On the origins of the Netherlands’ States General

Abstract

ABSTRACT The States General of the Netherlands took the lead in the revolt against the King of Spain, Philip II, in the sixteenth century and it ruled as a sovereign assembly until the end of the eighteenth century. It emerged relatively late, as compared to the French model dating from 1302. It is questionable if there was such a thing as a first meeting in the Netherlands. Current scholarship agrees on the meetings in January to March 1464 in Bruges, Ghent and Lille, summoned by Duke Philip with a very different purpose than the one which came to dominate the discussions. While it is generally assumed that the initiative came from the Duke, after his son had tried to usurp it, this article argues for more gradual processes. First, the meetings of 1464 and 1465 were successful thanks to decades of intense joint meetings between four and six of the core principalities concerning primarily economic purposes. Second, their cohesion facilitated their crucial role during successive dynastic crises from 1477 to 1492, when fundamental principles of constitutional representation were formulated. These would enable the States General to organize the war of liberation from Spanish oppression.