Note d — Chapter VIII

The supposed statute, De Tallagio non concedendo, is considered by Blackstone (Introduction to Charters, p. 67) as merely an abstract of the Confirmatio Chartarum. By that entitled Articuli super Chartas, 28 Edw. I., a court was erected in every county, of three knights or others, to be elected by the commons of the shire, whose sole province was to determine offences against the two charters, with the power of punishing by fine and imprisonment; but not to extend to any case wherein a remedy by writ was already provided. The Confirmatio Chartarum is properly denominated a statute, and always printed as such; but in form, like Magna Charta, it is a charter, or letters patent, proceeding from the crown, without even reciting the consent of the realm. And its "teste" is at Ghent, 2 Nov. 1297; Edward having engaged, conjointly with the count of Flanders, in a war with Philip the Fair. But a parliament had been held at London, when the barons insisted on these concessions. The circumstances are not wholly unlike those of Magna Charta.

The Lords' Committee do not seem to reject the statute "de tallagio non concedendo" altogether, but say that, "if the manuscript containing it (in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge) is a true copy of a statute, it is undoubtedly a copy of a statute of the 25th, and not of a statute of the 34th of Edward I." p. 230. It seems to me on comparing the two, that the supposed statute de tallagio is but an imperfect transcript of the king's charter at Ghent. But at least, as one exists in an authentic form, and the other is only found in an unauthorized copy, there can be no question which ought to be quoted.