38 Jeanette Needham. 
the verification of credentials. The decree in full follows: 
‘““The members of the clergy, assembled in the hall allotted to 
their order, for the purpose of renewing their sessions in con- 
formity with the will of the king, the first discourse and first 
declaration of His Majesty concerning the present session of 
the estates-general having been read, and in consequence of 
articles I and II of the aforesaid declaration, have agreed to 
recognize as valid all credentials already provisionally verified, 
of members absent as well as present, upon the rights of whom 
to represent their constituents, no contest has arisen. Conse- 
quently, they have declared that they constitute themselves 
from this time on, the active assembly of the order of the clergy 
to the estates-general. The said assembly has decreed in 
regard to the communication of credentials among the orders 
and the judgment upon contested credentials, to conform to 
articles II and X of the said declaration.’”4 
Thus, they expressed an unqualified acceptance of the king’s 
policy upon the verification of credentials, because it harmonized 
so closely with the proposition which the minority adopted on 
June 19. One clause of that same proposition provided for their 
immediate organization as the chamber of the clergy.’ Since 
article I of the first declaration of the king formally approved 
the idea of separate orders, it was only natural that the clergy 
should act at once upon both its own decree and that of the 
king, by declaring themselves the legitimate chamber of the 
order. Jallet asserts that they justified their course on the 
ground that they occupied the hall of their order.® 
Certain members of the order took some exception to the 
4Barmond, Récit, 269; Coster, Récit, 340. The latter says merely: “La 
chambre s’est constituée ordre du clergé et a déclaré qu’elle exécuterait la 
déclaration du roi publiée dans la séance royale.’’ Procés-verbal . . . de la 
noblesse, 268. The latter gives the text of the decree when it was communi- 
cated to the nobility. The texts in it and in the Récit are identical except in 
one instance. In the last sentence, the latter refers to articles XI and XII 
of the king’s first declaration while the former gives articles II and X. The 
Récit is wrong, as shown by comparison with the first declaration of the king. 
’ Thibault, 237; Grégoire in Etats-généraux, Extrait du journal de Paris, 
I, 90. : 
6 Jallet, 102. 
152 
