Geoffrey Robertson’s study of the trial of Charles I both introduces a new national hero in Cooke and puts forward a passionate argument for tyrants to be brought under the law – and not by the George Bushes of the world.

Robertson is a barrister and head of a human rights chambers in London. He has appeared as counsel in many landmark human rights cases in some of the highest courts in the world and he is a UN war crimes judge in Sierra Leone. However, he somehow found the time to research and write the story of John Cooke, who was, according to Robertson, a man before his time, and whose case against the king formed the legal basis for later attempts to bring the likes of Milosevic, Pinochet and Saddam Hussein to justice.

When Charles I was brought to London in 1648, most judges and lawyers fled, fearful of the consequences of putting a king on trial. By fate or circumstance, Cooke, a junior lawyer, took the case, apparently after instruction from God. He successfully argued that Charles should not be above the law. The king was executed and so began England’s ten year republic; the most bizarre and significant decade of her constitutional history.

Regicide had been unlikely before January 1649, but a combination of Charles’s lack of remorse, the fact he was still clinging to his right to appoint bishops and was forging links with the French and Dutch to restore him to power convinced Cooke and the judges that the king was contravening God's will and the concept of civil liberties. The only solution was to behead him.

“Killing the king was the culmination of the huge reforms achieved by parliament during the Civil War, principally the sovereignty of parliament, the independence of the judges, the separation of church and state; all the things we revere today. The king’s trial and execution set the seal on these great reforms.

Robertson rejects critics of the trial, and claims that English historians have never been able to come to terms with regicide.

“There seems to be a mental block among English historians about the event that is one of, if not the most momentous events in history. The shock horror of the execution of the only monarch who ever cared about culture.

“There has been lots of manipulation and cover-up. The right-wing historians tried to dismiss the event as treason and murder. The Whigs, who revived and revered Cromwell in the 19th century, failed to address it, palming off regicide as ‘cruel necessity’. The left-wing historians of this century were not liberal enough to confront it and instead focused on the Levellers.”

It is clear that Robertson has a deep respect for Cooke’s achievements, an affinity with his beliefs and thinks that he deserves not just a biography but a place among the historical elite.

“Cooke wasn’t an unthinking revolutionary. He came from a poor family and shouldn’t have been able to become a lawyer. James I had decreed that the law was only to be accessed by gentlemen. Cooke got into Oxford at 14 through a Wadham scholarship, and it was an incredible achievement that he got through the Inns of Court.

“Unlike so many at the time, Cooke was not an unthinking revolutionary. He wanted the law to work, believing it was the most crucial thing in society other than God. He was before his time in some of the things he believed; the abolition of prison for debt, the fact that poverty was a cause of crime, an early form of legal aid and even a national health service. He was a man of principle and believed in creating a more efficient legal system.”

Robertson’s epilogue to his study is a call for a UN convention against tyranny, so that rulers who violate the liberties of their subjects are brought to justice. He denies that this is merely a pipe dream.

“Our grandchildren will be astounded to hear we let Idi Amin die in his bed and Pol Pot to live happily ever after. There is a growing sense – as Cooke’s brief stated – to end immunity of leaders. Tyrants should not be allowed to live happily ever after. The problem is to answer Charles I’s great question, which Saddam Hussein also asked: ‘By what authority do you try me?’.

“If you’ve got immunity, you’re above the law. We need to work out ways of bringing you beneath the law. It was difficult enough to stop the ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, there were severe doubts about the legality of the invasion of Iraq.

“It’s the greatest problem in Western law. We must develop an international justice mechanism. I see a government like the Taliban, who harbour Bin Laden and shoot homosexuals against a wall and deny girls education and there has to come a point at which you say a regime is so bad that there is an international right to overthrow it. We can’t leave it to the George Bushes of the world to make decisions unilaterally as Iraq shows. There has to be a mechanism for triggering international action so that never again can a tyrant question by what authority he is tried.”

The Tyrannicide Brief is published on October 6th 2005

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