Magna Carta at 800
Because Magna Carta attempted to set limits to political power without grounding these limits in the sovereignty of the people, it demonstrated a problem with which philosophers have grappled for even longer than 800 years. From where do the principles that constrain rulers come, if from neither the rulers nor their subjects?
PRINCETON – Fly out of London’s Heathrow Airport and you may pass over a grassy field called Runnymede. Eight hundred years ago this month, it offered a colorful spectacle, dotted with the tents of barons and knights, and the larger pavilion of King John of England, looking like a circus top with the royal standard fluttering above.