EDWARD 1
The Angevin (Plantagenet) Kings:
Henry II (Father of the English Common Law), r. 11541189
Richard I (the Lion-Hearted), r. 1189-1199
John (the Lackland), r. 1199-1216
Henry III, r. 1216-1272
Edward I, r. 1272-1307
Edward II, r. 1307-1327
Edward III, r. 1327-1377
Richard II, r. 1377-1399
Main References:
Hollister, The Making of England, pp. 286-300.
Michael Prestwich, The Three Edwards: War and
State in England, 1272-1377, (London, 1980), pp. 178.
T.F.T. Plucknett, The Legislation of Edward I,
(Oxford, 1949)
Paul Brand, The Origins of the English Legal
Profession, (Oxford, 1992)
The reign of King Edward I (r. 1272-1307) was a significant period in the
development of parliamentary custom in England. He was successful in
defeating Simon de Montfort’s rebellion (at Evesham). Historians regarded
him as a skillful and capable leader; and he was definitely much better than his
father: Henry III.
When Henry III died in 1272, Edward was a mature and confident man at the
age of thirty-five. He was admired by his barons, and he was brave and
chivalrous. He was very tall, and his long arms and legs enabled him to excel
at swordsmanship, and so on. Furthermore, he was a fluent and persuasive
speaker.
Although his hobbies were fighting and hunting, (when
needed), he also dedicated to law and administration.
Edward was a characteristic king of the age that
produced the legal treatise ascribed to Bracton and the
works of Thomas Aquinas. Indeed, Edward I had the
quest for order, system, and definition, which led him to
(according to Hollister), “bring to completion the legal
achievements of Henry II, Hubert Walter, and the
administrators of Henry III.
In the admiring words of a seventeenth-century chief
justice, ‘The very scheme, mold and model of the
common law was set in order by King Edward I, and so,
in a very great measure, it was continued the same in all
succeeding ages to this day.’ Edward I’s regime gave
structure and system to the common law, ……
Customary law began to give way to enacted law;
thereafter, when the royal government sought to effect
significant legal changes, it generally did so by issuing
new statutes.
It was under Edward I that ‘statute’ became a widely understood concept.
The ancient notion that law was traditional and unchanging had long been
inconsistent with the realities of legal development. …… By Edward I’s time,
however, the English were coming to understand more clearly that the king,
with baronial consent, might indeed change old laws and create new ones.
…… In the fourteenth century, the definition of a statute would become
progressively sharper: whereas an ordinance might be issued by the king and
his council, a statute could only be enacted by the king in Parliament. ……
This developing association between parliaments and statutory law was of
enormous importance, for it led eventually to Parliament’s power to
legislate. …..
‘Bracton’s’ treatise declared that the king was the fountainhead of all justice
and that magnates and prelates who operated courts of their own did so only
by royal permission. Edward I undertook to translate this theory into reality.
The royal administration insisted that private franchises
[Private franchises were districts in which a private
landholder operated the legal machinery] would be
recognized only if they had been granted by royal
charter. As early as Henry III’s reign, the monarchy had
tried to enforce this principle through writs of quo
warranto [‘by what warrant?’], which initiated
investigations of the legal foundations of private
franchises. Between 1278 and 1294, Edward I initiated
quo warranto proceedings on a large scale. ……
Predictably, these royal efforts evoked a baronial furor. …… A
fourteenth-century chronicler tells a story that, whether accurate or
embroidered, catches the outraged spirit of Edward I’s nobility.
The elderly earl Warenne, summoned to defend his jurisdictional rights,
waved a rusty sword before the royal justices: ‘Here, my lords, here is
my warrant. My forefathers came over with William the Bastard and
conquered their lands with this sword. And I will defend them with the
same sword against anyone who tries to take them from me.’ ……
In the Statute of Quo Warranto of 1290, Edward modified his
policy: his administration would recognize franchises backed not
only by royal charter but by ancient privilege as well. By
endorsing unchartered franchises that could be shown to date
back to at least the time of Richard I, Edward was in fact
submitting to Earl Warenne’s argument of the rusty sword. ……
But while doing so, the king’s officials held to their basic principle
that a landholder might exercise private justice only by royal
delegation. As a consequence, the primacy of royal jurisdiction
gained ever-wider acceptance.
……
The king’s council, a small group of royal advisers including judges,
administrators, bishops, and baronial cronies, was the vital center of the king’s
administration.
……
The reign of Edward I splits into two distinct periods.
[1. 1274 to 1294: Edward I’s foreign policy was highly successful, and his
domestic policies of administrative and legal centralization were
without much opposition;
II. 1294 to 1307: Edward I’s wars were inconclusive, and his relations
with his people were bad]
……
Despite Edward’s severity, however, and despite the inconclusive
outcome of his Gascon and Scottish wars, his reign remains one of the
most productive in the annals of England. It was a period of immense
legal and administrative accomplishment and decisive constitutional
development.
Under Edward I, the royal administration became
truly professional, the common law reached
maturity, voluntary taxation and customs duties
became an accepted part of the crown’s revenues,
and Parliament became an indispensable
component of English government. These were the
foundations upon which the political history of
later medieval and early modern England would be
built.” (Hollister, The Making of England, pp. 259-300.)
According to Michael Prestwich, Edward I “was
without doubt one of the greatest rulers of his
time, …… Edward was a king to inspire fear and
respect; contemporaries valued his many
achievements …… With news of his illness in 1307
preachers were prophesying evil days to come --when his death became known, the news was met
with genuine and wide-spread grief.” (Michael
Prestwich, The Three Edwards: War and State in England,
1272-1377, p. 41.)
Chronology of Historical Events in the reign of Edward
I, r. 1272-1307
1272 Accession of Edward I
1274 Return of Edward I to England
1275 Statute of Westminster I
1277 First Welsh War
1278 Statute of Gloucester; quo warranto inquiries set up
1282 Second Welsh War
1285 Statute of Westminster (amended)
1290 Death of Eleanor of Castile
1294 War with Philip IV of France
1296 Edward I’s campaign in Scotland
1297 Constitutional crisis; issue of the Confirmation of the Charters
1306 Rebellion and enthronement of Robert Bruce in Scotland
1307 Death of Edward I