PETITION OF RIGHT. In the first parliament of Charles L, which met in 1626, the commons refused to grant supplies until certain rights and privileges of the subject, which they alleged had been vio lated, should have been solemnly recognised by a legislative enactment. 'With this view they framed a petition to the king, in which, after reciting various statutes by which their rights and privileges were recognised, they pray the king " that no mau be compelled to make or yield any gift, loan, benevolence, tax, or suchlike charge, without common consent by act of paliament,—that none be called upon to make answer for refusal so to do,—that freemen be imprisoned or detained only by the law of the land, or by due process of law, and not by the king's special command, without any charge,--that persona be not eompelled to receive soldiers and mariners into their houses against the laws and customs of the realm,—that commissions for proceeding by martial law be revoked : all which they pray as their rights and liberties according to the laws and statutes of the realm."
To this petition the king at first sent an evasive answer :—" The king willeth that right be done according to the laws and customs of the realm, and that the statutes be put in due execution, that his sub jects may have no cause to complain of any wrongs or oppressions contrary to their just rights and liberties, to the preservation whereof he holds himself in conscience obliged as of his own prerogative." This answer being rejected as unsatisfactory, the king at last pronounced the formal words of unqualified assent, " Let right be done as it is desired." (1 Car. I., c. 1.) Notwithstanding this, however, the minis ters of the crown caused the petition to be printed and circulated with the first insufficient answer.