ESTATES OF THE REALM. The proper meaning of this phrase, as applied to the English constitution, has been the subject of some dispute. Of its original meaning there can be no doubt. It indicated a division of society into classes or orders, and in England these orders were the nobles, the clergy, and the commons. The same kind of division is found in Continental states. In England there are, as Professor Stubbs has pointed out (Constitutional History of England, vol. ii. p. 189), indications of a tendency on the part of other orders of men to assume the character of estates. For example, the king used to treat with the merchants for grants of money to be raised by taxation from the general body of merchants throughout the country. In this sense the lawyers may be said to have been at one time an incipient estate of the realm. The organization of Parliament checked all such tendencies, and the technical “three estates” were those we have mentioned. In the lapse of time the original meaning of the phrase has been gradually lost sight of. The clergy have ceased to be a separate order so far as the political organization of the country is concerned. The “three estates” came to be identified with the three great divisions of the legislative authority,—kings, lords, and commons. The phrase seems to have beeu used in this sense in the reign of Henry IV., and Hallam says it was a current doctrine among the popular lawyers of the 17th century. According to another view, the three estates of the realm were “the lords spiritual, the lords temporal, and the commons.” (See p. 314 of the present volume.)