Junta

Junta ('assembly'), the name given in Spain to a body of persons combined for political or administrative purposes, whether summoned by the sovereign or meeting on their own initiative as representatives of the people. The most famous is the central junta of 1808, with its provincial juntas, chosen for the conduct of the war with France.—In English history the Whig junto was the name given to the chiefs of that party in the reigns of William III. and Anne. The Junta was also the name of a debating society founded by Benjamin Franklin, which developed into the American Philosophical Society in 1743. Here also may be mentioned the interior committee of the privy-council under Charles I., which was the germ of the modern cabinet, and which Clarendon says was reproachfully called the Juncto. Its principal members were Laud, Strafford, and Cottingham, the Chancellor of the Exchequer; the others were Juxon, the Lord High Treasurer, the two Secretaries, Vane and Windebank, the Marquis of Hamilton, and the Earl of Northumberland 'for ornament.'