Lesson Plan: Twenty Shillings and a Toy Hedgehog

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Overview

• Grade Level: AP US History / AP World History / AP European History / Social Studies (grades 9-12)

• Time Required: Bell-ringer (7 min audio), single class (45 min), or extended (2 classes)

• Historical Period: Stuart England, 1629 to 1649 (the Personal Rule of Charles I and the origins of the English Civil War); United States constitutional law, 2025 to 2026

• Modern Connection: The Supreme Court's 6-3 ruling in Learning Resources Inc. v. Trump (February 20, 2026), striking down IEEPA tariffs as an unconstitutional exercise of the taxing power, and Trump's same-day pivot to Section 122 tariffs

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Learning Objectives

Students will be able to:

1. Identify the constitutional principle at stake in both the Ship Money Case (1637) and Learning Resources Inc. v. Trump (2026): that the power to tax belongs to the legislature, not the executive.

1. Compare and contrast the political and legal strategies used by Charles I and President Trump to maintain executive revenue-raising authority after facing legal or political challenges.

1. Evaluate the limits of judicial rulings as mechanisms for enforcing constitutional boundaries, using both cases as evidence.

1. Construct a written or oral argument about whether legislative inaction constitutes tacit consent to executive overreach, drawing on historical and contemporary evidence.

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Before Reading

Anticipation Questions

Pose these questions before students read or listen. Do not provide answers yet. Ask students to write a one-sentence response to each, then share briefly with a partner.

1. If a court rules that a government action is illegal, but the government finds a different legal path to the same outcome within hours, did the court's ruling matter? Why or why not?

1. Who do you think should have the power to set taxes and tariffs in the United States: the president, Congress, or the courts? What does the Constitution say, and does it matter if the answer is inconvenient?

1. Can you think of a time in history when a single person's refusal to comply with a law or policy changed the course of events? What made that refusal significant?

Key Vocabulary

| Term | Definition | |---|---| | Ship money | A medieval English tax originally levied on coastal counties to fund the Navy in wartime; extended by Charles I to inland counties in peacetime without Parliament's consent | | IEEPA (International Emergency Economic Powers Act) | A 1977 U.S. law granting the president broad authority to regulate commerce during a declared national emergency; used by Trump as the legal basis for "Liberation Day" tariffs | | Tariff | A tax imposed by a government on imported goods, typically used to raise revenue or protect domestic industries | | Section 122 (Trade Act of 1974) | A provision allowing the president to impose temporary tariffs of up to 15 percent for up to 150 days to address balance-of-payments deficits, without requiring congressional approval | | The power of the purse | The constitutional authority of a legislature to raise and spend public money; in England, vested in Parliament; in the United States, vested in Congress under Article I | | Prerogative power | Authority claimed by a monarch or executive to act without legislative approval, often justified by emergency or tradition | | Dissent | A formal disagreement by one or more judges with the majority opinion in a court ruling | | Balance-of-payments deficit | A situation in which a country pays more to foreign nations than it receives from them, used here as the legal trigger for Section 122 tariffs |

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During Reading

Guided Questions

Ask students to keep these questions in front of them while reading or listening. They should jot brief notes as they go.

1. What was John Hampden's actual argument? He could afford to pay the tax. Why did he refuse, and what did his refusal accomplish?

1. The story says Charles I's victory in the Ship Money Case was "the most expensive victory an English monarch ever claimed." What does that mean, and what evidence does the story give to support it?

1. What specific legal reasoning did Chief Justice Roberts use to strike down the IEEPA tariffs? What principle did the majority apply?

1. The story argues that in both cases, "the real question was never what the court said. It was what the legislature did next." What does this claim mean, and do you agree with it as you read?

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After Reading

Discussion Questions

Progress through these questions in order, from comprehension to evaluation. Allow 2 to 3 minutes per question in a full-class discussion.

1. Comprehension: What were the two different legal authorities Trump used for tariffs, and why did the Supreme Court's ruling not end the tariff policy?

