Shortly after this, he received the demands of the refractory Earls, complaining of the non-observance of the charters, of the tallages, aids and requisitions, and of the tax on wool. Declining to give an answer at present, on the 22nd of August he set sail for Flanders. On the very next day the Earls appeared in the Exchequer Chamber, and peremptorily forbad the collection of the irregularly granted eighth, until the charters had been signed which had been the express condition of the grant. The necessity for concession had become obvious, and in a Parliament summoned on the 6th of October, the promised confirmation was given by the Prince. The Earls, who appeared in arms, with troops, insisted upon the addition of some supplementary clauses, which have since been known as the statute “De tallagio non concedendo.” They further demanded that the late grant should be considered illegal; it was therefore cancelled, and a new constitutional grant of a ninth was made in its place. Prince Edward’s confirmation was renewed by the King in person at Ghent. It was again renewed, in 1299, with an unsatisfactory clause “saving the rights of the Crown,” which the King was obliged subsequently to remove, and finally, in 1301, at the Parliament of Lincoln. The charters thus confirmed were the amended charter of Henry III., the additions to it were contained in the supplementary articles of the two Earls, which forbid what had hitherto been undoubtedly constitutional, the arbitrary tallaging of towns and taxing of wool. They contained however a clause “saving the old rights of the King,” and Edward took advantage of this afterwards, in 1304, to continue the old wool-tax and to tallage the towns in his own domain.[50]

It was the dangerous condition of his affairs which induced the King to yield to the pressure of the Barons; for in the spring of 1297, Wallace had made his appearance in Scotland. The younger son of a small proprietor in Elderslie, and without means of his own, he had established his fame as a guerilla leader. In the woods and mountains he collected a band of outlaws, with whom he attacked isolated parties of English, all of whom were at once put to death. His cruelties especially against the nuns and priests are described as most revolting. Cressingham, Treasurer of Scotland, foolishly despised him, and thus allowed the insurrection to gain head. He was joined by Sir William Douglas; but on the whole was both disliked and despised by the Scotch nobility. At length, as his followers had increased to an army, and threatened the fortress of Stirling, it became necessary to take measures against him. Warrenne, Earl of Surrey, and Cressingham, raised an army, and advanced to the Forth. The armies met early in September at Cambuskenneth, near Stirling. The river is there spanned by a narrow bridge, at the north end of which the Scotch were strongly posted. With overweening folly, Cressingham insisted on an immediate advance across the bridge. The natural consequence followed; when a small portion of the English had crossed, and were thus cut off from support, the Scotch fell on them and completely routed them. Warrenne, an old and feeble man, took to hasty flight, and the army was in fact destroyed. This victory was followed up by a fierce invasion of the north of England. Wallace seems to have collected troops by violent means; he then led them across the English border, and sweeping it lengthwise from Newcastle to Carlisle, “he left nothing behind him but blood and ashes.”[51] His cruelties were indeed beyond description, and could not but have filled the English with horror, something akin to that which the English in India must have felt at the outbreak of the mutiny.

Edward’s expedition to Flanders had been a failure. The people in the cities, angry with his interference in the wool trade, were opposed to him; his allies had been tampered with by Philip, who had also won a victory over them at Furnes; the Pope was urging peace; and Edward, who always regarded his French affairs as secondary, made a truce before the end of the year 1297, which two years afterwards ripened under the arbitration of Boniface to the Treaty of Chartres. By that treaty, Guienne was restored to the English King, who withdrew his support from his Flemish allies; while Philip in return gave up the cause of the Scotch. The treaty was cemented by a double marriage. Edward himself married Margaret, the French King’s sister; while his son Edward was betrothed to Isabella, Philip’s daughter.

Shortly after his return, Edward advanced to revenge the insults of Wallace, who had meantime unwisely taken the title of the Guardian of the Kingdom, thus still further exciting the jealousy of the nobles. He retired before the English army, laying waste the country behind him, and Edward had almost been starved into a retreat, when two Scotch Earls told him that Wallace was in the woods in his immediate neighbourhood. Edward at once advanced to meet him. Wallace, with his infantry formed into solid squares, awaited his attack. Such horse as he had fled without striking a blow. The arrows of the English archers broke the squares, and the 7000 heavy armed English cavalry had no difficulty in completing the victory. Wallace fled, and resumed his outlaw’s life, nor does he again play a prominent part in history. In 1305, he was betrayed by one of his own followers named Jack Short to Sir John Monteith, by whom he was given up to the English King, and suffered death, with all the extreme penalties of the law.[52] The bitter feeling his outrages had caused in England made any other fate impossible. But though Wallace sinks into obscurity, his work had not been without effect. The southern counties were so ravaged that the King could not maintain an army there, and had to retire from the country, which passed into the hands of a temporary regency, at the head of which was Comyn.

