I enjoyed the section on the Magna Carta’s Anniversary, (“800 Years of Magna Carta,” NYLJ, May 1), but I think history diminished its importance. It granted rights mostly to the nobility and expressly discriminated against the Jews. At that time, Jews had the status as the King’s chattel. The Magna Carta had several anti-Jewish economic clauses. Jews, whose career choices were limited, became England’s default money lenders. Since they could not own real property, barons who could not pay their debts gave Jews property. The property automatically transferred to the King, since the Jew could not retain it. The King gained power by owing more land and the barons loathed the Jews who collected their debts.
Though the Magna Carta created due process, during July 1290, King Edward I issued an order expelling England’s 2,500 Jews. Any Jews who remained after Nov. 1 faced extermination. Jews did not reestablish themselves in England until the late 17th century, after the first significant Jewish immigration to New Amsterdam.
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