“King John,” according to A A Milne, “Was not a good man; he had his little ways; and sometimes no-one talked to him for days and days and days.” On this day 794 years ago, King John of England put his seal to the Magna Carta (which means “Great Charter”). The people of England were aggrieved by the arbitrary use of power by the Crown, and a group of barons forced the king to sign the Magna Carta, which was a legal document guaranteeing that the king would be bound by the law and respect certain legal procedures and grant certain rights to his subjects.
The Magna Carta was an important forerunner of the Constitutions which are currently in force in most democratic countries. One of the most significant legal procedures provided for by the Magna Carta was the Writ of Habeas Corpus, a form of legal protection against unlawful imprisonment. A court order can be sought requiring that a person who has been detained be brought before the court so that the court can determine whether the imprisonment is lawful.
The right of a person not to be arbitrarily detained has come to be regarded as one of the most important rights in any democratic country. This is one reason why the Australian Anti-Terrorism Act 2005, which allows the imposition of arbitrary detention, is thought to be unconstitutional, and why the mandatory detention of illegal immigrants is so controversial.