Governments of Europe - pocketboek

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER HI THE CROWN AND THE MINISTRY I. The Crown: Legal Status And Privileges 148. Contrasts of Theory and Fact.?The government of the United Kingdom is in ultimate theory an absolute monarchy, in form a limited, constitutional monarchy, and in fact a thoroughgoing de- 1 mocracy.1 At its head stands the sovereign, who is at the same time the supreme executive, a co-ordinate legislative authority (and, in theory, much more than that), the fountain of justice and of honor, the "supreme governor" of the Church, the commander-in-chief of the army and navy, the conservator of the peace, and the parens patriae and ex officio guardian of the helpless and the needy. In law, all land is held, directly or indirectly, of him. Parliament exists only by his will. Those who sit in it are summoned by his writ, and the privilege of voting for a member of the lower chamber is only a franchise, not a right independent of his grant. Technically, the sovereign never dies; there is only a demise of the crown, i. e., a transfer of regal authority from one person to another, and the state is never without a recognized head. The assertions that have been made represent with substantial accuracy the ultimate theory of the status of the crown in the governmental system. In respect to the form and fact of that system as it actually operates, however, it would hardly be possible to make assertions that would convey a more erroneous impression. The breadth of the discrepancy that here subsists between theory and fact will be made apparent as examination proceeds of the organization and workings of the executive, the legislative, and the judicial departments of the government of the realm. It is necessary first of all, however, to give attention to certain of the more external aspects of the positi...