Abstract
In September and October 1645, John Lilburne, the 30-year-old leader of the Leveller movement during the English Civil War, sat in London’s Newgate prison, where he read from England’s Book of Statutes, debated politics with his jailers, and wrote England’s Birthright Justified, a pamphlet that became one of the inaugural texts of Western democracy. Despite its brutal reputation, Newgate—the site of today’s “Old Bailey”—allowed family cohabitation, so Lilburne’s pregnant wife Elizabeth and their young son John were allowed to stay with him as they pleased.1 Even more surprising was that Lilburne secured access to a pen, paper, and an outside publisher.
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