Lectures
British Christianity and the American Order: Stephen Langton and the Magna Carta
The story of our American Constitution did not begin in at the Philadelphia Convention of 1787, nor in 1776 with our Declaration of Independence from Great Britain, nor did it originate in the various colonial charters and fundamental orders of the 13 colonies. Rather the story of our political tradition of liberty under law began in the theological libraries and lecture halls of the University of Paris in the late 12th Century. There at the University a young English bible student was intellectually and spiritually formed to eventually become the key instrument in a great political conflict. Archbishop of Canterbury Stephen Langton, theologian, priest and minister of the Gospel proved to be the principal actor in securing the “Great Charter” of Anglo-American political liberty—the Magna Carta. Four centuries later the English Puritans appealed to the principles of the Great Charter in their struggle with the Stuart dynasty. Within four decades of this conflict another Stuart King was deposed and exiled and the Bloodless Revolution effected with appeal to the Magna Carta for justification. Additionally the English Bill of Rights was drafted and adopted by Parliament to further elucidate and expand upon the principles of the Magna Carta. In the 18th Century the English colonists of America waged a civil war with their mother country on the grounds that England had violated their rights as established in the Magna Carta, the Common Law, and the Bill of Rights. Lastly, the Americans in framing a new government designed a political order that looked very much like the British Constitution. It even included a Bill of Rights whose fundamental principles were garnered from the Magna Carta and the English Bill of Rights. In this lecture Alan Crippen argues that the Magna Carta was of primary importance for the formation of the American Constitution and that the Christian worldview, personal character, and courageous actions of Stephen Langton are of significant consequence for the American political heritage of liberty under law.
