Editor's note

• Author: JIANG Dong
• Pages: 201-203

FRONTIERS OF LAW IN CHINA

VOL. 11 JUNE 2016 NO. 2

DOI 10.3868/s050-005-016-0011-5

FOCUS

THE PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE OF RULE OF LAW

EDITOR’S NOTE

JIANG Dong*

On June 15, 1215, King John of England signed at Runnymede with his barons

Magna Carta, “the foundation of principles and systems of government of which neither

King John nor his nobles dreamed.” To celebrate its 800th anniversary and promote the

rule of law in China, the conference of “The Past, Present and Future of Rule of Law:

Manga Carta, the 800th Anniversary” was held at Renmin University of China Law from

September 5 to September 6 of 2015. Five articles presented to the conference are

included into this issue to reveal how the idea of the rule of law embedded in Magna

Carta influenced the legality in different countries.

Prof. Timothy Endicott from University of Oxford Faculty of Law of the UK, the

birth country of Magna Carta, challenges in his article “Magna Carta 1215: A Glorious

Failure” the legend that Magna Carta laid the foundation of the rule of law. It reveals that

Magna Carta was not the first because other charters before 1215 also contained the

elements of the king’s coronation to abide by the law. But Manga Carta did make a

sustainable innovation of the rule of law: not the idea that the king was subject to the law,

but the idea that there could be lawful processes for compelling him to conduct his duties.

The lessons from 1215 are thereby that the rule of law will be promoted with the

assistance of more specific and more effectively enforceable laws, a legacy of Magna

Carta to bear in mind for future generations.

Two American professors expound the significant constitutionals issues — writ of

habeas corpus and due process of law — a direct inheritance of Magna Carta in American

constitutionalism. Prof. H. Robert Baker in his article “Magna Carta and the American

Political Imagination: Two Instances of Habeas Corpus Vindicated” closely examines two

historical episodes of the failed attempts by the U.S. government to suspend the writ of

habeas corpus: the one in 1807 and followed revelations of the so-called Burr Conspiracy

and the recent one that occurred during the War on Terror and culminated with the

* (󰓠) Ph.D and Associate Professor of Law, at School of Law, Renmin University of China, Beijing

100872, China. Contact: djiang@ruc.edu.cn