The English Bill of Rights of 1689 and Its American Echoes

After James II fled England in 1688, Parliament offered the throne to William and Mary on condition that they accept a Declaration of Right, enacted in 1689 as the Bill of Rights. It barred the monarch from suspending laws, levying taxes or keeping a standing army in peacetime without Parliament's consent. It protected free elections, freedom of speech in Parliament and the right to petition the king, and it allowed Protestant subjects to have arms for their defence as suitable to their condition and allowed by law.

Its most direct legacy in America is a single sentence: excessive bail should not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted, which the Eighth Amendment copies almost exactly. The English document protected Parliament against the Crown rather than individuals against Parliament, a key difference Americans noticed. They wanted a bill of rights that would bind legislatures too.