For several years the steps taken for the reduction of Scotland were marked by great weakness. Edward’s energy was paralyzed, partly by the affairs in France, partly by questions arising with regard to the charters in England. Frequent complaints had been raised with regard to infringements of the Charter of Forests. It was to settle these complaints, and to discuss an extraordinary claim raised by Pope Boniface, that a Parliament was assembled at Lincoln in 1301. With regard to the charter the King yielded, and a considerable disafforesting of districts illegally included within the limits of the forests took place. Pleased with the King’s constitutional conduct, the baronage joined heartily in the rejection of the Papal claim. Boniface had issued a mandate desiring the King to abstain from all further attacks on Scotland, “which did and doth still belong in full right to the Church of Rome.” This mandate was delivered while Edward was in Scotland, and Boniface’s position as arbiter between Edward and the King of France prevented him from at once rejecting it. It is probable that Boniface was only asserting his position as guardian of international law, but the English treated the claim as serious. When it was brought before Parliament, the baronage replied that the kingdom of Scotland never had belonged to the See of Rome, and that they, the Barons of England, would not allow Edward, even if he wished it, to surrender the rights of the Crown. It was not till 1303 that Edward was able to resume his conquest of that kingdom. Early in that year he ordered his Barons to assist John Segrave, Governor of Scotland, in marching from Berwick to Edinburgh. But that General mismanaged his march, and as he approached Roslin on the way to Edinburgh, in three divisions, he was fallen upon by Comyn, and his army defeated in detail.

The King had thus much to revenge when, in June, he began his march. On this occasion he was accompanied by a fleet to bring his supplies. He thus avoided the difficulty which the desolate state of the country had hitherto presented. He pushed onward into the far North. On returning he took up his abode for a time in Dunfermline. Most of the Scotch Barons there sought and obtained pardon, and at length Comyn, who had been the leader of the rebellion, made a treaty in Fife, by which the Lords agreed to suffer any pecuniary fine Edward thought fit, and the castles and government were to be in Edward’s hands. One stronghold only refused to obey this treaty. Sir William Oliphant held the fortress of Stirling, and it required three months to reduce its gallant defenders to submission. This was the last opposition Edward had to fear; he at once admitted the Scotch to pardon, and settled the country, placing his chief confidence apparently in Wishart, Bishop of St. Andrews, John de Mowbray and Robert Bruce. It was soon seen how little reliance could be put on the first and last of these Commissioners.

Robert Bruce was the grandson of the claimant of the Scotch throne; his grandfather had been an English judge, his father a constant friend of Edward. It was only by marriage that the family had acquired the estates of Carrick and Annandale. He was therefore to all intents and purposes an Englishman, or rather a Norman Baron, possessed of that peculiar characteristic of the race which rendered it in fact a race of adventurers, with the constant hope of winning great things before their minds. The instances of Norman Barons who had won earldoms, kingdoms and empires, were too numerous not to have had effect upon aspiring members of the race. Bruce had up to this time played a somewhat vacillating game, but on the whole, perhaps because of his feud with Balliol, he had remained faithful to Edward. He seems now to have thought his opportunity had arrived. It may perhaps have been the King’s growing infirmities that encouraged him. At all events, early in February 1306, he murdered in the church of Dumfries Comyn, who, in accordance with the interpretation of the law which Edward had recognized, stood next to the Balliols in succession to the Scotch throne, and who, since he had last submitted to Edward, had been true to him. Bruce then, joined by a few nobles, raised the standard of revolt. He proceeded at once to Scone, and there, in March, was crowned by Wishart and other of Edward’s Commissioners. This unexpected insurrection from those whom he had trusted roused Edward to extreme anger. With great pomp, at a meeting at Westminster, he knighted his son, and took a solemn oath to avenge John Comyn’s death. Carlisle was the point of rendezvous, but already Bruce had been defeated at Methven near Perth by Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, and was wandering barefoot and in misery among the hills and woods of the country. He was reduced to demand the pity of the King, but was refused; and a severe ordinance was issued that all abettors of the murder of Comyn should be hanged, and that all those who assisted Bruce should be imprisoned. The ordinance was carried out with severity. Nigel Bruce, two Seatons, the Earl of Athole and Simon Fraser, were all executed, and the Countess of Buchan, who had crowned Bruce, was imprisoned, with ironical cruelty, in a crown-shaped cage. But Bruce himself was not taken, and issuing from his fastnesses, he inflicted many losses by surprise upon the English. He even in his turn defeated the Earl of Pembroke, and shortly after the Earl of Gloucester; and Edward was rousing himself to attack him, though scarcely able to mount his horse, when he died upon the march.