1. Comprehension: In the Ship Money Case, Charles I won in court but lost politically. In Learning Resources, Trump lost in court but continued the policy. What does this suggest about the relationship between legal rulings and political outcomes?

1. Analysis: The story draws a structural parallel between Charles I and Trump. What are the strongest points of comparison? Where does the parallel break down or mislead?

1. Analysis: The story says the power to tax is "a political question that legislatures must defend continuously." What historical examples support or challenge this claim?

1. Evaluation (genuinely debatable): The Section 122 tariffs expire on July 24 unless Congress votes to extend them. If Congress does nothing, is that a failure of constitutional governance, a legitimate exercise of legislative discretion, or something else entirely? Does legislative inaction have the same meaning as legislative consent?

The Parallel

1. Structural similarity: Both cases involve an executive using emergency or prerogative authority to raise revenue without explicit legislative approval, facing a legal challenge, and then finding an alternative path to the same policy goal. What does this pattern suggest about how executives respond to constitutional limits on taxing power?

1. Key difference: Hampden lost in court; Learning Resources won. The story argues this difference is less important than it appears. Do you find that argument convincing? What would have to be true for a court victory to actually constrain executive behavior?

1. Does the parallel illuminate or mislead? Charles I eventually lost everything: his Parliament, his army, his throne, and his head. The story ends with "Trump's Congress has until July 24." Is it fair to imply a similar trajectory, or does the parallel create a false sense of historical inevitability? What would a historian caution us about when using historical analogies to predict political outcomes?

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Activities

Bell-Ringer (7 minutes)

Activity: "The Principle Behind the Penny"

Play the Time Rhymes audio narration of the story (approximately 5 to 6 minutes). Before pressing play, write this single question on the board:

"Both men were fighting over money. Neither one was really fighting about money. What were they actually fighting about?"

After the audio ends, give students 90 seconds to write a one-sentence answer. Cold-call two or three students. Use their responses to frame the day's lesson or discussion. This works as a standalone bell-ringer or as the opening move in the 45-minute lesson below.

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Single Class (45 minutes)

Structured Lesson: "The Power to Tax Without Permission"

Segment 1: Bell-Ringer and Anticipation Questions (8 minutes) Post the three anticipation questions on the board or screen. Give students 3 minutes to write brief responses independently. Spend 5 minutes in a quick whole-class share. Do not resolve the questions yet. Tell students to keep their initial answers because they will revisit them at the end.

Segment 2: Audio and Guided Reading (12 minutes) Play the Time Rhymes audio narration, or distribute the story text and give students 10 minutes to read silently. Students should annotate for the four guided questions listed above. If time is short, assign the first two guided questions to one half of the class and the last two to the other half, then pair students across groups for a brief share.

Segment 3: Jigsaw Discussion (12 minutes) Divide the class into four groups. Assign each group one of the following roles:

• Group A: The Historian. What does the Ship Money Case tell us about how constitutional crises develop? What warning signs appeared before the English Civil War?

• Group B: The Lawyer. What is the legal logic of the Roberts majority opinion? What does "expressly" mean in constitutional interpretation, and why does it matter?

• Group C: The Economist. What is a tariff, who actually pays it, and why would a small toy company be the plaintiff in a case about $175 billion in trade policy?

• Group D: The Political Scientist. What tools does Congress have to respond to executive overreach on tariffs? Why might Congress choose not to use them?

Each group discusses for 6 minutes, then one spokesperson shares a 60-second summary with the class.

Segment 4: The Parallel (8 minutes) Pose the three "Parallel" questions from the After Reading section above. Focus especially on the third question about whether the analogy misleads. Push students to identify at least one way the parallel is genuinely illuminating and one way it is potentially dangerous as a predictive tool.

Segment 5: Exit Ticket (5 minutes) Students return to their anticipation question responses from Segment 1. Ask them to write two to three sentences answering this prompt:

"What did you think before the story, and what do you think now? What specific evidence from the story changed or confirmed your thinking?"

Collect as a formative assessment.

