The States of Friesland were the sovereign body that governed the province of Friesland under the Dutch Republic. They were formed in 1580 after the former Lordship of Frisia (a part of the Habsburg Netherlands) acceded to the Union of Utrecht and became one of the Seven United Netherlands. The Frisian stadtholder was their "First Servant" (mostly in military matters, as he had few other powers before 1748, when the Government Regulations for Friesland were promulgated by then-stadtholder William IV, Prince of Orange). The board of Gedeputeerde Staten (Delegated States) was the executive of the province when the States were not in session (which was most of the time). The States of Friesland were abolished after the Batavian Revolution of 1795 when the Batavian Republic was founded. They were resurrected in name (but not in substance) in the form of the Provincial States of Friesland under the Constitution of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
Background
After the Lordship of Frisia (formerly enjoying Imperial immediacy in the Holy Roman Empire, but given as a fief to the father of George, Duke of Saxony in 1498 by Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, then still King of the Romans, and sold by duk George to Charles V in 1515), became part of the Habsburg Netherlands, its government followed the general Habsburg model of a stadtholder with a Council (in this case the Court of Friesland). But as in other provinces of the Netherlands a States was periodically convened to send representatives to the States General of the Netherlands to deliberate about the granting of extraordinary subsidies to the central government (called Beden), and as in other provinces the three Estates: Clergy, Nobility, and Third Estate were represented in that body. In Friesland the Third Estate was formed by representatives of the three Goas that made up Friesland: Westergo, Oostergo, and Zevenwouden. These representatives were elected by eigenerfden (comparable to freeholders) who possessed a hornleger (a farmhouse and yard), with a parcel of land attached that was taxed for the verponding or floreen (a land tax that was comparable to the French Taille). The "electoral districts" were formed by the 30 Grietenijen into which Friesland was subdivided. Originally the citizens of the eleven cities were mixed in with the peasants and nobles in the grietenijen, but just before the accession of Friesland to the Union of Utrecht in 1580, they were allowed to form a separate fourth "quarter", apart from the three Goas just mentioned, by then-stadtholder George de Lalaing, Count of Rennenberg, and have their own representation in the States. After the revolutionary period of the accession to the Union in 1579-1580 the Clergy and Nobility no longer participated in the States, at least as separate Estates.
The Gedeputeerde Staten (Delegated States) also predated the Dutch Republic. Already in the 1530s they were formed by the States as a counterweight against the Court of Friesland (then still mainly a kind of Privy council for the stadtholder, and secondarily the court of highest instance in the Lordship). During the first years of the Dutch Revolt they achieved a permanent existence when Rennenberg in 1577 formally recognized them after the Pacification of Ghent. Initially they consisted of two members for each of the "quarters" of Friesland, but in 1584 the quarter of the cites was given three representatives, bringing the total number of members to nine. They formed the true "Executive" on a daily basis and were directly responsible to the States.
Organisation and Powers
The States of Friesland were the assembly of the thirty grietenijen and eleven cities of Friesland in which each had one vote. (In comparison, the States of Holland and West Friesland were made up of eighteen cities and the ridderschap (College of Nobles) of the County of Holland, each having one vote). Other than most other provinces, Friesland did not have a Ridderschap as part of its States, and the Clergy was also no longer represented as such (though individual nobles and clergymen could of course be delegates). Every grietenij and every city was allowed to send two delegates to the annual session of the States, that was known as the Landdag (Landtag or Diet (assembly)). The grietenijen elected such delegates, called Volmachten (which literally means Proxy) in elections in which owners of a taxable parcel of land of a certain minimum size, with a farmhouse on it (so-called eigenerfden), could take part. The minimum size varied over the course of time. In the Government Regulations adopted in 1748 the minimum size was put at five pondematen of clay soil, or ten pondematen of woodland.