No regent was appointed for Baldwin IV even though he was a minor. This matter must have been considered by the High Court at the time of his election, and the decision which it reached may be reflected in a passage in the Livre au roi, a treatise on the laws of the kingdom drawn up for Aimery of Lusignan (1197–1205):

This enactment excludes the mother of a child ruler from the regency if he inherits the throne from his father, and almost certainly reflects a decision made when Baldwin IV became king. The ruling ran contrary to the custom of the kingdom in the case of lordships, where a mother normally had the right to administer the fief on behalf of a child heir. In Baldwin IV's case that custom could not be applied because his parents' marriage had been annulled and his mother, Agnes of Courtenay, was not legally King Amalric's widow, while the dowager-queen, Maria Comnena, was not the young king's mother.

It would appear that the High Court did not reach any decision about who Baldwin's ‘nearest male relation on the father's side’ was, and the work of government automatically devolved on the seneschal, Miles of Plancy. John of Ibelin, writing some eighty years later about the customs of the kingdom, noted: