Program, Magna Carta Presentation Ceremony, June 3, 1976
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s-pers_348_001_001_tr.txt - Transcription (Scripto)
- Read Full Text Only (TXT)
- Extent (Dublin Core)
- 18 pages
- File Name (Dublin Core)
- s-pers_348_001_001
- Title (Dublin Core)
- Program, Magna Carta Presentation Ceremony, June 3, 1976
- Date (Dublin Core)
- 1976-06-03
- Date Created (Dublin Core)
- 1976-06-03
- Congress (Dublin Core)
- 94th (1975-1977)
- Topics (Dublin Core)
- See all items with this valueUnited States--Foreign relations--Great Britain
- See all items with this valueAmerican Revolution Bicentennial, 1976
- Policy Area (Curation)
- Arts, Culture, Religion
- International Affairs
- Creator (Dublin Core)
- Unknown
- Record Type (Dublin Core)
- programs (documents)
- Rights (Dublin Core)
- http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/CNE/1.0/
- Language (Dublin Core)
- eng
- Collection Finding Aid (Dublin Core)
- https://dolearchivecollections.ku.edu/index.php?p=collections/findingaid&id=21&q=
- Physical Location (Dublin Core)
- Collection 005, Box 348, Folder 1
- Institution (Dublin Core)
- Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS
- Archival Collection (Dublin Core)
- Robert J. Dole Senate Papers-Personal/Political Files, 1969-1996
- Full Text (Extract Text)
-
(page 1)
(script) Magna Carta
(page 2)
(blank)
(page 3)
(script) Magna Carta
PRESENTATION CEREMONY
The Great Rotunda
The Capitol
Ten Thirty o'clock, antemeridian
June Third
Nineteen Hundred Seventy-six
(page 4)
(blank)
(page 5)
(script) Program
WELCOMING REMARKS
Master of Ceremonies, The Honorable Hugh Scott
Republican Leader, United States Senate
INVOCATION
Chaplain of the House, The Reverend Edward G. Latch
THE BALLAD OF MAGNA CARTA
Composed by Kurt Weill
Libretto by Maxwell Anderson
The United States Air Force Symphony Orchestra and the Singing Sergeants (conducted by Colonel Arnald D. Gabriel, Commander and Conductor, the United States Air Force Band)
REMARKS
The Honorable Hugh Scott
PRESENTATION OF MAGNA CARTA
The Lord Chancellor of the House of Lords
The Right Honorable, The Lord Elwyn-Jones
ACCEPTANCE OF MAGNA CARTA
The Speaker of the House of Representatives
The Honorable Carl Albert
BENEDICTION
Chaplain of the Senate,
The Reverend L. R. Elson
VIEWING OF MAGNA CARTA FOLLOWING CEREMONY
(page 6)
(script) Magna Carta
The United Kingdom's foremost Bicentennial gift to the United States of America, the loan of one of four existing copies of the 761-year-old Great Charter of England, symbolizes the right of free men everywhere to call to account arbitrary governments. Granted to the Barons by King John at Runnymede in 1215, Magna Carta foreshadowed the development of such fundamental rights and privileges as freedom of religion, equality before the law and due process.
Subsequently revised and re-issued by a succession of English kings, Magna Carta has come to be regarded by all those who have inherited English legal traditions as their initial constitutional defense.
This historic document was produced more than two and one-half centuries before the New World was discovered. It was drafted at a time when the English and those who were to become Americans were the same people.
Within a week after King John affixed his seal of office to the original document, additional copies were made for distribution to every abbey and large city in the Kingdom. No one knows what became of the original. Four of the official copies sent out soon afterwards, also legitimized by the King's seal, remain in existence.
It is the Wymes copy, normally kept in the British Museum, which will be on display in the Rotunda of the Capitol for one year.
(page 8)
(blank)
(page 9)
THE BALLAD OF MAGNA CARTA
King John of England was an old man in twelve hundred fifteen;
He had reigned long and unjustly
And both the Nobles and the Common People were enraged
And desperate during those last years of his life.
He laid taxes without warrant and without mercy, He punished without trial,
And he loaded favorites with riches and honors.
It was he who invented the practice of pulling a tooth a day to extort money from the wealthy Jews.
It was he who had his nephew Arthur murdered to insure the succession for himself.
He ravaged his own Kingdom with fire and with murder,
From North to South because it rebelled against him.
In the year before his evil life ended,
The Barons and Earls of England met at Runnymede on the Thames
And demanded of King John that certain laws should be kept inviolate in England for the protection of all citizens!
These laws they wrote down for his signature,
And they mean to have your signature
And the paper whereon they are written is called "The Magna Carta."
These laws they wrote down for his signature
And the paper whereon they are written is called
"The Magna Carta."
And here's how it happened:
Deep in his castle sits old King John,
A pasty on the table,
A fire on the stone,
A bull-fiddle in the corner,
A drink on the hob
And a tax collector paying him twenty-six bob;
And his left foot stuck out on a pillow because he had gout among other things
And would rather surrender a province
Thank walk across a courtyard
A bull-fiddle in the corner,
A drink on the hob,
And a tax collector paying him twenty-six bob.
A Seneschal came running
King john
They heard him cry
Take your mind off the money,
Take your fist from the pie,
Take your foot from the pillow,
Find your axe and your shoes,
And put on all the armour a King can use
For the Nobles have gathered again under Runnymede Oak,
And they've drawn up a long paper,
And they mean to have your signature on it before the sun sets tonight on the Thames River
Take your foot from the pillow,
Find your axe and your shoes,
And put on all the armour a King can use!
King John stood up and he roared:
"God's wounds!
I'll cut steaks out of them
And I'll feed them to the hounds!
Rouse up, my officers!
Copyright MCMXL by Chappell & Co. Inc., N.Y.C.
(page 10)
(unintelligible copy of the Magna Carta)
(page 11)
(unintelligible copy of the Magna Carta)
(page 12)
Call out my guards!
Let me see ten thousand men in the castle yard!"
And he picked up a mace
And dragged on a couple of iron boots over his gout.
Swearing horribly in old English.
And kicking all the servants into the corner on his way to the portcullis.
Now out in the court there were just seven men
Standing in the place
Where the army should have been,
King John looked around him,
And nobody spoke,
For the men at arms were marching down to Runnymede Oak.
"Why those sons of dogs!"
Said old King John still speaking old English.
"Every man jack of them got a silver penny from me last month and now they've left me to serve my enemies!"
"I'll make them sorry for it as sure as this is the year twelve hundred fifteen A.D."
Then he rode down to the Thames with iron on his toes;
And his seven men behind him
And looked at his foes.
Swine! He called across the river,
And his voice had a ring.
"You will now disperse and scatter
By order of your King,
By order of your King!"
"Hallow!" Hallow! (echo)
"Hallow!" Hallow!
"Can you hear me?"
We hear you.
"What do you want?"
You'd better come over and find out!"
"I think you heard my proclamation,
Disperse and go to your houses by order of your King,
By my order, I, King John!
For I want you to know the King rules this country
And will continue to rule it;
And it would be better for the leaders of this rabble
If they'd never been born,
For I shall have the teeth out of their jaws,
And the hearts out of their cadavers!"
Ha, ha, ha!
Then a man rode out from the Runnymede ring
And he said:
We don't mind about your being King;
Men can't escape government and similar diseases
But from now on the King won't rule as he pleases
He will rule, your Highness, according to certain laws written down on paper in clear English.
And we have here written down the laws we intend that you shall sign!
King or no King, and You're King for this while,
You shall punish no Free-man without fair trail;
You shall lay no tax, Not in general use;
You shall use no torture on Christians and Jews.
And he held out a copy of "Magna Carta."
(page 13)
"Well, I won't sign your dog-dogged paper!"
In fact, I'll see you in Hades before I sign your dog-dogged paper!
And I'll see ten or a dozen of you in the cellar of Pomfred Castle trying to adjust yourselves to a rack with thumbscrews!"
But your army is on this side of the river, old King John!
"What I sign I can repudiate my Barons and my lords!"
But it happens that the taxes are in our hands now, oh King!
And what's the good of a King without taxes,
Ha-ha-ha-ha!
What's the good of a King without taxes,
A King without taxes!
"And I still won't sign!
I still won't sign!
I still won't sign!"
Very well! said the leader
Pull up your drawbridge
And dwell there still!
But a King without followers withers and dies..
It was you killed Prince Arthur,
It was you put out his eyes.
And he turned away and left King John.
And now the blood mounts up into the King's face as he looks at the Leader's back.
"Proclaim that a man a traitor!"
He cries to his Seneschal
"Proclaim him outlaw, and put on his head a price of five hundred florins!"
And because the Seneschal stands silent and does nothing
The King strikes him with his mailed hist,
So that his cheek is cut and he falls clanging to the ground with his trumpet in his hand...
And after the blow was struck
And the Seneschal had departed,
One of King John's seven Nobles turned his horse's head away from the King
"I swore to stay with you to the end, and now the end has come."
And he rode down the hill.
Then a second man turned to the King:
"You killed my Brother, and I thought I'd forgiven you, but I haven't."
And he rode down.
Then a third man spoke:
"I'm one of your last, because we were boys long ago.
But I have looked on too long at injustice administed by law."
And he turned away.
And one by one each for a different reason they spoke and left the King
Until the last has left him and he stood on his side alone;
And he looked about and saw that his injustice had caught up with him.
"Give me your dog-dogged paper!" ...
(page 14)
(blank)
(page 15)
Delegation of the Congress of the United States
Speaker Carl Albert, Chairman
Senator Mike Mansfield, Vice Chairman
Representative Thomas P. O'Neill, House Majority Leader
Senator Hugh Scott, Senate Republican Leader
Representative John J. Rhodes, House Minority Leader
Representative Thomas E. Morgan
Senator James B. Pearson
Representative Wayne L. Hays
Senator George McGovern
Representative Peter W. Rodino, Jr.
