Under Charles VII, in 1443, took place the first division of the authority of the Parlement, which, however, had been long preparing. The preceding year, the king had made an expedition into Gascogne and Languedoc; on his retiral he left behind him "that which was worth more than an army," a parlement established in Toulouse with jurisdiction over all of Languedoc and the duchy of Guyenne. Ten years later, the dauphin created in his appanage the Parlement of Grenoble. The double jurisdiction of the Parlement of Paris at this period is thus defined: "First, it sat in judgment on causes spéciales, those of the peers of France and of the royal domain, those of régale (right possessed by the crown to receive the income of a vacant bishopric), and those of individuals who had received by letters of committimus the right to be judged by it; second, it received appeals from all the inferior jurisdictions, the royal, seigneurial, ecclesiastic, and university tribunals. In addition, it deliberated on a multitude of administrative matters, and, under pretext of interpreting the ordinances, rendered decrees which were veritable acts of legislation. The royal ordinances having the validity of laws only when enregistered by the Parlement, it frequently refused this enregistrement, and sometimes thus checked the royal authority. Finally, it frequently exercised the right of making remontrances, not only against the ordinary ordinances, but against treaties with foreign powers, particularly concerning the papal bulls, which led to its exercising a superior superintendence over the entire government of the Church in France. These divers powers gave the Parlement of Paris a very high position in the State, and it will be frequently seen intervening in public affairs."
Under Louis XI, there were parlements at Grenoble, Bordeaux, and Dijon; greater freedom of appeal from the decisions of the seigneurial tribunals to the court of the king, and the magistrates were relieved from the fear of removal from office. We have already seen instances of the affability of this monarch toward the bourgeoisie of Paris, and his not unsuccessful attempts to identify himself with them; the tangible benefits which he bestowed upon them were quite sufficient to win their gratitude. Their offices were rendered immovable, they were exempted from all taxation, their assemblies were authorized, the free election of their magistrates, their city was carefully fortified, they were armed to the number of sixty or eighty thousand men; he permitted them to acquire, by purchase, the right which the nobles had to command the guet, and to the noblesse was given the exercise of certain municipal offices.
The États Généraux of 1484, during the minority of Charles VIII, are considered to have been the first of the truly representative national assemblies, even the peasants in the most distant communes being represented. The number of problems presented by the exigencies of the government was formidable; during the royal session, Jean de Rely, canon and deputy of Paris, addressed the monarch in an eloquent discourse, half Latin and half French, bristling with texts and citations, then he commenced to read the list of grievances demanding redress; he read bravely for three hours, when it was perceived that the young king was sound asleep, and the sitting was adjourned for two days. Neither François I nor his son Henri II had any desire to appear before the assembled representatives of the nation; the former replaced the États Généraux by a mixed assembly of notables and deputies of Bourgogne in 1526, and in the following year by an assembly of notables at Paris, which sanctioned his violation of the treaty of Madrid, and granted him two millions of golden écus for the ransom of his sons, left as hostages behind him, but it took no part in the affairs of State. The Parlement was not treated with any more consideration; a royal edict of 1523 divested the jurisdiction of the prévôt and of the Châtelet of Paris of all causes and matters of which it took cognizance in its quality as conservator of the privileges of the University, and for the judgment of these causes established a new bailiwick, of which the seat was to be the Hôtel de Nesle, where there were appointed a bailiff, a lieutenant, an avocat, a procureur du roi, twelve counsellors, an audiencer [usher, or crier], a sous-audiencer, and twelve sergents. The Parlement was much displeased at this diminution of its authority, and on the 9th of March a formidable protest against the new edict was made before it by the prévôt of Paris, his lieutenants, civil and criminal, the counsellors of the Châtelet, and all the other officers, sergents, greffiers, huissiers, and officials of the University. When the king heard of this demonstration, he sent to the Parlement the Sieur de la Barre, gentleman of his chamber, to inform that body, once for all, that when he granted letters patent it was understood that they were to be enregistered, no matter what protests might be made against them. The Parlement replied by appointing a commission to inquire concerning the necessity of establishing a new bailiwick, and sent word to the monarch that the members would inform themselves on the subject; on the 17th, the Comte Saint-Paul appeared before them with an order directing the immediate registering of the edict, and with the information that he would assist at their deliberations in order to be able to inform his royal master concerning those of them who permitted themselves to differ from him in opinion. The decree was accordingly enregistered, and on the 30th of April the Chevalier Jean de la Barre presented himself before the Parlement with the title and quality of Bailli de Paris. This office, however, was suppressed in May, 1526, and its jurisdiction reunited to that of the prévôt and of the Châtelet. In 1527, the Parlement was forbidden to interfere in any matters of State, or in anything excepting what concerned the administration of justice; it was permitted only to give advice regarding the perfecting of the laws. The two most important legal monuments of this reign were the edict of Crémieu, 1536, restricting the jurisdiction of the seigneurs, and that of Villers-Cotterets, 1539, designed to put an end to the encroachments of the tribunals of the bishops upon those of the king, and restricting their competence to spiritual or ecclesiastical causes only. Of the principal offices of the crown, four were held by men of legal lore, hommes de robe longue,—that of grand chancellor, who held the royal seal and without whose advice nothing important could be decided; that of the secretaries of State; that of the presidents, counsellors, avocats, and all those to whom the administration of civil and criminal justice was confided throughout the realm, and that of the treasurers, precepteurs and receivers who administered the royal revenues. The superior officers of justice and finance enjoyed privileges of nobility which, while still confining them to their rank in society, exempted them from various imposts and charges.
Henri II was obliged, after the loss of the battle of Saint-Quentin, in August, 1557, to convene an assembly of notables, in which the members of the Parlement sat apart, like a fourth order in the State, below the nobles but above the tiers état. There were still survivals of the feudal epoch in the administration,—the Connétable was invested with authority over the army and the Grand Admiral over the fleet, but the era of ministries was beginning. "The clercs du secret, become sécretaires d'État (in 1547), had in charge the correspondence of the king on all public affairs. An ordinance of Henri II, in 1547, fixed their number at four, each of them corresponding with a quarter of the provinces of the kingdom and a quarter of the foreign countries. The special attributions are of a later date; thus, all the affairs of the maison du roi and, later, of ecclesiastical affairs, were assigned to one of them. The other three were: in 1619 and in 1636, war; in 1626, foreign affairs; under Louis XIV, the marine; which did not prevent them from apportioning France geographically among themselves for those affairs which remained common to them all. The Chancelier was chief of the department of justice, and the Surintendant, of that of finances. The police, that great arm of monarchical times, was commencing."
The Parlement of Paris, however, cannot, by any means, be presented always as maintaining a more or less courageous stand for justice and right. In the massacre of the Saint Bartholomew, for example, it was a zealous coadjutor. The officers of the municipalité had prepared for this great measure, the prévôt of the merchants, summoned to the Louvre, received from Charles IX orders to close all the gates of the city and to have in readiness the captains, lieutenants, and bourgeois in whom he had confidence. He promised "to put so many hands at the mischief that it should be remembered." Rewards