412 The Period of Constitution Making
more than anything else, a court of law. The king sought
counsel and information, but he was not dealing with a
national assembly standing over against him and repre-
senting another interest. When the barons resisted the
king, they did it individually or in groups with force of
arms, they did it as a feudal nobility; they did not fight
out issues in parliamentary manner in an assembly. When
the king acted formally it was through his court; it was
the king in action.
During the thirteenth century, the oneness of king and
court—especially in the form of the great council—was
less marked than before. The union of barons at Runny-
mede and the constant call for united action against
Henry III. could not but be reflected in the temper and
work of the great council, and to us there seems to have
been the beginning, though of course unrecognized at the
time, of some law-declaring authority outside the king.
Something has already been said1 of the curious and
changing " legislation" of the thirteenth century and the
early uses of the word statute, but here, where attention
is more centered upon a developing assembly, it should
be emphasized that some slight distinction was being
made between a routine applying of law and an applica-
tion which had such novelty in it as to imply change.
In the latter case the consent of the barons was more and
more felt to be necessary. When representatives of
counties and boroughs were being added to the great
council an element of confusion was introduced so great
as to do violence to any theory—had a theory really
existed. The king might get information, advice, con-
sent from any element of his people thus brought to the
center, and the ordinance, or whatever one may choose
to call it, based upon this action, was enforcible. But
this constituted no recognition of a right on the part of
these elements to a share in legislation. There was no
ideaolj^slation as a rightjboube^sou^it^orshaxed. In-
deeOegidation as an act of government distinguishable
1 See above, pp. 237-240.