Senator Edward W. Brooke
Representative Elford A. Cederberg
Senator Bob Packwood
Representative Phil M. Landrum
Senator Robert Morgan
Representative Edward J. Derwinski
Representative Jack Edwards
Representative Lee H. Hamilton
Representative M. Caldwell Butler
Representative Lindy Boggs
(page 16)
The Capitol is both the home of the United States Congress
and the best loved and most revered building in America.
The original Capitol was first occupied in 1800;
the Rotunda was completed in 1829;
and the Great Iron Dome and wings of the Capitol
were added during the Civil War period.
Magna Carta will be on display
in the great central hall of the Capitol known as the Rotunda.
More than twenty United States citizens of eminence,
including Presidents from Abraham Lincoln to Lyndon Johnson,
have lain in state in this Rotunda.
The height, from the floor of the Rotunda to the apex of the Brumidi fresco,
"Apotheosis of Washington," in the dome is 180 feet.
(page 17)
(blank)
(page 18)
(blank) -
(page 1)
(script) Magna Carta
(page 2)
(blank)
(page 3)
(script) Magna Carta
PRESENTATION CEREMONY
The Great Rotunda
The Capitol
Ten Thirty o'clock, antemeridian
June Third
Nineteen Hundred Seventy-six
(page 4)
(blank)
(page 5)
(script) Program
WELCOMING REMARKS
Master of Ceremonies, The Honorable Hugh Scott
Republican Leader, United States Senate
INVOCATION
Chaplain of the House, The Reverend Edward G. Latch
THE BALLAD OF MAGNA CARTA
Composed by Kurt Weill
Libretto by Maxwell Anderson
The United States Air Force Symphony Orchestra and the Singing Sergeants (conducted by Colonel Arnald D. Gabriel, Commander and Conductor, the United States Air Force Band)
REMARKS
The Honorable Hugh Scott
PRESENTATION OF MAGNA CARTA
The Lord Chancellor of the House of Lords
The Right Honorable, The Lord Elwyn-Jones
ACCEPTANCE OF MAGNA CARTA
The Speaker of the House of Representatives
The Honorable Carl Albert
BENEDICTION
Chaplain of the Senate,
The Reverend L. R. Elson
VIEWING OF MAGNA CARTA FOLLOWING CEREMONY
(page 6)
(script) Magna Carta
The United Kingdom's foremost Bicentennial gift to the United States of America, the loan of one of four existing copies of the 761-year-old Great Charter of England, symbolizes the right of free men everywhere to call to account arbitrary governments. Granted to the Barons by King John at Runnymede in 1215, Magna Carta foreshadowed the development of such fundamental rights and privileges as freedom of religion, equality before the law and due process.
Subsequently revised and re-issued by a succession of English kings, Magna Carta has come to be regarded by all those who have inherited English legal traditions as their initial constitutional defense.
This historic document was produced more than two and one-half centuries before the New World was discovered. It was drafted at a time when the English and those who were to become Americans were the same people.
Within a week after King John affixed his seal of office to the original document, additional copies were made for distribution to every abbey and large city in the Kingdom. No one knows what became of the original. Four of the official copies sent out soon afterwards, also legitimized by the King's seal, remain in existence.
It is the Wymes copy, normally kept in the British Museum, which will be on display in the Rotunda of the Capitol for one year.
(page 8)
(blank)
(page 9)
THE BALLAD OF MAGNA CARTA
King John of England was an old man in twelve hundred fifteen;
He had reigned long and unjustly
And both the Nobles and the Common People were enraged
And desperate during those last years of his life.
He laid taxes without warrant and without mercy, He punished without trial,
And he loaded favorites with riches and honors.
It was he who invented the practice of pulling a tooth a day to extort money from the wealthy Jews.
It was he who had his nephew Arthur murdered to insure the succession for himself.
He ravaged his own Kingdom with fire and with murder,
From North to South because it rebelled against him.
In the year before his evil life ended,
The Barons and Earls of England met at Runnymede on the Thames
And demanded of King John that certain laws should be kept inviolate in England for the protection of all citizens!
These laws they wrote down for his signature,
And they mean to have your signature
And the paper whereon they are written is called "The Magna Carta."
These laws they wrote down for his signature
And the paper whereon they are written is called
"The Magna Carta."
And here's how it happened:
Deep in his castle sits old King John,
A pasty on the table,
A fire on the stone,
A bull-fiddle in the corner,
A drink on the hob
And a tax collector paying him twenty-six bob;
And his left foot stuck out on a pillow because he had gout among other things
And would rather surrender a province
Thank walk across a courtyard
A bull-fiddle in the corner,
A drink on the hob,
And a tax collector paying him twenty-six bob.
