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The counsel for Bate in the former case and for Hampden in the latter case may not have apprehended the philosophical theory of the separation of governmental powers elaborated by Montesquieu in the next century, and they may not have contended that taxation was essentially a legislative function and, therefore, could not be exercised by the king; but in final analysis they affirmed these principles when they asserted that parliament alone could impose taxes. The judgment of a majority of the court in the Ship-Money case, as had been the judgment in the case of Impositions, was in favor of the crown, but the appeal to the country cost Charles I. his head and ultimately resulted in vesting in parliament the exclusive power to legislate and hence to tax. If England had then had an independent judiciary charged with the duty of enforcing the fundamental law of the land, the levying of the taxes in both of these cases would have been held contrary to the letter, as it was certainly contrary to the spirit, of Magna Carta.