The mere narration of the political facts of the reign, although it brings out prominently much of Edward’s greatness, gives no idea of the real constitutional importance of his work. Not only was he the first truly English King, both by his circumstances and political views, but he became, in virtue of his love of order and legal arrangement, the completer of the English Constitution. In the first place, it is to him that we owe the perfection of the Parliamentary system, of the complete representation in Parliament of the three Estates of the realm, the Lords, Commons, and Clergy. For it is plain that it was his intention to combine the three, although the clergy refused to accede to his wish, and preferred to tax themselves separately in Convocation; a body which however, as will be afterwards seen, also owes its representative arrangements to him. The gradual introduction of the representative system of the counties has been mentioned. Again and again, on special occasions, knights, to represent the shire and to give information with regard to their counties, had been summoned. Simon de Montfort had even introduced representation of the boroughs; but this was regarded as wholly exceptional. Nevertheless, Edward was not long in seeing both the justice and advantage of the system. In the first Parliament of his reign, when enacting the first great Statute of Westminster, a healing and restorative measure applicable to the whole country, he said that he made it with the consent of the commonalty; there were possibly representatives of the counties present; more probably their consent was arrived at in some other way. At the same time, the high view which he took of his own constitutional position is marked by a change in the ordinary form of enactment. Statutes had hitherto been enacted “by the counsel and consent of Parliament.” The alteration of a few letters changed the meaning of this phrase. The present statute was said to be enacted “by the King by the advice of his Council and the assent of Parliament.” The legislative power was thus made to reside in the King and his Council. It is the power thus claimed which gave rise to the legislative, or rather the ordaining power claimed by the King in Council, which was afterwards frequently complained of by the Parliament. But Edward, in spite of these pretensions, accepted the view that all should be consulted where the interests of all were at stake. This was of course chiefly in the matter of taxation, and the convenience as well as the justice of the method which Simon de Montfort had set on foot soon became evident to his mind. From the beginning of this reign, the method of taxation had been changed. Instead of an aid, raised from the land, it had become a subsidy raised by an assessment on the moveables of the people. Most frequently the proportion granted was a tenth or fifteenth, but in these early times every variety of proportion was granted. As yet, however, these taxes had been collected locally in accordance with arrangements made by Exchequer officers, sheriffs, or the county court. In 1282, the King, being in want of money for his Welsh wars, proceeded by his ordinary method. The sums raised locally were insufficient; while his Barons were with him at the wars it was inconvenient to hold a Parliament; writs were issued therefore to the sheriffs and archbishops to collect their two Estates, the Commons and the clergy, at two centres, York and Northampton. At these meetings were present four representative knights from each county, and all freeholders of more than one knight’s fee. The Commons made their grant of a thirtieth. The assemblies of the clergy declined, until the parochial clergy were represented. For this purpose the election of Proctors was then ordered, and they have since formed a regular part of the Convocation. These negotiations were not completed when what is called the Parliament of Acton Burnell was summoned to settle the affairs of Wales. At that meeting there were present no clergy, and representatives of twenty towns only, summoned separately. In 1290, a further proof is given that for taxation by subsidy the representation of the Commons was beginning to be considered necessary. In that year an old-fashioned feudal aid was granted for the marriage of the King’s daughter. It was granted by the baronage for the whole commonalty, and was in the old form of land-tax, but the Commons being subsequently present, it was changed at their request to a fifteenth. It was possible for the baronage to grant the aid upon military tenants, but the rest of the people could not be reached. Two principles had by this time been established,—that the clergy should be fully represented, and that for subsidies upon the whole kingdom it was both convenient and just that the Commons should in some way be represented; but it was not yet held necessary for feudal matters, or for questions touching the baronage only, that the Commons should be present. Indeed, at this very Parliament, the statute “Quia Emptores” was passed by the Barons before the Commons assembled. All these preparatory steps found their completion in the Parliament of 1295, when writs were issued to the Archbishops to appear themselves, and to send Proctors to Westminster; to the Prelates and Barons, as Peers, and to the sheriffs, summoning the knights of the counties, and two burghers from each town.[53] There was thus a Parliament complete in all its parts, such as it has since remained. We must not suppose, however, that the Estates acted in common, or that the Commons had much voice in the deliberation. At this very Parliament of 1295, the grant of each order was different, nor was it till 1318, in Edward II.’s reign, that the Commons can be considered as perfectly incorporated in the Legislative Assembly. The constitutional view at present was, that the King, with the assent of his Barons, granted the petitions of the Commons and the Clergy.