A Seneschal came running
King john
They heard him cry
Take your mind off the money,
Take your fist from the pie,
Take your foot from the pillow,
Find your axe and your shoes,
And put on all the armour a King can use
For the Nobles have gathered again under Runnymede Oak,
And they've drawn up a long paper,
And they mean to have your signature on it before the sun sets tonight on the Thames River
Take your foot from the pillow,
Find your axe and your shoes,
And put on all the armour a King can use!
King John stood up and he roared:
"God's wounds!
I'll cut steaks out of them
And I'll feed them to the hounds!
Rouse up, my officers!
Copyright MCMXL by Chappell & Co. Inc., N.Y.C.
(page 10)
(unintelligible copy of the Magna Carta)
(page 11)
(unintelligible copy of the Magna Carta)
(page 12)
Call out my guards!
Let me see ten thousand men in the castle yard!"
And he picked up a mace
And dragged on a couple of iron boots over his gout.
Swearing horribly in old English.
And kicking all the servants into the corner on his way to the portcullis.
Now out in the court there were just seven men
Standing in the place
Where the army should have been,
King John looked around him,
And nobody spoke,
For the men at arms were marching down to Runnymede Oak.
"Why those sons of dogs!"
Said old King John still speaking old English.
"Every man jack of them got a silver penny from me last month and now they've left me to serve my enemies!"
"I'll make them sorry for it as sure as this is the year twelve hundred fifteen A.D."
Then he rode down to the Thames with iron on his toes;
And his seven men behind him
And looked at his foes.
Swine! He called across the river,
And his voice had a ring.
"You will now disperse and scatter
By order of your King,
By order of your King!"
"Hallow!" Hallow! (echo)
"Hallow!" Hallow!
"Can you hear me?"
We hear you.
"What do you want?"
You'd better come over and find out!"
"I think you heard my proclamation,
Disperse and go to your houses by order of your King,
By my order, I, King John!
For I want you to know the King rules this country
And will continue to rule it;
And it would be better for the leaders of this rabble
If they'd never been born,
For I shall have the teeth out of their jaws,
And the hearts out of their cadavers!"
Ha, ha, ha!
Then a man rode out from the Runnymede ring
And he said:
We don't mind about your being King;
Men can't escape government and similar diseases
But from now on the King won't rule as he pleases
He will rule, your Highness, according to certain laws written down on paper in clear English.
And we have here written down the laws we intend that you shall sign!
King or no King, and You're King for this while,
You shall punish no Free-man without fair trail;
You shall lay no tax, Not in general use;
You shall use no torture on Christians and Jews.
And he held out a copy of "Magna Carta."
(page 13)
"Well, I won't sign your dog-dogged paper!"
In fact, I'll see you in Hades before I sign your dog-dogged paper!
And I'll see ten or a dozen of you in the cellar of Pomfred Castle trying to adjust yourselves to a rack with thumbscrews!"
But your army is on this side of the river, old King John!
"What I sign I can repudiate my Barons and my lords!"
But it happens that the taxes are in our hands now, oh King!
And what's the good of a King without taxes,
Ha-ha-ha-ha!
What's the good of a King without taxes,
A King without taxes!
"And I still won't sign!
I still won't sign!
I still won't sign!"
Very well! said the leader
Pull up your drawbridge
And dwell there still!
But a King without followers withers and dies..
It was you killed Prince Arthur,
It was you put out his eyes.
And he turned away and left King John.
And now the blood mounts up into the King's face as he looks at the Leader's back.
"Proclaim that a man a traitor!"
He cries to his Seneschal
"Proclaim him outlaw, and put on his head a price of five hundred florins!"
And because the Seneschal stands silent and does nothing
The King strikes him with his mailed hist,
So that his cheek is cut and he falls clanging to the ground with his trumpet in his hand...
And after the blow was struck
And the Seneschal had departed,
One of King John's seven Nobles turned his horse's head away from the King
"I swore to stay with you to the end, and now the end has come."
And he rode down the hill.
Then a second man turned to the King:
"You killed my Brother, and I thought I'd forgiven you, but I haven't."
And he rode down.
Then a third man spoke:
"I'm one of your last, because we were boys long ago.
But I have looked on too long at injustice administed by law."
And he turned away.
And one by one each for a different reason they spoke and left the King
Until the last has left him and he stood on his side alone;
And he looked about and saw that his injustice had caught up with him.
"Give me your dog-dogged paper!" ...
(page 14)
(blank)
(page 15)
Delegation of the Congress of the United States
Speaker Carl Albert, Chairman
Senator Mike Mansfield, Vice Chairman
Representative Thomas P. O'Neill, House Majority Leader
Senator Hugh Scott, Senate Republican Leader
Representative John J. Rhodes, House Minority Leader
Representative Thomas E. Morgan
Senator James B. Pearson
Representative Wayne L. Hays
Senator George McGovern
Representative Peter W. Rodino, Jr.
Senator Edward W. Brooke
Representative Elford A. Cederberg
Senator Bob Packwood
Representative Phil M. Landrum
Senator Robert Morgan
Representative Edward J. Derwinski
Representative Jack Edwards
Representative Lee H. Hamilton
Representative M. Caldwell Butler
Representative Lindy Boggs
(page 16)
The Capitol is both the home of the United States Congress
and the best loved and most revered building in America.
