g, and also "those just laws and customs
which the common people (through their juries) had chosen," and
substituted the will of parliament in their stead.

Coke was a great advocate for the legislative power of parliament, as a
means of restraining the power of the king. As he denied all power to
_juries_ to decide upon the obligation of laws, and as he held that the
legislative power was "_so transcendent and absolute as (that) it cannot
be confined, either for causes or persons, within any bounds_,"[116] he
was perhaps honest in holding that it was safer to trust this terrific
power in the hands of parliament, than in the hands of the king. His
error consisted in holding that either the king or parliament had any
such power, or that they had any power at all to pass laws that should
be binding upon a jury.

These declarations of Coke, that the charter was confirmed by thirty-two
"acts of parliament," have a mischievous bearing in another respect.
They tend to weaken the authority of the charter, by conveying the
impression that the charter itself might be _abolished_ by "act of
parliament." Coke himself admits that it could not be revoked or
rescinded by the _king_; for he says, "All pretence of prerogative
against Magna Carta is taken away." (_2 Inst._, 36.)

He knew perfectly well, and the whole English nation knew, that the
_king_ could not lawfully infringe Magna Carta. Magna Carta, therefore,
made it impossible that absolute power could ever be practically
established in England, _in the hands of the king_. Hence, as Coke was
an advocate for absolute power,--that is, for a legislative power "so
transcendent and absolute as (that) it cannot be confined, either for
causes or persons, within any bounds,"--there was no alternative for him
but to vest this absolute power in parliament. Had he not vested it in
parliament, he would have been obliged to abjure it altogether, and to
confess that the people, _through their juries_, had the right to judge
of the obligation of all legislation whatsoever; in other words, that
they had the right to confine the government within the limits of "those
just laws and customs which the common people (acting as jurors) had
chosen." True to his instincts, as a judge, and as a tyrant, he assumed
that this absolute power was vested in the hands of parliament.

But the truth was that, as by the English constitution parliament had no
authority at all for _general_ legislation, it coul