Definition
In historical legal usage, *constitucion* (also rendered *constitutio* or *constitución* in various sources) refers to the formal appointment or authorization of an attorney to act on behalf of another. In this sense, it is a term of the old law — specifically Law French — denoting the act by which a principal designates a representative to appear or act in legal proceedings. The term carries no modern doctrinal weight in Anglo-American law but is encountered in medieval and early modern legal texts describing the creation of an agency relationship in a formal, court-connected context.
This usage is distinct from the modern constitutional sense of the word (a founding document of government), though both share the same Latin root: *constituere*, meaning to set up, establish, or appoint.
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Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): "Constitution" in ordinary English refers most commonly to the fundamental law or governing charter of a nation, state, or organization — the document that establishes structure, powers, and rights.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): Webster's gives the primary meaning as "the act or process of constituting" and also "the fundamental, organic law or principles of government of men, embodied in written documents." The political/governmental sense was already dominant by 1913.
The gap here is significant. A researcher encountering *constitucion* in a historical legal source — particularly a Britt. or Bracton-era text — should not interpret the term through its modern governmental meaning. In these sources, *constitucion* is a term of private law, referring to the appointment of a personal legal representative, not a public charter of governance.
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Common Confusion
*Constitucion* is easily misread as a reference to constitutional law or a governing document when encountered in medieval legal sources. It is not. In the Law French and Latin legal tradition from which Burrill draws, the word functions as an agency term: the act of constituting (i.e., creating, appointing) an attorney. Researchers should also be careful not to conflate this term with *constitutio principis* — the Roman law term for an imperial decree or edict — which appears in civil law and canon law sources and carries an entirely different meaning.
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Why It Matters in Research
This term presents a genuine trap for researchers working in early English legal sources. Its surface resemblance to "constitution" in the governmental sense can cause misreadings of texts from Britton, Bracton-era materials, and other pre-modern common law sources.
**Corpus navigation notes:**
- When you encounter *constitucion* in Law French texts, you are almost certainly in an agency or representation context, not a governmental or public law context. The surrounding text will typically concern court appearances, pleading, or the formal creation of a representative relationship.
- Burrill's citation to Britt. c. 126 points to *Britton*, the late 13th-century Anglo-Norman legal treatise written in Law French — a core source in the Law Mind corpus for early common law procedure. That chapter deals with the appointment of attorneys for court proceedings.
- The term reflects a period when the concept of "attorney" was itself in early formation. The formal act of *constitucion* was a necessary legal step because a party could not simply send a representative to court without a recognized appointment.
- Researchers tracing the history of agency, power of attorney, or attorney-client concepts in the common law should treat *constitucion* as an early data point in that lineage, preceding modern concepts of authorization by several centuries.
- The term does not appear with frequency in post-medieval sources; by the time of early modern common law dictionaries, the agency meaning had migrated into English-language terms like "warrant of attorney" or "letter of attorney."
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Historical Dictionary Support
Burrill's is the primary source here, and its entry is terse but precise: "the constitution or appointment of an attorney," with a citation to Britton. This is consistent with the Law French procedural vocabulary of the 13th and 14th centuries, in which the formal appointment of a court representative required explicit authorization — what we might today call a grant of authority.
Historical dictionaries do not extensively develop this term, reflecting its relatively narrow procedural function. What Burrill captures is the technical sense used in practice texts and plea rolls. Broader legal dictionaries of the 18th and 19th centuries (Bouvier, Black) do not carry the term prominently, suggesting it had largely dropped from active use by then, surviving mainly as a historical reference. Researchers should not expect cross-dictionary consensus on this term beyond its core procedural meaning.
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Jurisdictional Note
This is a term of historical Anglo-Norman and common law origin with no modern jurisdictional application in the United States, England, or elsewhere. It is relevant only in the context of interpreting historical sources.
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Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Law Mind Encyclopedia — Agency and Representation (historical origins of attorney authorization)
Law Mind Encyclopedia — Constitutional Law (for the distinct modern meaning of "constitution" as governing document)
Law Mind Encyclopedia — Early Common Law Procedure (Britton, Bracton, and the Law French tradition)
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