The original Capitol was first occupied in 1800;
the Rotunda was completed in 1829;
and the Great Iron Dome and wings of the Capitol
were added during the Civil War period.
Magna Carta will be on display
in the great central hall of the Capitol known as the Rotunda.
More than twenty United States citizens of eminence,
including Presidents from Abraham Lincoln to Lyndon Johnson,
have lain in state in this Rotunda.
The height, from the floor of the Rotunda to the apex of the Brumidi fresco,
"Apotheosis of Washington," in the dome is 180 feet.
(page 17)
(blank)
(page 18)
(blank) -
(page 1)
(script) Magna Carta
(page 2)
(blank)
(page 3)
(script) Magna Carta
PRESENTATION CEREMONY
The Great Rotunda
The Capitol
Ten Thirty o'clock, antemeridian
June Third
Nineteen Hundred Seventy-six
(page 4)
(blank)
(page 5)
(script) Program
WELCOMING REMARKS
Master of Ceremonies, The Honorable Hugh Scott
Republican Leader, United States Senate
INVOCATION
Chaplain of the House, The Reverend Edward G. Latch
THE BALLAD OF MAGNA CARTA
Composed by Kurt Weill
Libretto by Maxwell Anderson
The United States Air Force Symphony Orchestra and the Singing Sergeants (conducted by Colonel Arnald D. Gabriel, Commander and Conductor, the United States Air Force Band)
REMARKS
The Honorable Hugh Scott
PRESENTATION OF MAGNA CARTA
The Lord Chancellor of the House of Lords
The Right Honorable, The Lord Elwyn-Jones
ACCEPTANCE OF MAGNA CARTA
The Speaker of the House of Representatives
The Honorable Carl Albert
BENEDICTION
Chaplain of the Senate,
The Reverend L. R. Elson
VIEWING OF MAGNA CARTA FOLLOWING CEREMONY
(page 6)
(script) Magna Carta
The United Kingdom's foremost Bicentennial gift to the United States of America, the loan of one of four existing copies of the 761-year-old Great Charter of England, symbolizes the right of free men everywhere to call to account arbitrary governments. Granted to the Barons by King John at Runnymede in 1215, Magna Carta foreshadowed the development of such fundamental rights and privileges as freedom of religion, equality before the law and due process.
Subsequently revised and re-issued by a succession of English kings, Magna Carta has come to be regarded by all those who have inherited English legal traditions as their initial constitutional defense.
This historic document was produced more than two and one-half centuries before the New World was discovered. It was drafted at a time when the English and those who were to become Americans were the same people.
Within a week after King John affixed his seal of office to the original document, additional copies were made for distribution to every abbey and large city in the Kingdom. No one knows what became of the original. Four of the official copies sent out soon afterwards, also legitimized by the King's seal, remain in existence.
It is the Wymes copy, normally kept in the British Museum, which will be on display in the Rotunda of the Capitol for one year.
(page 8)
(blank)
(page 9)
THE BALLAD OF MAGNA CARTA
King John of England was an old man in twelve hundred fifteen;
He had reigned long and unjustly
And both the Nobles and the Common People were enraged
And desperate during those last years of his life.
He laid taxes without warrant and without mercy, He punished without trial,
And he loaded favorites with riches and honors.
It was he who invented the practice of pulling a tooth a day to extort money from the wealthy Jews.
It was he who had his nephew Arthur murdered to insure the succession for himself.
He ravaged his own Kingdom with fire and with murder,
From North to South because it rebelled against him.
In the year before his evil life ended,
The Barons and Earls of England met at Runnymede on the Thames
And demanded of King John that certain laws should be kept inviolate in England for the protection of all citizens!
These laws they wrote down for his signature,
And they mean to have your signature
And the paper whereon they are written is called "The Magna Carta."
These laws they wrote down for his signature
And the paper whereon they are written is called
"The Magna Carta."
And here's how it happened:
Deep in his castle sits old King John,
A pasty on the table,
A fire on the stone,
A bull-fiddle in the corner,
A drink on the hob
And a tax collector paying him twenty-six bob;
And his left foot stuck out on a pillow because he had gout among other things
And would rather surrender a province
Thank walk across a courtyard
A bull-fiddle in the corner,
A drink on the hob,
And a tax collector paying him twenty-six bob.
A Seneschal came running
King john
They heard him cry
Take your mind off the money,
Take your fist from the pie,
Take your foot from the pillow,
Find your axe and your shoes,
And put on all the armour a King can use
For the Nobles have gathered again under Runnymede Oak,
And they've drawn up a long paper,
And they mean to have your signature on it before the sun sets tonight on the Thames River
Take your foot from the pillow,
Find your axe and your shoes,
And put on all the armour a King can use!
King John stood up and he roared:
"God's wounds!
I'll cut steaks out of them
And I'll feed them to the hounds!
