This collection investigates the constitutional evolution and legal frameworks that defined the British state during the tumultuous period of the Puritan Revolution. Samuel Rawson Gardiner, a preeminent nineteenth-century historian of the Stuart era, compiles and annotates the primary legislative and political documents that shaped the transition from absolute monarchy to the Commonwealth. By presenting these texts chronologically, he provides a rigorous foundation for understanding the legal shifts that occurred between 1625 and 1660. The work serves as a documentary record of the ideological conflicts that fundamentally altered the British political landscape.

Historians and legal scholars recognize this volume as a foundational reference for the study of seventeenth-century British constitutional history. Readers frequently note the academic density of the prose and the necessity of the text for serious research into the period.