Skip to Content

The Human Rights Act: a Magna Carta for the twenty-first century?

(May 2014, Mark Rathbone, Canford School)

Magna Carta was sealed at Runnymede in June 1215 by King John; the Human Rights Act owes its origins to the European Convention on Human Rights, signed in Rome in November 1950 by ministers from fifteen countries, including Britain. This article compares the two documents and considers whether the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and the Human Rights Act (HRA) can be seen as a modern equivalent to Magna Carta.

Click Rathbone Essay Human Rights Act and Magna Carta to download the full essay.

 

Featured Article

Alice Richmond

Alice Richmond

Deputy Chairman, Magna Carta 800th Committee

Rex no potest peccare (The King can do no wrong). How many of you have read Unbroken, the bestseller by Laura Hillenbrand about Olympic runner Louis Zamperini ‘s experiences in World War II? Perhaps ...

Read on...

Recent Articles

See more...

Stay updated

If you would like to keep informed about the work of the Magna Carta Trust and our partners, please sign up to the newsletter below.