Rouse up, my officers!
Copyright MCMXL by Chappell & Co. Inc., N.Y.C.
(page 10)
(unintelligible copy of the Magna Carta)
(page 11)
(unintelligible copy of the Magna Carta)
(page 12)
Call out my guards!
Let me see ten thousand men in the castle yard!"
And he picked up a mace
And dragged on a couple of iron boots over his gout.
Swearing horribly in old English.
And kicking all the servants into the corner on his way to the portcullis.
Now out in the court there were just seven men
Standing in the place
Where the army should have been,
King John looked around him,
And nobody spoke,
For the men at arms were marching down to Runnymede Oak.
"Why those sons of dogs!"
Said old King John still speaking old English.
"Every man jack of them got a silver penny from me last month and now they've left me to serve my enemies!"
"I'll make them sorry for it as sure as this is the year twelve hundred fifteen A.D."
Then he rode down to the Thames with iron on his toes;
And his seven men behind him
And looked at his foes.
Swine! He called across the river,
And his voice had a ring.
"You will now disperse and scatter
By order of your King,
By order of your King!"
"Hallow!" Hallow! (echo)
"Hallow!" Hallow!
"Can you hear me?"
We hear you.
"What do you want?"
You'd better come over and find out!"
"I think you heard my proclamation,
Disperse and go to your houses by order of your King,
By my order, I, King John!
For I want you to know the King rules this country
And will continue to rule it;
And it would be better for the leaders of this rabble
If they'd never been born,
For I shall have the teeth out of their jaws,
And the hearts out of their cadavers!"
Ha, ha, ha!
Then a man rode out from the Runnymede ring
And he said:
We don't mind about your being King;
Men can't escape government and similar diseases
But from now on the King won't rule as he pleases
He will rule, your Highness, according to certain laws written down on paper in clear English.
And we have here written down the laws we intend that you shall sign!
King or no King, and You're King for this while,
You shall punish no Free-man without fair trail;
You shall lay no tax, Not in general use;
You shall use no torture on Christians and Jews.
And he held out a copy of "Magna Carta."
(page 13)
"Well, I won't sign your dog-dogged paper!"
In fact, I'll see you in Hades before I sign your dog-dogged paper!
And I'll see ten or a dozen of you in the cellar of Pomfred Castle trying to adjust yourselves to a rack with thumbscrews!"
But your army is on this side of the river, old King John!
"What I sign I can repudiate my Barons and my lords!"
But it happens that the taxes are in our hands now, oh King!
And what's the good of a King without taxes,
Ha-ha-ha-ha!
What's the good of a King without taxes,
A King without taxes!
"And I still won't sign!
I still won't sign!
I still won't sign!"
Very well! said the leader
Pull up your drawbridge
And dwell there still!
But a King without followers withers and dies..
It was you killed Prince Arthur,
It was you put out his eyes.
And he turned away and left King John.
And now the blood mounts up into the King's face as he looks at the Leader's back.
"Proclaim that a man a traitor!"
He cries to his Seneschal
"Proclaim him outlaw, and put on his head a price of five hundred florins!"
And because the Seneschal stands silent and does nothing
The King strikes him with his mailed hist,
So that his cheek is cut and he falls clanging to the ground with his trumpet in his hand...
And after the blow was struck
And the Seneschal had departed,
One of King John's seven Nobles turned his horse's head away from the King
"I swore to stay with you to the end, and now the end has come."
And he rode down the hill.
Then a second man turned to the King:
"You killed my Brother, and I thought I'd forgiven you, but I haven't."
And he rode down.
Then a third man spoke:
"I'm one of your last, because we were boys long ago.
But I have looked on too long at injustice administed by law."
And he turned away.
And one by one each for a different reason they spoke and left the King
Until the last has left him and he stood on his side alone;
And he looked about and saw that his injustice had caught up with him.
"Give me your dog-dogged paper!" ...
(page 14)
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(page 15)
Delegation of the Congress of the United States
Speaker Carl Albert, Chairman
Senator Mike Mansfield, Vice Chairman
Representative Thomas P. O'Neill, House Majority Leader
Senator Hugh Scott, Senate Republican Leader
Representative John J. Rhodes, House Minority Leader
Representative Thomas E. Morgan
Senator James B. Pearson
Representative Wayne L. Hays
Senator George McGovern
Representative Peter W. Rodino, Jr.
Senator Edward W. Brooke
Representative Elford A. Cederberg
Senator Bob Packwood
Representative Phil M. Landrum
Senator Robert Morgan
Representative Edward J. Derwinski
Representative Jack Edwards
Representative Lee H. Hamilton
Representative M. Caldwell Butler
Representative Lindy Boggs
(page 16)
The Capitol is both the home of the United States Congress
and the best loved and most revered building in America.
The original Capitol was first occupied in 1800;
the Rotunda was completed in 1829;
and the Great Iron Dome and wings of the Capitol
were added during the Civil War period.
