In brief, then, Henry’s policy was twofold: to convert the County Courts practically into Royal Courts, since in them royal officials now dispensed royal justice according to the same rules as prevailed at the King’s own _Curia_; and to reduce all manorial or private courts to insignificance by diverting pleas to his own _Curia_, and leaving the rival tribunals to die gradually from inanition. Both branches of this policy met ultimately with complete success, although the event hung in the balance until long after his death. The barons, though partially deceived by the gradual and insidious nature of Henry’s reforms, did what they could to thwart him; but the current of events was against them and with the Crown. Royal justice steadily encroached upon feudal justice. One of the last stands made by the barons has left its traces plainly written in several chapters of Magna Carta.[151] ----- Footnote 151: _E.g._ 34 and 39. ----- These contain what seem, at first sight, to be merely trivial alterations of technical points of court procedure; but inextricably bound up with them are principles of wide political and constitutional importance. Henry’s policy was to disguise radical reforms until they looked like small changes of procedure; it follows that the framers of Magna Carta, while appearing merely to seek the reversal of these trivial points, were really seeking to return to the totally different conditions which had prevailed prior to the reforms of Henry. A short account of the main outlines of that monarch’s new system of procedure forms a necessary preliminary to a complete comprehension of these important chapters of Magna Carta. Such an account falls naturally into two divisions. (1) _Criminal Justice._ (_a_) By his Assizes of Clarendon and Northampton Henry strictly reserved all important crimes for the exclusive consideration of his own judges either on circuit or at his court; and he demanded entry for these judges into franchises, however powerful, for that purpose. In this part of his policy, the King was completely successful; heinous crimes were, in the beginning of the thirteenth century, admitted on all hands to be “pleas of the Crown” (that is, cases exclusively reserved for the royal jurisdiction); and Magna Carta made no attempt to reverse this part of the Crown’s policy. The change was accepted as inevitable. All that was attempted in 1215 was to obtain a promise that these functions, now surrendered to the Crown forever, should be discharged by the Crown’s officials in a proper manner.[152] ----- Footnote 152: See _infra_, under chapters 24 and 45. -----