Honouring the Treaty

From Wikipedia:

"Was the most significant early influence on the extensive historical process that led to the rule of constitutional law today.

It explicitly protected certain rights of the [British Soveriegn's] subjects

By the late 19th century, most clauses in their original form had been [extinguished by judges]

There are some popular misconceptions about [it] such as [...] that it in practice limited the power of the [British Sovereign] (it mostly did not [in a later era]); and that it is a single static document (it is a variety of documents referred to under a common name).

Background

The [British Crown] had [...] become a powerful and influential [force] in [the world]. Factors contributing to this include the sophisticated centralised government created by the procedures of [modern] Anglo-Saxon systems of governance; and extensive [...] land holdings [overseas].

Led the [chiefs] to [try] to restrain what the [British Sovereign] could legally do [to them individually and collectively]

France were a major cause of discontent [and in competition over land with] the English

The Church [...] began to want a say

[Many of the political and land speculating elite] in England had had enough, and [pressured] London [which found] sympathies with their cause [...] A formal document to record the agreement was created by the [delegated official] this was the original [Treaty]. An unknown number of copies of it were sent out to officials

Content

Rights still in force today

It was not mentioned for a period of nearly 100 years. There was much ignorance about the document. The few who did know about the document spoke of a good [Sovereign power] being forced by [the temporary circumstances] “to attaine the shadow of seeming liberties” and that it was a product of a wrongful [assertion of the chiefs] against the one true authority, the [British Sovereign power]. The original [Treaty] was seen as an ancient document with shadowy origins and as having no bearing on the [new regime's] world.

First uses of the [Treaty] as a bill of rights

Although there was a re-awakening of the use of [the Treaty in some] law, it was not seen (as it was later) as an entrenched set of liberties [...] against the Crown and Government. Rather, it was a normal statute, which gave a certain level of liberties, most of which could not be relied on, least of all against the [Crown]. Therefore, the [Treaty] had little effect on the governance of the early [...] period. [...] by this stage the powers of parliament had managed to exceed those humble beginnings. The [Treaty] had no real effect until the [later period].

Reinterpretation of the [Treaty]

In academia, earnest but futile attempts were made to prove [various contentious points, and events surrounding the initial signings] were "re-discovered"

The [Treaty] was interpreted as an attempt to return to a pre-[colonial] state of things. The [Treaty] came to be regarded as such an important document.

[The Treaty] again occupied legal minds, and it again began to shape how that government was run. Soon the [Treaty] was seen as an immutable entity

One of the first respected jurists to write seriously about the [Treaty] was [...] Coke, who had a great deal to say on the subject and was influential in the way [the Treaty] was perceived throughout the [future]

The [Treaty] was seen in part as entrenched law by Coke's opinion and no one would dare deny it, but it was not seen as binding on the [Crown]

[The Treaty] had attained an almost mythical status for its admirers and was seen as representing a ‘golden age’ of [indigenous rights] extant prior to the [colonial] invasion. Whether or not this 'golden age' ever truly existed is open to debate; regardless, proponents of its application [...] saw themselves as leading [the nation] back to a pre-[colonial] state of affairs.

[The Treaty] was not important because of the liberties it bestowed, but simply as ‘proof’ of what had come before; many great minds influentially exalted the [Treaty]; by the [later period the judiciary were] talking of the [Treaty] as an indispensable method of limiting the powers of the Crown, a popular principle

It was not the content of the [Treaty] which has made it so important in the history of [the nation], but more how it has been perceived in the popular mind. [The Treaty] represented many things, which are not to be found in the [Treaty] itself. Firstly it was used to claim liberties against the Government in general rather than just the Crown and the officers of the crown, secondly that it represented that the [indigenous rights], dated back to a time immemorial

Parliament’s power had increased greatly from their original level [...] they had become the only body allowed to raise tax, a right which although descended from the [Treaty] was not guaranteed by it

Parliament had become so powerful that the [Treaty] was being used both by those wishing to limit Parliament's power (as a new organ of the Crown), and by those who wished Parliament to rival the [British Sovereign's] power [...] When it became obvious that some people wished to limit the power of Parliament by claiming it to be tantamount to the crown, Parliament claimed they had the sole right of interpretation of the [Treaty].

Discussions of Parliament sovereignty seemed to only involve the [Treaty] as the entrenched law, and the discussions were simply about whether Parliament had enough power to repeal the document.

It had gotten to the stage where [...] Parliament was inseparable from the ideas of the Crown as described in the [Treaty] and therefore it was potentially not just the [British Monarch] that was bound by the [Treaty], but Parliament also.

There were many revolutionary theorists, and many based their theories at least initially on [the Treaty], in the misguided belief that [it] guaranteed liberty and equality for all.

[Left-wing social activists representing the disenfranchised grassroots indigenous population] claimed [the Treaty] was above any branch of government, and this led to the upper echelons of the [...] movement denouncing Parliament. [...] However, as it became apparent that [the Treaty] did not grant the level of [self-determination] demanded by the [activist community], the movement reduced its advocacy of it. [...] Parliament and the courts advocated [the Treaty] and yet did not even follow it themselves. The [hard-core activists] did, however, believe in the pre-[colonial] golden age and wished to return to it, and they called for the abolition of all [colonial] and post-[colonial] law.

NO Freeman shall be taken or imprisoned, or be disseised of his Freehold, or Liberties, or free Customs, or be outlawed, or exiled, or any other wise destroyed; nor will We not pass upon him, nor condemn him, but by lawful judgment of his Peers, or by the Law of the Land. We will sell to no man, we will not deny or defer to any man either Justice or Right."