1. Social Studies 884 SAS®
Curriculum Pathways®
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The Trial of Charles I: Printable Documents
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The Petition of Right (1628)
III. And whereas also by the statute called "The Great Charter of the Liberties of England," it is declared and
enacted, that no freeman may be taken or imprisoned or be disseized of his freehold or liberties, or his free
customs, or be outlawed or exiled, or in any manner destroyed, but by the lawful judgment of his peers, or by the
law of the land.
IV. And in the eight-and-twentieth year of the reign of King Edward III, it was declared and enacted by authority of
parliament, that no man, of what estate or condition that he be, should be put out of his land or tenements, nor
taken, nor imprisoned, nor disinherited nor put to death without being brought to answer by due process of law.
V. Nevertheless, your subjects have of late been imprisoned without any cause showed; and when for their
deliverance they were brought before your justices by your Majesty's writs of habeas corpus, there to undergo
and receive as the court should order, and their keepers commanded to certify the causes of their detainer, no
cause was certified, but that they were detained by your Majesty's special command, signified by the lords of your
Privy Council, and yet were returned back to several prisons, without being charged with anything to which they
might make answer according to the law.
Oliver Cromwell and Henry Marten Discuss the Trial (January 19, 1649)
Cromwell heard the King was landed at Sir Robert Cotton's stairs. Went to the window looking at the King as he
came up the garden, he turned white as the wall ... and said "... he is come, he is come, and now we are doing
that great work that the whole nation will be full of: Therefore I desire you to let us resolve here what answer we
shall give the King when he comes before us, for the first question that he will ask us will be by what authority and
commission do we try him?" None answered, but presently Marten said "In the name of the Commons and
Parliament assembled and all the good people of England."
The Charge of Parliament against Charles Stuart, King of England, of High Treason and Other High
Crimes (January 20, 1649)
That the said Charles Stuart, being admitted King of England, and therein trusted with a limited Power, to govern
by, and according to the Laws of the Land, and not otherwise; And by his Trust, Oath, and Office, being obliged to
use the Power committed to him, For the good and benefit of the People, and for the preservation of their Rights
and Liberties; Yet nevertheless out of a wicked Design, to erect, and uphold in himself an unlimited and
Tyrannical Power to rule according to his Will, and to overthrow the Rights and Liberties of the People ... hath
Trayterously and maliciously levyed War against the present Parliament, and the People therein Represented.
...
By all which it appeareth, that He, the said Charles Stuart, hath been, and is the Occasioner, Author, and
Contriver of the said Unnatural, Cruel, and bloody Wars, and therein guilty of all the Treasons, Murthers, Rapines,
Burnings, Spoils, Desolations, Damage, and Mischief to this Nation, acted or committed in the said Wars, or
occasioned thereby.

2. Social Studies 884 SAS®
Curriculum Pathways®
Copyright © 2011, SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC, USA, All Rights Reserved 1/6/2011
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... [F]or the said Treasons and Crimes ... the said People of England, Impeach the said Charles Stuart as a
Tyrant, Traytor, Murtherer, and a publike, and Implacable Enemy to the Common-wealth of England: and pray,
That the said Charles Stuart, King of England, may be put to answer All and Every the Premises, That such
Proceedings, Examinations, Tryals, Sentence, and Judgment may be thereupon had, or shall be agreeable to
justice.
Charles I at Trial (January 20, 1649)
The King: I would know by what power I am called hither.
...
Remember I am your King, your lawful King, and what sins you bring upon your heads, and the Judgment of God
upon this Land, think well upon it, I say, think well upon it, before you go further from one sin to a greater;
therefore let me know by what lawful Authority I am seated here, and I shall not be unwilling to answer, in the
mean time I shall not betray my Trust: I have a Trust committed to me by God, by old and lawful descent, I will not
betray it to answer to a new unlawful Authority, therefore resolve me that, and you shall hear more of me.
Lord President: ... [I]n the name of the People of England, of which you are Elected King ... answer them.
...
The King: ... England was never an Elective Kingdom but an Hereditary Kingdom for neer these thousand years
... I do stand more for the Liberty of my People then any here that come to be my pretended Judges.
From Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan (1651)
Chapter X: Of Power, Worth, Dignity, Honour, and Worthiness
The Greatest of humane Powers, is that which is compounded of the Powers of most men, united by consent, in
one person, Naturall, or Civill, that has the use of all their Powers depending on his will...
...Chapter XVIII--Of the Rights of Soveraignes by Institution
[T]hey that are subjects to a Monarch, cannot without his leave cast off Monarchy, and return to the confusion of a
disunited Multitude; nor transferre their Person from him that beareth it, to another Man ... for they are bound,
every man to every man, to Own, and be reputed Author of all, that he that already is their Soveraigne, shall do,
and judge ... [T]herefore if they depose him, they take from him that which is his own, and so again it is injustice.
...
It is true that they that have Soveraigne power, may commit Iniquity, but not Injustice or Injury ...
... [A]nd consequently ... no man that hath Soveraigne power can justly be put to death, or otherwise in any
manner by his Subjects punished.

3. Social Studies 884 SAS®
Curriculum Pathways®
Copyright © 2011, SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC, USA, All Rights Reserved 1/6/2011
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From John Milton's The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates (1649)
For if all humane power to execute, not accidentally but intendedly, the wrath of God upon evill doers without
exception, be of God; then that power, whether ordinary, or if that faile, extraordinary so executing that intent of
God, is lawfull;
...
[T]o say Kings are accountable to none but God, is the overturning of all Law and government.
...
It follows lastly, that since the King or Magistrate holds his authoritie of the people, both originally and naturally for
their good in the first place, and not his owne, then may the people as oft as they shall judge it for the best, either
choose him or reject him, retaine him or depose him though no Tyrant, meerly by the libertie and right of free born
men to be govern'd as seems to them best.