Appointment to the position of Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds is a procedural device to allow Members of Parliament to resign from the House of Commons of the United Kingdom. Since MPs are technically unable to resign, resort is had to a legal fiction. An appointment to an "office of profit under The Crown" disqualifies an individual from sitting as a Member of Parliament (MP). Several offices were used in the past to allow MPs to resign, only the Crown Stewardships of the Chiltern Hundreds and the Manor of Northstead are in present use.