Why Britain needs a written constitution by Linda Colley

Hajar LYAMANI

DM Civilisation Britannique

British civilization

" Why Britain needs a written constitution? " by Linda Colley

1. Briefly present this article. Who is Linda Colley ?

This document is a press article excerpted from the 12 of March 2021 edition of the Financial Times, a British daily newspaper that is considered to be the leading business daily across Europe. This article was written by Linda Colley, professor of history at Princeton University and expert on British imperial and global history since 1700. In this article Linda Colley addresses the public at large and exposes her arguments as to, why should Britain have a written constitution especially within these troubling times, as the country faces the many downsides of the Brexit and its devastating consequences on the unity and integrity of the United Kingdom as we know of today, the latter might even change not only its constitution but its components as well.

1. According to her, what are the main advantages of having a codified constitution ?

Having a written constitution can have many upsides for a country not just as a bunch of legal and political clauses and mesures set out on paper, but mostly as a way to mould and state out a country’s vision, as she refers to line 48 to 49 of her article : “(…). They supply a way of shaping and proclaiming a country’s desired brand.“

Moreover, a simple written constitution “can provide an informational and reference guide for civilians as well as politicians and lawyers“ as she stated line 57 to 58, making it easier for citizens as well as scholars or politicians to have access to it as seen line 64 to 66 were she said : “future politicians were likely to obtain some advanced information on how the British system of government supposedly functioned“. Furthermore, within British history there has been an anthology of several documents that served the function of a written constitution and that was handed out around the world as she mentioned line 62-63 : “from the early 1800s, books on this subject increasingly proliferated in these islands, and were distributed across the globe“, which helped promote the British political and legal system abroad. But fast and foremost a codified constitution protects its citizens as mentioned by the writer quoting Charles Walker, member of parliament, line 2 to 4 : “the need for "a written constitution" (…), one that would guarantee "fundamental rights" for inhabitants of the UK and be enforced by its Supreme Court.“

However British politicians, especially conservatives, do not seem to be much concerned by the matter, and it does not seem like this very British tradition is going to come to an end anytime soon.    

1. How does she explain the British exception — the absence of a codified constitution ?

In other nations, many of which have undergone revolution or regime change, it has been important to start from the ground up, building new state structures and defining their relationships with one another and their people. The British Constitution, on the other hand, has changed over time, reflecting the relative stability of the British polity. Consolidating the essential elements of this order has never been considered appropriate in the United Kingdom. Even though there have been an attempt to codify this constitution during the civil wars during the 1640s and 1650s by the New Model Army whom “pressed for a written and published Agreement of the People signed by "every Englishman "“ as we can see line 36 to 40. However trying to change this long running British tradition is not so easy even for opposition parties and leaders as it can be seen as “too niche, elitist and alien for the commonsensical Brits“ and yet again a change in the constitutional form in practically every state or country “required a major trauma of some kind -(…)- to persuade busy and self interested politicians to run the risk of devoting extensive time to thoroughgoing constitutional change“as mentioned by Linda Colley line 94-100.

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