As Protector from April 1454 to January 1455, and from November 1455 to February 1456, the duke of York faced three major challenges to his authority: from baronial disorders in the north and the west country; from the mutinous garrison at Calais; and from his own enemies in the court. Each of these incorporated antagonisms derived from his personal feud with the duke of Somerset, and presented considerable obstacles to his capacity to govern for the common good and with the support of the peers. In considering the last of these, his policy towards the court and the royal household, it is necessary to start from his re-entry into the political maelstrom of 1450 as the heralded agent of reform and retribution on the courtier clique.

The royal household had two main functions: it attested the honour and estate of the king, and it was the operational centre of royal patronage and power. As such it formed the major charge on the ordinary revenues of the crown. Criticism of its political and financial working, which was not infrequent, always risked affronting the king's dignity and might even be construed as treason. But in 1449–50 it was the courtiers who were denounced as traitors, for stripping the crown of its wealth. In the Michaelmas session of the parliament of 1449–50 the Commons demanded the resumption of all crown gifts as the price for taxation. In January they proceeded to impeach the duke of Suffolk, who had resisted this. Historically, resumption had always been strongly opposed both by the king, as derogatory to his honour, and by the nobility, as an attack on their wealth, and it was only following Suffolk's exile and death and the offer of a tax, that the Commons’ bill was conceded early in the third session. The prologue to the resumption bill adduced the treasurer's declaration of the ‘state of the realm’ in claiming that the king's debts and arrears amounted to ￡372,000, the annual charge of his household was ￡24,000, and his ordinary income only ￡5,000.