Magna Carta will be on display
in the great central hall of the Capitol known as the Rotunda.
More than twenty United States citizens of eminence,
including Presidents from Abraham Lincoln to Lyndon Johnson,
have lain in state in this Rotunda.
The height, from the floor of the Rotunda to the apex of the Brumidi fresco,
"Apotheosis of Washington," in the dome is 180 feet.
(page 17)
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(page 18)
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(page 1)
(script) Magna Carta
(page 2)
(blank)
(page 3)
(script) Magna Carta
PRESENTATION CEREMONY
The Great Rotunda
The Capitol
Ten Thirty o'clock, antemeridian
June Third
Nineteen Hundred Seventy-six
(page 4)
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(page 5)
(script) Program
WELCOMING REMARKS
Master of Ceremonies, The Honorable Hugh Scott
Republican Leader, United States Senate
INVOCATION
Chaplain of the House, The Reverend Edward G. Latch
THE BALLAD OF MAGNA CARTA
Composed by Kurt Weill
Libretto by Maxwell Anderson
The United States Air Force Symphony Orchestra and the Singing Sergeants (conducted by Colonel Arnald D. Gabriel, Commander and Conductor, the United States Air Force Band)
REMARKS
The Honorable Hugh Scott
PRESENTATION OF MAGNA CARTA
The Lord Chancellor of the House of Lords
The Right Honorable, The Lord Elwyn-Jones
ACCEPTANCE OF MAGNA CARTA
The Speaker of the House of Representatives
The Honorable Carl Albert
BENEDICTION
Chaplain of the Senate,
The Reverend L. R. Elson
VIEWING OF MAGNA CARTA FOLLOWING CEREMONY
(page 6)
(script) Magna Carta
The United Kingdom's foremost Bicentennial gift to the United States of America, the loan of one of four existing copies of the 761-year-old Great Charter of England, symbolizes the right of free men everywhere to call to account arbitrary governments. Granted to the Barons by King John at Runnymede in 1215, Magna Carta foreshadowed the development of such fundamental rights and privileges as freedom of religion, equality before the law and due process.
Subsequently revised and re-issued by a succession of English kings, Magna Carta has come to be regarded by all those who have inherited English legal traditions as their initial constitutional defense.
This historic document was produced more than two and one-half centuries before the New World was discovered. It was drafted at a time when the English and those who were to become Americans were the same people.
Within a week after King John affixed his seal of office to the original document, additional copies were made for distribution to every abbey and large city in the Kingdom. No one knows what became of the original. Four of the official copies sent out soon afterwards, also legitimized by the King's seal, remain in existence.
It is the Wymes copy, normally kept in the British Museum, which will be on display in the Rotunda of the Capitol for one year.
(page 8)
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(page 9)
THE BALLAD OF MAGNA CARTA
King John of England was an old man in twelve hundred fifteen;
He had reigned long and unjustly
And both the Nobles and the Common People were enraged
And desperate during those last years of his life.
He laid taxes without warrant and without mercy, He punished without trial,
And he loaded favorites with riches and honors.
It was he who invented the practice of pulling a tooth a day to extort money from the wealthy Jews.
It was he who had his nephew Arthur murdered to insure the succession for himself.
He ravaged his own Kingdom with fire and with murder,
From North to South because it rebelled against him.
In the year before his evil life ended,
The Barons and Earls of England met at Runnymede on the Thames
And demanded of King John that certain laws should be kept inviolate in England for the protection of all citizens!
These laws they wrote down for his signature,
And they mean to have your signature
And the paper whereon they are written is called "The Magna Carta."
These laws they wrote down for his signature
And the paper whereon they are written is called
"The Magna Carta."
And here's how it happened:
Deep in his castle sits old King John,
A pasty on the table,
A fire on the stone,
A bull-fiddle in the corner,
A drink on the hob
And a tax collector paying him twenty-six bob;
And his left foot stuck out on a pillow because he had gout among other things
And would rather surrender a province
Thank walk across a courtyard
A bull-fiddle in the corner,
A drink on the hob,
And a tax collector paying him twenty-six bob.
A Seneschal came running
King john
They heard him cry
Take your mind off the money,
Take your fist from the pie,
Take your foot from the pillow,
Find your axe and your shoes,
And put on all the armour a King can use
For the Nobles have gathered again under Runnymede Oak,
And they've drawn up a long paper,
And they mean to have your signature on it before the sun sets tonight on the Thames River
Take your foot from the pillow,
Find your axe and your shoes,
And put on all the armour a King can use!
King John stood up and he roared:
"God's wounds!
I'll cut steaks out of them
And I'll feed them to the hounds!
Rouse up, my officers!
Copyright MCMXL by Chappell & Co. Inc., N.Y.C.
(page 10)
(unintelligible copy of the Magna Carta)
(page 11)
(unintelligible copy of the Magna Carta)
(page 12)
Call out my guards!
Let me see ten thousand men in the castle yard!"
And he picked up a mace
And dragged on a couple of iron boots over his gout.
