1.  Wales and Scotland were conquered, and the first remained permanently a part of the English kingdom. 2.  The landed proprietors of the whole country were made more directly responsible to the Crown. 3.  The excessive growth of Church property was checked. 4.  Laws for the better suppression of acts of violence were enacted and rigorously enforced. 5.  The Great Charter, with additional articles for the protection of the people, was confirmed by the King, and the power of taxation expressly acknowledged to reside in Parliament only. 6.  Parliament, a legislative body now representing all classes of the nation, was permanently organized, and for the first time regularly and frequently summoned by the King.[1]

[1] It will be remembered that De Montfort’s Parliament in 1265 (S213) was not regularly and legally summoned, since the King (Henry III) was at that time a captive.  The first Parliament (consisting of a House of Commons and House of Lords, including the upper Clergy), convened by the Crown, was that called by Edward I in 1295 (S217).

Edward II—­1307-1327

229.  Accession and Character.

The son to whom Edward I left his power was in every respect his opposite.  The old definition of the word “king” was “the man who CAN,” or the able man.  The modern explanation usually makes him “the chief or head of a people.”  Edward II would satisfy neither of these definitions.  He lacked all disposition to do anything himself; he equally lacked power to incite others to do.  By nature he was a jester, trifler, and waster of time.

Being such, it is hardly necessary to say that he did not push the war with Scotland.  Robert Bruce (S227) did not expect that he would; that valiant fighter, indeed, held the new English sovereign in utter contempt, saying that he feared the dead father, Edward I, much more than the living son.

230.  Piers Gaveston; the Lords Ordainers; Articles of Reform.

During his first five years of his reign, Edward II did little more than lavish wealth and honors on his chief favorite and adviser, Piers Gaveston, a Frenchman who had been his companion and playfellow from childhood.  While Edward I was living, Parliament had with his sanction banished Gaveston from the kingdom, as a man of corrupt practices; but Edward II was no sooner crowned than he recalled him, and gave him the government of the realm during his absence in France, on the occasion of his marriage.

On Edward’s return, the barons protested against the monopoly of privileges by a foreigner, and the King was obliged to consent to Gaveston’s banishment.  He soon came back, however, and matters went on from bad to worse.  Finally, the indignation of the nobles rose to such a pitch that at a council held at Westminster the government was virtually taken from the King’s hands and vested in a body of barons and bishops.