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Extension Activity

Multi-Day Project: "What Did the Legislature Do Next?"

This project asks students to research what happened after a court ruling or legal challenge to executive power, and to evaluate whether the legislature enforced, ignored, or undermined the constitutional principle at stake.

Option A: Historical Research Paper (individual, 3 to 5 pages) Students choose one of the following cases and write a research paper tracing the legislative response to an executive overreach ruling:

• The Long Parliament's abolition of ship money and prerogative courts (1640 to 1641)

• The War Powers Resolution of 1973 and its enforcement record

• Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co. v. Sawyer (1952) and congressional responses to presidential seizure of private property

• INS v. Chadha (1983) and the fate of the legislative veto

The paper must answer: Did the legislature defend the constitutional principle? What factors determined whether it did or did not?

Option B: Comparative Timeline (pairs or small groups) Students create an annotated comparative timeline placing the Ship Money Case and Learning Resources Inc. v. Trump side by side, with at least six events on each timeline. Each annotation must identify whether the event represents a legislative action, executive action, judicial action, or popular response. The final panel of the timeline must answer: "What happened next, and what does that tell us about constitutional enforcement?"

Option C: Op-Ed or Policy Brief (individual) Students write a 600 to 800 word op-ed or policy brief addressed to a member of Congress, arguing for a specific legislative response to the Section 122 tariffs before the July 24 expiration. The brief must cite at least one historical precedent (the story provides one; students must find at least one more independently) and must acknowledge the strongest counterargument.

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Primary Source Connections

1. The Ship Money Writ (1635), issued by Charles I

1. The Judgment in Rex v. Hampden (1638), excerpts from the opinions of Justice Finch and Justice Hutton

1. The Petition of Right (1628), presented to Charles I by Parliament

1. Article I, Section 8, Clause 1 of the United States Constitution (1787) and the majority opinion in Learning Resources Inc. v. Trump (2026), excerpts

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Standards Alignment

C3 Framework

• Dimension 1 (Developing Questions): This lesson supports the inquiry arc by asking students to generate and refine compelling questions about the relationship between judicial rulings and political outcomes. The central question ("Does a court ruling actually constrain executive power?") is a genuine disciplinary question with no settled answer, requiring students to weigh evidence rather than retrieve a fact.

• Dimension 2 (Applying Concepts): The lesson draws on disciplinary concepts from multiple social studies domains. From history: causation (how a twenty-shilling refusal contributed to civil war), continuity and change over time (the persistence of the legislative taxing power principle across four centuries), and contextualization (placing both cases within their broader constitutional crises). From civics: separation of powers, checks and balances, the major questions doctrine, and the distinction between legal authority and political legitimacy. From economics: the incidence of tariffs (who actually pays them), balance-of-payments concepts, and the difference between revenue tariffs and protective tariffs.

• Dimension 3 (Evaluating Sources): The story itself models source evaluation by distinguishing between what courts said, what executives did, and what legislatures failed to do. The primary source connections above ask students to read royal writs, judicial opinions, parliamentary petitions, and constitutional text, evaluating each for purpose, audience, and perspective. The extension activity requires students to find and evaluate at least one additional historical source independently.

• Dimension 4 (Communicating Conclusions): The exit ticket, the jigsaw spokesperson role, and all three extension activity options require students to construct and communicate evidence-based arguments. The op-ed and policy brief options specifically require students to acknowledge counterarguments, a key element of disciplinary argumentation at the AP level.

AP Alignment

• AP US History: Key Concept 9.3 (Debates about the role of the federal government): The Learning Resources ruling and the Section 122 response directly engage the ongoing debate about executive power, congressional delegation of authority, and the limits of emergency powers in the post-World War II administrative state. This story connects to the broader APUSH theme of American and National Identity as expressed through constitutional conflict.

• AP European History: Key Concept 1.5 (The English Civil War and the development of constitutional monarchy): The Ship Money Case is a foundational event in the long arc from Tudor absolutism to the Glorious Revolution of 1688. This story