Runnymeade

This is just a place where the American Bar Association put a memorial for the Magna Carta. I just can't help but see how the Lord's hand was in this and how the ball started rolling so to speak. I want to quote Scott for this one. He explains it so much better than me. Sorry this is long. Here is what Scott said about it. (This will be a repeat for close family members)

"On the way to Windsor, we stopped at the field of Runnymeade, where the leading English nobles forced King John (the whiny, thumb-sucking lion from Disney's Robin Hood) to sign the Magna Carta.  There wasn't much to look at but I had fun talking to the students about why Magna Carta is so important.  The only things to really look at are a memorial placed by the American Bar Association celebrating Runnymeade as the first step toward English and American liberty...The interesting thing for me was the observation that Americans take the Magna Carta more seriously than the British: remember that the major memorial is from the American bar, not the British.  I would say that the British respect the document and know it's important, but Americans revere it as a first step towards our own liberties.  I had the same impression at Salisbury Cathedral a few weeks ago when our tour guide showed us one of the few remaining original copies of the Magna Carta but dismissed it at the same time as not as important as everyone says it was.  She was right in the sense that Magna Carta did not immediately change the world: its effect on England for the next three to four centuries was minimal.  But in the long run (at least, in this American's eyes) Magna Carta changed everything: it became a symbol in the 16th and 17th centuries of the rule of law, the idea that even kings were subject to the law.  It set a precedent of popular involvement in governance (even if the represented population was just a group of 25 barons at that time) and it established some rights as fundamental and irrevocable, such as the right to not be imprisoned without access to a judge.  Even if Magna Carta didn't gain its power until much later, it did become a powerful precedent for democratization that was seized on by reformers in England and the American colonies.  Americans are fortunate that our own experience with self-government grew up precisely at a time when notions of rule of law and fundamental rights were blossoming in English thought and England's laws.  For the English, Magna Carta is one small step in a long journey towards democracy.  But for Americans, who took longer steps in a shorter time, Magna Carta was a crucial precursor to our own Constitution.

In addition, I think our appreciation for Magna Carta is greater because Americans have an obsession with written constitutions.  The "British constitution" is a collection of documents and unwritten traditions and it seems almost an oxymoron to even call that a constitution when a constitution seems to me to be a document with writing on the bottom.  For whatever reason, Americans have a kind of legalistic view of government that it involves a contract or agreement and signatures at the bottom.  I think that's part of why Magna Carta appeals to us even more than to the British--we cling to the piece of paper the barons forced on King John because we need written proof of the rights we hold.  The British are content with the knowledge that their ancestors have traditionally had those rights and therefore they have them too.  My head understands the British view, but my heart was excited to be at Runnymeade."