could not abrogate, modify or infringe them. But it was admitted that he might do so by the consent of the States-General. The States could give the king a dispensation from a fundamental law in a given instance; they could even, in agreement with the king, make new fundamental laws. The States of Blois of 1576 and 1588 offer entirely convincing precedents in this respect. It was universally recognized that in the event of the line of Hugh Capet becoming extinct, it would be the function of the States-General to elect a new king.
The States-General of 1614 had been the last. A new convocation had indeed been announced to take place on the majority of Louis XIV., and letters were even issued in view of the elections, but this ended in nothing. Absolute monarchy was becoming definitely established, and was incompatible with the institution of the States-General. Liberal minds, however, in the entourage of the duke of Burgundy, who were preparing a new plan of government in view of his accession to the throne, thought of reviving the institution. It figures in the projects of St Simon and Fenelon, though the latter would have preferred to begin with an assembly of non-elected notables. But though St Simon was high in the favour of the regent Orleans, the States were not summoned at the death of Louis XIV.
In 1789 they were summoned. They were preceded, as Fénelon had wished in former days, by an assembly of notables in 1787, which already displayed great independence. It was the refusal of the parlement of Paris to register the fiscal edicts submitted to the Notables which led to the convocation of the States-General. The Notables, who had sat in 1787, were again summoned in 1788 to inquire into and fix the rules for the elections and the procedure of the States. Necker, in the Mémoire which he submitted to the conseil du roi in December 1788, granted for these States the doublement du tiers, i.e. that the third estate should have a number of deputies equal to that of the deputies of the other two orders combined, this is what had happened previously in the few provincial assemblies created by Necker during his first administration and in those created by an edict of 1787 for all the pays d'élections. But Necker's report, as to the subject of deliberating separately (par ordre) or in common, simply referred to the ancient principles; and he seems also to have proposed to maintain the system of voting by bailliages. Now the doubling of the tiers could yield it no real advantage unless the deliberation was in common and the voting by individuals, and it was this question which from the 6th of May 1789 onwards was the subject of the separate deliberations and negotiations between the three orders. On the 13th of June the third estate had arrived at a resolution to examine and settle in common the powers of the three orders, and invited to this common work those of the clergy and nobles. Certain of the latter and the majority of the clergy joined the tiers, and on the 17th of June it arrived at the celebrated decision by which it affirmed the principle of the national supremacy residing in the mass of the nation; the deputies, without any distinction of order, constituted a national assembly, which assembly was called upon to regenerate France by giving her a constitution, while the royal power (which in reality became provisional) could not negative its decisions. The king tried to resist. In the séance royale of the 23rd of June 1789, where he took the attitude of granting a charte octroyée ( a constitution granted of the royal favour) , he affirmed, subject to the traditional limitations, the right of separate deliberation for the three orders, which constitutionally formed three chambers. We know how this move failed; soon that part of the deputies of the nobles who still stood apart joined the National Assembly at the request of the king. The States-General had ceased to exist, having become the National Constituent Assembly, though it consisted of the deputies elected by the order.
See G. Picot, Histoire des états-généraux (2nd ed., Paris, 1888). (J. P. E.)
The Dutch States-General.—In the Netherlands the convocation of the States-General, consisting of delegates from the provincial estates, dates from about the middle of the 15th century, under the rule of the dukes of Burgundy The name was transferred, after the separation of the northern Netherlands from the Spanish dominions, to the representatives elected by the seven sovereign provincial estates for the general government of the United Provinces. The States-General, in which the voting was by provinces—each province having one vote—was established from 1593 at the Hague. The States-General came to an end after the revolution in 1795) with the convocation of the National Assembly (March 1, 1796), See Holland (History). The title of Staten-Generaal is, however, still borne by the Dutch parliament. (W. A. P.)
STATES OF THE CHURCH, or Papal States (Ital. Stato
delta Chiesa, Stato Pontifico, Stato Romano, Stato Ecclesiastico;
Fr. États de l'Eglise, Pontifical Souverain de Rome, &c. ; Ger.
Kirchenstaat; in ecclesiastical Latin often Patrimonium Sancti
Petri), that portion of central Italy which, previous to the unification of the kingdom, was under the direct government of the
see of Rome. The territory stood in 1859 as in the annexed table.
With the exception of Benevento, surrounded by the Neapolitan province of Principato Ulteriore, and the small state of Pontecorvo, enclosed within the Terra di Lavoro, the States of the Church formed a Compact territory, bounded on the N.W. by the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom, on the N.E. by the Adriatic, on the S.E. by the kingdom of Naples, on the S.W. by the Mediterranean, and on the W. by the grand-duchy of Tuscany and the duchy of Modena. On the Adriatic the coast extended 140 m. from the mouth of the Tronto (Truentus) to the southern mouth of the Po, and on the Tyrrhenian Sea 130 m. from 41° 20′ to 42° 22′ N. lat.
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Comarca of Rome . Bologna Ferrara Forli
Ravenna
Urbino, with Pesaro LVelletri . . â– .
Ancona
Macerata .
Camerino . . .
Fermo
Ascoli Perugia .
Spoleto
Rieti
Viterbo
Orvieto
Civita Vecchia
Frosinone, with Pontecorvo
Benevento ....
Area in
English sq. m.
1752.8
1359.2
1094.0
718.8
701.5
1414.6
571.3
441.8
895.0
320.0
335.7
476.3
1555.5
1175.9
531.7
1158.9
316.6
380.0
739.9
61.3
16,000-8
Population
in 1853.
326,509
375,631
244,524
218,433
175,994
257,751
62,013
176,519
243,104
42,991
110,321
91,916
234,533
135,029
73,683
128,324
29,047
20,701
154,559
23,176
3,124,758
The divisions shown above were adopted on the 21st of December 1827, the legations being ruled by a cardinal and the delegations by a prelate. Previously the several districts formally recognized were Latium, the Marittima (or sea-board) and Campagna, the patrimony of Saint Peter, the duchy of Castro, the Orvietano, the Sabhia, Umbria, the Perugino, the March of Ancona, Romagna, the Bolognese, the Ferrarese, and the duchies of Benevento and of Pontecorvo. The former papal territories are now comprised within the Italian provinces of Bologna, Ferrara, Forli, Ravenna, Pesaro and Urbino, Ancona, Macerata, Ascoli-Piceno, Perugia, Rome and Benevento.
The question of the origin of the territorial jurisdiction of the pope is treated under Papacy. With the moral and ecclesiastical decay of the papacy in the 9th and 10th centuries much of its territorial authority slipped from its grasp; and by the middle of the 11th century its rule was not recognized beyond Rome and the immediate vicinity. By the treaty of Sutri (February 1111) Paschal II. was compelled by the emperor Henry V. to surrender all the possessions and royalties of the Church ; but this treaty was soon afterwards repudiated, and by the will of Matilda, countess of Tuscany, the papal see was enabled to lay claim to new territories
