Charters, Edicts and Declarations of Rights and Conscience

The Great Law of Peace was carried as an oral constitution of some 117 articles, kept by wampum belts, giving each member nation a defined role in a shared confederate council. It opens the path as a governing agreement that was spoken and remembered before it was ever written down.

Issued on 8 September 1264 by Boleslaw the Pious, the Statute of Kalisz put Polish Jews under the duke's direct jurisdiction, gave Jewish courts authority over disputes among Jews and guaranteed freedom of movement and trade. Later rulers confirmed it, including Casimir the Great in 1334.

The Declaration of Arbroath is a letter of 6 April 1320 from the barons and community of Scotland to Pope John XXII. It argues that the Scots fight for freedom alone and that the community would choose another king if Robert the Bruce ever submitted to England.

Written in 1517 by Martin Luther, then a professor at the University of Wittenberg, the Ninety-five Theses were propositions for academic debate attacking the sale of indulgences. Printed in Basel, Leipzig and Nuremberg, they spread quickly and are regarded as the spark of the Protestant Reformation.

Signed on 25 September 1555 between Charles V and the Schmalkaldic League, the Peace of Augsburg let each ruler in the Holy Roman Empire choose Lutheranism or Roman Catholicism for his state. Calvinism was not recognized until the later Peace of Westphalia.

Henry IV of France signed the Edict of Nantes in April 1598. It kept Catholicism as the established religion but granted the Huguenots substantial rights and a measure of religious tolerance after their long struggle.

Enacted on 13 July 1787, the Northwest Ordinance set the process for admitting new states on equal footing with the original thirteen. It protected basic civil liberties, supported public education and prohibited slavery in the territory.

Signed in 1848 by 68 women and 32 men at the Seneca Falls convention, the Declaration of Sentiments was principally written by Elizabeth Cady Stanton. She modeled it on the United States Declaration of Independence.

Published in London in February 1848 and written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels for the Communist League, the Manifesto argues that class struggle drives history. It was first issued anonymously in German and closes with the call that workers of the world should unite.