Thailand Law Journal 2011 Fall Issue 2 Volume 14

The Annals by King Udumborn told a story about royal pardons. In the reign of King Ekadasna, the last reign of the Ayudhya era, the recently enthroned king ordered that subjects be exempt from taxes and that all prisoners in all four prisons in the city be released.⁴²

Conclusively, the royal pardoning power during the Ayudhya era hinged on the combination of three concepts--Deva Raja, the Lord of Life, and Dhamma Raja. The king could exercise his pardoning power at his pleasure. He could do so either rigidly or leniently. From the historical records, we know that the king seemed more likely to treat his pardoning power in the rigid ways of Deva Raja and of the Lord of Life than in the lenient way of Dhamma R.aja, so receiving a pardon was difficult. To receive one, a criminal needed someone who both was the king's favorite and would ask for a pardon on behalf of the criminal. In addition, kings granted pardons not only for individual criminal regarding their personal guilt but also for groups of criminals regarding their general guilt, and these mass pardons would occur on auspicious occasion such as a coronation.

4. Concepts of Royal Pardons in the Dhonburi Era

After a Burmese army invaded Ayudhya in 1762, Burmese soldiers destroyed the city almost entirely. King Taksin the Great, a former nobleman of Ayudhya, led the effort to regroup the people, to restore the country, and to liberate it from Burma. The king spent two years successfully suppressing chaos created by many breakaway cliques all around the country until he could establish the new capital, named Dhonburi, on the west bank of the Chao Phraya River. During the reign, conflict and battle engrossed the king's life. He had to exercise his absolute powers rigidly in order to establish for himself a meritorious reputation in his soldiers' eyes. Although a criminal was his favorite soldier, the king did not exempt him from execution. The king's biography tells the story:

In 1769, King Taksin learned that his army that had just conquered Chiang Mai City would return to Dhonburi. He thus came down from the inner palace to the royal float-house on the Chao Phraya River, commanding that all soldiers must immediately join in the battle raging in Rajburi City. Nobody should stop by his own house in Dhonburi. If anyone disobeyed this command, he would be beheaded. There was a commander-in-chief named Phra Debyodha who stopped by his own house to visit his family. The king thus called Phra Debyodhya to his presence and beheaded this commander himself. The king also commanded that Phra Debyodha's head be placed atop a pole, stuck in the ground next to the city gate to condemn this disobedience publicly.⁴³

However, when there was no war, the king was kind to his servants and his other subjects, in accordance with Dhamma Raja. He discontinued the old Ayudhya tradition that people must not see the king and must escape the king's presence. King Taksin loved to mingle with his subjects, having conversations with them. Consider this passage from the Dhonburi Annals: "The king commanded his chamberlain to bring people in markets to have an audience with him, so that he could predict how the life of each would be in the future."⁴⁴

In some respects, King Taksin governed his realm as had the Sukhothai kings. The king acted as though he were the father of all subjects, as exemplified by the speech that he gave to his soldiers in the battle of Bang Nang Kaew:

Alas my children! You went into battle without me and you could not win the war. I am so surely disgraced. Actually, the reason I waged the war rested not on my own happiness but on my desire to sustain Buddhism and to make everyone happy in our realm, free from troubles brought about by wicked enemies. I love all my children equally. I acknowledge that you cannot defeat Burma -- our foe-- this time; but I do not want to punish you. I have fed you all until you grew into the strong adults that you are now. I will forgive you, and you must do well for our country more and more.⁴⁵

Because of the unique social structure and the unique nature of each city, Ayudhya had to forsake the father-and-children concept. However, this above royal speech reflects the return of the father-and-children concept to the Dhonburi era. And the speech is proof that the royal pardoning power during the Dhonburi era combined the concepts of Deva Raja, the Lord of Life, and Dhamma Raja with the concept of a father's bestowal of kindness upon his children.

Although there were many wars and much chaos during this era, the king granted general pardons many times on auspicious occasions. When the queen delivered a royal son, the Annals by Princess Narindradevi tell us that "Queen Hor Khlang delivered a royal son. There was an earthquake. In the year of the Ox, the king released all prisoners to celebrate the royal son's birth."⁴⁶

During the late period of the reign, there was a rebel led by a nobleman-- Phya San. The king ordered the arrest of Phya San's wives and children. However, when the king learned that the culprits of the rebellion were not particularly strong and that all Phya San's wives and children were scared, the king came to the prison himself and released all the women who had just been arrested. This rebellion triggered a great riot during the king's reign, and the king's was neither as decisive nor as stable as he had been prior to the rebellion. Finally, the Dhonburi era came to the end.⁴⁷