[4] Lilburne also wrote a 1646 book called The Legal Fundamental Liberties of the People of England, asserted, revived and vindicated.
[5] Also in 1646, the General Court of Massachusetts referred to the Fundamental Laws of England in regard to Magna Carta, while defending their representative and legislative autonomy in their address to the Long Parliament.
[6] In his 1670 trial, William Penn called upon the phrase many times, including "However, this I leave upon your Consciences, who are of the Jury (and my sole Judges) that if these Ancient Fundamental Laws, which relate to Liberty and Property, and (are not limited to particular Persuasions in Matters of Religion) must not be indispensably maintained and observed, Who can say he hath Right to the Coat upon his Back?
Locke's view in Two Treatises of Government[verification needed] (1690) was "that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions".
He raised as a hypothetical consideration the question of whether such fundamental laws could be judged by an English or Scottish court in the same manner as other countries consider constitutional cases.
The classic rebuttal or at least qualification is expressed by Albert Venn Dicey, whose 1885 text Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution argues that the will of the electorate must ultimately prevail over any attempt at tyranny: it is "a political, not a legal fact" that fundamental principles of natural justice cannot be denied.
This implies that in most scenarios principles of the Fundamental Laws can be upheld by statutory interpretation or as an alternative since 1998 by issuing a Declaration of incompatibility.