trong central power that could
make itself respected and obeyed. William supplied this power,--
without which there could be no true national strength,--yet at the
same time he was careful to encourage the local system of self-
government. He gave London a liberal charter to protect its rights
and liberties (S107). He began the organization of a royal court of
justice; he checked the rapacious Norman barons in their efforts to
get control of the people's courts.

[1] See SS2, 3 of this Summary.

Furthermore, side by side with the feudal cavalry army, he maintained
the old English county militia of foot soldiers, in which every
freeman was bound to serve. He used this militia, when necessary, to
prevent the barons from getting the upper hand, and so destroying
those liberties which were protected by the Crown as its own best
safeguard against the plots of the nobles.

Next, William had a census, survey, and valuation made of all the
estates in the kingdom outside London which were worth examination.
The result of this great work was recorded in Domesday Book (S120).
By means of that book--still preserved--the King knew what no English
ruler had known before him; that was, the property-holding population
and resources of the kingdom. Thus a solid foundation was laid on
which to establish the feudal revenue and the military power of the
Crown.

Finally, just before his death, the Conqueror completed the
organization of his government. Hitherto the vassals of the great
barons had been bound to them alone. They were sworn to fight for
their masters, even if those masters rose in open rebellion against
the sovereign. William changed all that. At a meeting held at
Salisbury, 1086, he compelled every landholder in England, from the
greatest to the smallest,--sixty thousand, it is said,--to swear to be
"faithful to him against all others" (S121). By that oath he "broke
the neck of the Feudal System" as a form of government, though he
retained and developed the principle of feudal land tenure. Thus at
one stroke he made the Crown the supreme power in England; had he not
done so, the nation would soon have fallen prey to civil war.

7. William's Norman Successors.

William Rufus has a bad name in history, and he fully deserves it.
But he had this merit: he held the Norman barons in check with a stiff
hand, and so, in one way, gave the country comparative peace.

His successor, Henry I, granted, 1100, a Charter