432 POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS. 



larly in the next century, during disputes as to the regency 

 while Alphonso XL was a minor, the cortes at Burgos 

 demanded that the towns should &quot; contribute nothing beyond 

 what was prescribed in &quot; their charters. Kindred causes 

 wrought kindred results in France; as when, by an insur 

 rectionary league, Louis Hutin was obliged to grant charters 

 to the nobles and burgesses of Picardy and of Normandy, 

 renouncing the right of imposing undue exactions ; and as 

 when, on sundry occasions, the States-general were assembled 

 for the purpose of reconciling the nation to imposts levied 

 to carry on wars. Nor must its familiarity cause us to omit 

 the instance furnished by our own history, when, after pre 

 liminary steps towards that end at St. Alban s and St. 

 Edmund s, nobles and people at Eunnymede effectually 

 restrained the king from various tyrannies, and, among others, 

 from that of imposing taxes, without the consent of his sub 

 jects. 



And now what followed from arrangements which, with 

 modifications due to local conditions, were arrived at in several 

 countries under similar circumstances ? Evidently when the 

 king, hindered from enforcing unauthorized demands, had to 

 obtain supplies by asking his subjects, or the more powerful 

 of them, his motive for summoning them, or their representa 

 tives, became primarily that of getting these supplies. The 

 predominance of this motive for calling together national 

 assemblies, may be inferred from its predominance previously 

 shown in connexion with local assemblies ; as instance a 

 writ of Henry I. concerning shire-moots, in which, professing 

 to restore ancient custom, he says &quot; I will cause those courts 

 to be summoned when I will for my own sovereign necessity, 

 at my pleasure.&quot; To vote money is therefore the primary 

 purpose for which chief men and representatives are as 

 sembled. 



501. From the ability to prescribe conditions under which 

 money will l&amp;gt;e voted, grows the ability, and finally the right, 



