ndamental rights of the Commons as a body are enumerated. To the
enumeration should be added, historically, an item contained in a
petition of the Commons, May 23, 1610, which reads as follows: "We
hold it an ancient, general, and undoubted right of Parliament to
debate freely all matters which do properly concern the subject and
his right or state; which freedom of debate being once foreclosed, the
essence of the liberty of Parliament is withal dissolved."[25] The
occasion for this last-mentioned assertion of right arose from the
king's habitual assumption that there were various important matters
of state, e.g., the laying of impositions and the conduct of foreign
relations, which Parliament possessed no right so much as to discuss.

[Footnote 24: Petyt, Jus Parliamentarium (London,
1739), 227-243. Portions of this document are
printed in Prothero, Statutes and Constitutional
Documents, 286-293.]

[Footnote 25: Commons' Journals, I., 431; Prothero,
Statutes, 297.]

*29. The Parliaments of James I. and Charles I.*--The tyranny of (p. 028)
James I. and Charles I. assumed the form, principally, of the issue of
proclamations without the warrant of statute and the exaction of taxes
without the assent of Parliament. Parliament, during the period
1603-1640, was convened but seldom, and it was repeatedly prorogued or
dissolved to terminate its inquiries, thwart its protests, or subvert
its projected measures. Under the disadvantage of recurrent
interruption the Commons contrived, however, to carry on a contest
with the crown which was essentially continuous. During the reign of
James I. (1603-1625) there were four parliaments. The first, extending
from 1604 to 1611, was called in session six times. It sorely
displeased the king by remonstrating against his measures, and
especially by the persistency with which it withheld subsidies pending
a redress of grievances. The second, summoned in 1614, vainly
reiterated the complaints of its predecessor and was dissolved without
having enacted a single measure. The third, in 1621, revived the power
of impeachment (dormant since the days of Henry VII.), reasserted the
right of the chambers to debate foreign relations, and avenged by a
fresh protestation of liberties the arrest of one of its members. The
fourth, in 1624, abolished monopolies and renewed the attack upon