The father's authority was held in veneration, and the utmost confidence reposed in guardians of his choice; but we do not find in the statutes any great development of the _patria potestas_. On the contrary, as in other cities, the marked characteristic of the family is their doing everything in common. All affairs of moment are settled by the family council, by an assembly of relations. Both law and custom continue to follow this course. In the family, the party-circle, or _clique_, and the association, the community of interests is sometimes carried to extraordinary lengths. Not only may a father or brother be summoned to pay the debts of a son or brother, but every creditor of a consociation can sue its individual members, and one associate may be made liable even for the crimes of another. Within the circle of the family or association, disputes were settled by arbiters, whose awards had the validity of legal sentences. The trade associations, as we have already stated, had regularly constituted, special tribunals of their own. These incidents and characteristics of statutory law certainly cannot be referred to the Roman legislation, but find their explanation in the very beginnings of Italian history to which Germanic races and institutions undoubtedly contributed in no small degree. The distinctive character of the Commune remains always the same. On the one hand particular associations attain great development; on the other the action of the political power is sometimes too feeble, but at times exercises a pressure such as would seem excessive even at this day. In a society in which the State is so feeble that its very existence seems continually threatened, it is certainly strange to find it interfering so directly and extensively in the private affairs of the citizens. The emancipation of sons is to be effected with due solemnity at a full meeting of the Council of the People, in the presence of the heads of the Republic. Should a noble citizen desire to change his abode and move to another quarter of the city, the matter must be brought before the same Councils of the People and the Commune, and decided by a special Act.[378] We find the chief magistrates of the Florentine commonwealth continually altering the boundaries and extent of the Quartieri or Sestieri of the city, enlarging or contracting now one and now another in order to preserve the balance which is always being threatened by parties and sects, and prevent any one quarter from winning undue predominance. A change of abode from one district of the town to another might drag a citizen into a different sect or party, and so become of political importance. All this shows more and more clearly that society had not yet found its natural and permanent basis. The manifold new and varied elements entering into its composition were being developed on all sides; but the synthetic power which unites and assimilates could never be attained by the Italian Commune. XI.