiastical and civil grievances; and the parliament in return agreed to grant him supply—a tenth of the ecclesiastical benefices, and a scutage of three marks on each knight's fee; but as they had experienced his frequent breach of promise, they required that he should ratify the Great Charter in a manner still more authentic and more solemn than any which he had hitherto employed. All the prelates and abbots were assembled; they held lighted tapers in their hands; the Great Charter was read before them; they denounced the sentence of excommunication against every one who should thenceforth violate the fundamental law; they threw their tapers on the ground, and exclaimed, "May the soul of every one who incurs this sentence so stink and corrupt in hell!" The king bore a part in this ceremony, and subjoined, "So help me God, I will keep all these articles inviolate, as I am a man, as I am a Christian, as I am a knight, and as I am a king crowned and anointed." Yet was this tremendous ceremony no sooner finished, than his favourites, abusing his weakness, made him return to the same arbitrary and irregular administration, and the expectations and hopes of the nation were again eluded and disappointed.
The universal discontent which ensued afforded a pretext to Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, to attempt, by means of a revolution, to wrest the sceptre from the feeble and irresolute hands which held it. This powerful noble was the younger son of that Simon de Montfort who displayed so much skill and courage in the crusade against the unfortunate Albigenses, but who tarnished his fame by the most execrable cruelty; for the history of religious persecution does not show a darker page than that in which the sufferings of the Albigenses are recorded.
A large inheritance in Britain had fallen to the victorious crusader, whose eldest son, unable to perform fealty to the Kings of France and England, had transferred it to his younger brother Simon, who came over and did homage for his lands and the title of Earl of Leicester.
In 1238 he married Eleanor, the king's sister, the widow of William, Earl of Pembroke; but the union of the princess with a subject and a foreigner, though contracted with Henry's consent, was loudly complained of, not only by the Earl of Cornwall, but also by most of the English barons. The bridegroom, however, was protected against their violence by his brother-in-law, who little imagined the return he would meet with.