The Legal and Political Meaning of the Arguments concerning A Bill of Rights in Modern Britain

The materials of this paper are those of the arguments concerning a Bill of Rights. By examining these materials, this writer will clarify one of the tendencies of the legal theories in the present age of crisis. This writer knows that among the arguments concerning a Bill of Rights, there are many other subjects to be examined; for example, the relationshop between the rigid constitution and the English constitution, the question about the Parliamentary Sovereignty, and the question about the common law, etc. But this writer does not deal with these subjects because of the objects of this paper. The followings are the contents of this paper. (1) The economical, social, and political crises of the contemporary Britain and the understandings of these crises by lawyers. (2) The critical examinations about the arguments concerning a Bill of Rights. (3) Some comments on the fundamental legal thought prevailing the arguments concerning a Bill of Rights. The followings are the conclusions of this paper. The proposals of a Bill of Rights based on the revived natural law theory will not eliminate the roots of the contemporary crises in Great Britain. Rather, it seems, the effects of these proposals are to keep the present regime as it is. Therefore it seems to this writer that to secure the interests of the people, another kind of proposals based on another kind of the legal theory will be needed. But we can hardly find such proposals among the British lawyers now. So the difficulties of the people in Great Britain will not be dissolved for the present