men of his parish were chosen to determine and declare under oath the extent of his personal liability. In the next reign, that of Richard I, this new principle of jury assessment was applied in a general way to the assessment of lands as well as chattels; and from thence the representative principle in taxation begins to ascend through successive stages, until it becomes established and recognized as the highest function of the British and all other essentially free governments.[1]
The abandonment, furthermore, of the right on the part of the sovereign to make arbitrary exactions in respect to personal property, and the assumption by a class of privileged subordinates—i. e., legislators—of the right to vote or deny supplies to the king or state, and for the attainment of which results the English clergy of the thirteenth century led the way, marks also the dawn of constitutional or free government. All authorities are agreed, that on the clause in the Magna Charta of 1215 respecting the taxing power, is based all that has since been achieved in respect to English liberty. By it the king (John) was allowed to reserve for himself but three feudal aids, or rights, for extraordinary money allowances from the state, which very curiously have never been alienated from the English crown by any subsequent legislative enactment. Namely, to ransom the king in the case of his capture by an enemy; to defray the expenses of the knighthood of his eldest son; and third, on account of expenses incident to the marriage of his eldest daughter. In all other respects the charter provides that "no scutage"—by which is understood a land tax in commutation for personal military service—"or aid shall be imposed in our realm, save by the Common Council of our realm"; and this provision of the Great Charter was more
- ↑ It is, however, worthy of note that the only time when this subject appears to have prominently attracted the attention of the British Parliament and occasioned debate, was in connection with the imposition of taxes, without representation, on the British colonies in North America, and which assumption of right on the part of the crown to thus act, subsequently led to the American Revolution. The question at issue before Parliament was, had the state the right of taxing the colonies under existing circumstances, in default of representation of the taxpayers? The colonists did not deny the right of Great Britain to tax them; but they did hold that for the people of Great Britain to appropriate any part of the property without their consent was neither reasonable nor consistent with the British Constitution. And in the great debate in Parliament on this subject, in 1764, Mr. Pitt sustained the position of the colonists; and Lord Camden, who followed, said that "taxation and representation were inseparable," and that a blade of grass growing in the most obscure part of the kingdom could not rightfully be taxed without the consent of its proprietor.
Recent historical investigations have, however, shown (as before pointed out, chapter ii) that the grievance alleged and complained of by the American colonists was not peculiar to them, but was shared by the people of the mother country to such an extent that at the time of the colonial revolt not one tenth of them were allowed to participate by vote in the election of members of Parliament.
