The Governments of Europe

by Frederic Austin Ogg

Footnote 3: Thus, in 871, the minor children of Ethelred I. were passed over in favor of Alfred, younger brother of the late king.[(Back)]

Footnote 4: The Anglo-Saxon king was "not the supreme law-giver of Roman ideas, nor the fountain of justice, nor the irresponsible leader, nor the sole and supreme politician, nor the one primary landowner; but the head of the race, the chosen representative of its identity, the successful leader of its enterprises, the guardian of its peace, the president of its assemblies; created by it, and, although empowered with a higher sanction in crowning and anointing, answerable to his people." W. Stubbs, Select Charters Illustrative of English Constitutional History (8th ed., Oxford, 1895), 12.[(Back)]

Footnote 5: Law and Custom of the Constitution, II., Pt. 1., 7. Cf. W. Stubbs, Constitutional History of England, I., 127.[(Back)]

Footnote 6: The classic description of Anglo-Saxon political institutions is W. Stubbs, Constitutional History of England in its Origin and Development, 3 vols. (6th ed., Oxford, 1897), especially I., 74-182; but recent scholarship has supplemented and modified at many points the facts and views therein set forth. A useful account (though likewise subject to correction) is H. Taylor, The Origins and Growth of the English Constitution, 2 vols. (new ed., Boston, 1900), I., Bk. 1., Chaps. 3-5; and a repository of information is J. Ramsay, The Foundations of England, 2 vols. (London, 1898). A valuable sketch is A. B. White, The Making of the English Constitution, 449-1485 (New York, 1908), 16-62. A brilliant book is E. A. Freeman, The Growth of the English Constitution (4th ed., London, 1884); but by reason of Professor Freeman's over-emphasis of the perpetuation of Anglo-Saxon institutions in later times this work is to be used with caution. Political and institutional history is well set forth in T. Hodgkin, History of England to the Norman Conquest (London, 1906), and C. W. C. Oman, England before the Norman Conquest (London, 1910). A useful manual is H. M. Chadwick, Studies on Anglo-Saxon Institutions (Cambridge, 1905); and an admirable bibliography is C. Gross, The Sources and Literature of English History (London, 1900).[(Back)]

Footnote 7: Anson, Law and Custom of the Constitution, II., Pt. I., II.[(Back)]

Footnote 8: W. Wilson, The State (rev. ed., Boston, 1903), 369.[(Back)]

Footnote 9: Anson, Law and Custom of the Constitution, II., Pt. I., 13.[(Back)]

Footnote 10: Stubbs, Select Charters, 21.[(Back)]

Footnote 11: The term "peers," as here employed, means only equals in rank. The clause cited does not imply trial by jury. It comprises a guarantee simply that the barons should not be judged by persons whose feudal rank was inferior to their own. Jury trial was increasingly common in the thirteenth century, but it was not guaranteed in the Great Charter.[(Back)]

Footnote 12: Good accounts of the institutional aspects of the Norman-Angevin period are Stubbs, Constitutional History, I., 315-682, II., 1-164; Taylor, Origin and Growth of the English Constitution, I., Bk. 2, Chaps. 2-3; Adams, The Origin of the English Constitution, Chaps. 1-4; and White, Making of the English Constitution, 73-119. Two excellent little books are Stubbs, Early Plantagenets (London, 1876) and Mrs. J. R. Green, Henry II. (London, 1892). General accounts will be found in T. F. Tout, History of England from the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III., 1216-1377 (London, 1905), and H. W. C. Davis, England under the Normans and the Angevins (London, 1904). A monumental treatise, though one which requires a considerable amount of correction, is E. A. Freeman, History of the Norman Conquest, 6 vols. (Oxford, 1867-69), and a useful sketch is Freeman, Short History of the Norman Conquest (3d ed., Oxford, 1901). Among extended and more technical works may be mentioned: F. Pollock and F. W. Maitland, History of English Law, 2 vols. (2d ed., Cambridge, 1898), which, as a study of legal history and doctrines, supersedes all earlier works; F. W. Maitland, Domesday Book and Beyond (Cambridge, 1897); J. H. Round, Feudal England (London, 1895); K. Norgate, England under the Angevin Kings, 2 vols. (London, 1887); ibid., John Lackland (London, 1902), and J. H. Ramsay, The Angevin Empire (London, 1903). The text of the Great Charter is printed in Stubbs, Select Charters, 296-306. English versions may be found in G. B. Adams and H. M. Stephens, Select Documents of English Constitutional History (New York, 1906), 42-52; S. Amos, Primer of the English Constitution and Government (London, 1895), 189-201; and University of Pennsylvania Translations and Reprints (translation by E. P. Cheyney), I., No. 6. The principal special work on the subject is W. S. McKechnie, Magna Carta; a Commentary on the Great Charter of King John (Glasgow, 1905). An illuminating commentary is contained in Adams, Origin of the English Constitution, 207-313.[(Back)]