The great statutes which were passed in these various Parliaments must now be mentioned. Those which were of most general national interest were the First Statute of Westminster, which, as has been before said, revived and re-established the old constitutions of the country, and limited the employment of feudal aids; and the Statute of Winchester, passed in 1285, which was a re-enactment and completion of the Assize of Arms established by Henry II., and aimed at once at the defence and police of the country. It laid upon the counties, under heavy penalties, the duty of indicting felons and robbers, ordered the police arrangements of walled towns, the enlargement and clearing of the edges of public roads, and further defined the arms which each class of the population was bound to procure for the preservation of the land. Constables and justices were to be appointed to see to the proper observance of this statute, from whom subsequently grew the justices of the peace. Some such statute was indeed very necessary, and even its stringent provisions were not sufficient to establish order. In 1305, England was full of riotous outlaws, who were willing to hire themselves out for purposes of private outrage when they were not plying their own trade of robbery; these were known by the name of “trail-bâtons.” To suppress them it was found necessary to issue commissions to travelling justices, empowering them to act summarily towards such breakers of the peace. Their strictness is mentioned in the political songs of the day. It was impossible, it was said, any longer to beat your children, you were at once punished as a trail-bâton.[54] Even the stringency of these measures of suppression mark Edward’s love of order. Lastly, must be mentioned the great Acts for the confirmation of the charters, which are sometimes regarded as the statute “De tallagio non concedendo.” From this time forward arbitrary tallages, though occasionally used, began to be regarded as illegal.

There were also two great statutes bearing almost entirely upon the feudal relations of landed proprietors. The first was the statute of “Quia Emptores” (1290), which forbad subinfeudation and the formation of new manors. Its original object was to prevent feudal lords from being defrauded of their dues. Henceforward, property alienated ceased to belong in any sense to the subordinate grantor, and returned to the property of the lord superior of the whole estate. The effect, unforeseen by the enacters, was to increase the number of independent gentry holding immediately from the crown or from the great lords. The second statute is known by the name of the Second Statute of Westminster, or “De donis conditionalibus.” When an estate had been given to a man and to his children, it had hitherto been held sufficient that the child should be born. The estate had then become the absolute property of the man to whom it had been granted, and he could alienate it at his will. It was now enacted that he had but a life interest in it, that if his children were not living at his death, it reverted to the original grantor. Thus was established the power of entail. There remains one great statute to be mentioned, the Statute of Mortmain. This was aimed against the increasing power and wealth of the Church, and against a legal trick by which laymen had freed themselves from feudal liabilities. It had become a custom to give property to the Church and to receive it back as tenant of the Church, thus freed from obligation to lay superiors. At the same time, even though this device was not used, the accumulation of property in the hands of the Church withdrew it from many feudal duties. It passed, it was said, “in mortuam manum”—into a dead hand. All transactions by which lands or tenements could in any way pass into mortmain were now forbidden. The same spirit which produced these laws had been felt in the administration of justice, where the three courts of Exchequer, King’s Bench and Common Pleas were finally separated, and each provided with a full staff of officials. Even from this short sketch of the work of Edward I. may be gathered the great constitutional importance of the reign.