Swearing horribly in old English.
And kicking all the servants into the corner on his way to the portcullis.
Now out in the court there were just seven men
Standing in the place
Where the army should have been,
King John looked around him,
And nobody spoke,
For the men at arms were marching down to Runnymede Oak.
"Why those sons of dogs!"
Said old King John still speaking old English.
"Every man jack of them got a silver penny from me last month and now they've left me to serve my enemies!"
"I'll make them sorry for it as sure as this is the year twelve hundred fifteen A.D."
Then he rode down to the Thames with iron on his toes;
And his seven men behind him
And looked at his foes.
Swine! He called across the river,
And his voice had a ring.
"You will now disperse and scatter
By order of your King,
By order of your King!"
"Hallow!" Hallow! (echo)
"Hallow!" Hallow!
"Can you hear me?"
We hear you.
"What do you want?"
You'd better come over and find out!"
"I think you heard my proclamation,
Disperse and go to your houses by order of your King,
By my order, I, King John!
For I want you to know the King rules this country
And will continue to rule it;
And it would be better for the leaders of this rabble
If they'd never been born,
For I shall have the teeth out of their jaws,
And the hearts out of their cadavers!"
Ha, ha, ha!
Then a man rode out from the Runnymede ring
And he said:
We don't mind about your being King;
Men can't escape government and similar diseases
But from now on the King won't rule as he pleases
He will rule, your Highness, according to certain laws written down on paper in clear English.
And we have here written down the laws we intend that you shall sign!
King or no King, and You're King for this while,
You shall punish no Free-man without fair trail;
You shall lay no tax, Not in general use;
You shall use no torture on Christians and Jews.
And he held out a copy of "Magna Carta."
(page 13)
"Well, I won't sign your dog-dogged paper!"
In fact, I'll see you in Hades before I sign your dog-dogged paper!
And I'll see ten or a dozen of you in the cellar of Pomfred Castle trying to adjust yourselves to a rack with thumbscrews!"
But your army is on this side of the river, old King John!
"What I sign I can repudiate my Barons and my lords!"
But it happens that the taxes are in our hands now, oh King!
And what's the good of a King without taxes,
Ha-ha-ha-ha!
What's the good of a King without taxes,
A King without taxes!
"And I still won't sign!
I still won't sign!
I still won't sign!"
Very well! said the leader
Pull up your drawbridge
And dwell there still!
But a King without followers withers and dies..
It was you killed Prince Arthur,
It was you put out his eyes.
And he turned away and left King John.
And now the blood mounts up into the King's face as he looks at the Leader's back.
"Proclaim that a man a traitor!"
He cries to his Seneschal
"Proclaim him outlaw, and put on his head a price of five hundred florins!"
And because the Seneschal stands silent and does nothing
The King strikes him with his mailed hist,
So that his cheek is cut and he falls clanging to the ground with his trumpet in his hand...
And after the blow was struck
And the Seneschal had departed,
One of King John's seven Nobles turned his horse's head away from the King
"I swore to stay with you to the end, and now the end has come."
And he rode down the hill.
Then a second man turned to the King:
"You killed my Brother, and I thought I'd forgiven you, but I haven't."
And he rode down.
Then a third man spoke:
"I'm one of your last, because we were boys long ago.
But I have looked on too long at injustice administed by law."
And he turned away.
And one by one each for a different reason they spoke and left the King
Until the last has left him and he stood on his side alone;
And he looked about and saw that his injustice had caught up with him.
"Give me your dog-dogged paper!" ...
(page 14)
(blank)
(page 15)
Delegation of the Congress of the United States
Speaker Carl Albert, Chairman
Senator Mike Mansfield, Vice Chairman
Representative Thomas P. O'Neill, House Majority Leader
Senator Hugh Scott, Senate Republican Leader
Representative John J. Rhodes, House Minority Leader
Representative Thomas E. Morgan
Senator James B. Pearson
Representative Wayne L. Hays
Senator George McGovern
Representative Peter W. Rodino, Jr.
Senator Edward W. Brooke
Representative Elford A. Cederberg
Senator Bob Packwood
Representative Phil M. Landrum
Senator Robert Morgan
Representative Edward J. Derwinski
Representative Jack Edwards
Representative Lee H. Hamilton
Representative M. Caldwell Butler
Representative Lindy Boggs
(page 16)
The Capitol is both the home of the United States Congress
and the best loved and most revered building in America.
The original Capitol was first occupied in 1800;
the Rotunda was completed in 1829;
and the Great Iron Dome and wings of the Capitol
were added during the Civil War period.
Magna Carta will be on display
in the great central hall of the Capitol known as the Rotunda.
More than twenty United States citizens of eminence,
including Presidents from Abraham Lincoln to Lyndon Johnson,
have lain in state in this Rotunda.
The height, from the floor of the Rotunda to the apex of the Brumidi fresco,
"Apotheosis of Washington," in the dome is 180 feet.
(page 17)
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(page 18)
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Position: 2120 (7 views)