PARLIAMENT (OF., Fr. dis course, conference. legislature. from park r. to speaks. The name of the legislative assembly of Great Britain and Ireland. The legislative assemblies of and of In land previous to the union with England (171) ) and (:real Brit ain (1801) respectively bore the name of Par• Hameln. This is also the designation of the latures of the 'Dominion of Canada and of the ('oninnumealth of Australia. The Parlements) which exited in Frame before the Ilevolutimi of 17 S'.1 were not legislative, but judicial bodies. The word was first used by Matthew Paris in 1241;, hut only gradna11 replaced the terms by which the councils the English King had previously limn known. Moreover. even when so called, Parliament 11:1(1 not at first the privileges and functions which to-day. Alodern Parliament has de veloped by slow and painful degrees from the Witenagemot of times. This his was composed of princes. ealdormen. and a number royal nominees. It 11114 yearly, had the power of electing and de posing gave counsel and assent in all matters of legislation. and was the supreme court of justice for the kingdom. It was in no sense a representative and legislative body, but. the name indicates, a council of witan or wise men, assembled to advise the King. After the Norman Conquest the Witenagemot gradually lost its old sigulleance together with its 11:1111e. ‘‘ ;14 merged in the (heat Council. an as,embly to \Odell in theory every tenant-in-chief of the Kime belom.ed. This was generally attended only by royal officials. the great prelates. earls. and those barons who were individually SUM moned. The powers of the body were three: it held a somewhat loose eontrol over taxes. it gave eonsent to laws proposed by the King. and it acted as a court of justice. The first function beeame of some importance by the end of the twelfth century. when the idea that taxation and representation hand in hand first germinated; the second was exercised to good purpose in great crises like the conflict between Henry II. and Thomas ft Becket; but the third developed earliest and gave the Council its peculiar char acter.
With the granting of the Great Charter on June 15, 1215, by King John, the national as sembly entered upon its chief period of transi tion. (Stv _Matix.‘ The commons,
especially the citizens of London. had given hn portant aid to the barons in their struggle, and the latter obtained certain privileges, personal and commercial. for them. More important was the fact that for the first time the nobles and CO/11111011s were thus lathed against the Crown. The Great Charter provided that scntage, a form of feudal taxation hitherto exacted at the pleasure of the King. should no longer be levied without the consent of the Great Council, which was to be summoned forty days before the ap pointed date for• meeting. so that all might have time to attend. The document took no notice of the representative principle, however, and the minor barons subsequently regarded themselves as exempt from attendance at the Great Council because they were no longer entitled to summons by special writ. But, curiously enough, John had already recognized the principle of representation in 1213 when lie summoned to the Council of Saint Albans the reeve and four men from each vill on the royal demesne. This is the first oc casion where all three estates, nobles, clergy, and commons, sat together. Recognition had thus been gained for• the ideas of representation. elec tion, and concentration in a central assembly, but until 1254 the experiment seemed abortive. In that year Queen Eleanor and Earl Richard of Cornwall, regents during the absence of Henry 111. in Gascony, called a council to meet at West nminste•r. at which were present two knights chosen from each shire. This element was to be of great importance in the development of Par liament, since the knights of the shire hence forth furnished leaders for the commons, and. many of them being nearly related to the nobles, they enabled the two estates to unite in opposi tion to the Crown. This was a most important effect of the rule of primogeniture which. con trary to the custom on the Continent, was in strict force in England. The younger sons of the nobility were usually country gentlemen and thus served as a connecting link between the nobles and the commons.