highest English authorities. But here is another view of the Constitution, or laws, in which the Queen is made the source and centre of power and authority. It is natural that an American should ask for an explanation.

In the first place, it should be observed that the Queen is not said to exercise these powers, or to be entitled to do so by the Constitution; they merely belong to her according to the forms of law. It is not the Constitution, but the forms of law, by which such power is attributed to her. In America we arraign a criminal in the name of the state, or in the name of the people of the state in which the crime was committed, but the people of the state have no direct share in his trial; the criminal has to do with a judge and a jury. The fact that in England the name of the Queen takes the place of "people" in the legal formula gives her no judicial power. No one claims that the Monarch has any direct share in judicial business. So in respect to all the forms which connect the name of the Queen with the acts of Parliament; they are merely forms. The Ministers write the Queen's speech. Parliament determines its own sittings. An act which has passed the two Houses of Parliament requires the Queen's signature before it is completed, yet Mr. Bagehot, from whom I have quoted the declarations respecting the high prerogatives of the Queen, is most emphatic in his denial of the Queen's constitutional power to withhold her signature. The signing is merely a form. Indeed, so far as judicial and legislative business is concerned, the Crown is almost without power.

The case of the Executive is different. All admit that the Monarch does have some share in executive business, and through the relation of the Crown to the Cabinet, the Monarch may affect the Parliament. If she has any influence upon the judiciary, it is through the executive act of

1 Bagehot, English Constitution, p. 125.

appointing judges; but in that matter she is bound to be guided by the advice of the Lord Chancellor. All that is important in the constitutional position of the Crown is found in the Executive.

There are five terms used in the discussion of the English Constitution the meaning of which should be carefully noted. These are the Crown, the Executive, the Ministry, the Cabinet, and the Government. As the words are sometimes used they all have the same meaning. They mean the body of high officials who are responsible for the public business. It is often said that the Crown does a thing, or the Queen does it, when the meaning is that the Ministers do it. As now understood, the Constitution does not permit the Queen, by her own will and on her own responsibility, to perform any executive act. What the Queen does must be done through her Ministers. Yet the term "Crown" is often applied to the personal influence of the Monarch upon the Ministers. "Executive" is a comprehensive term applicable to the Crown and the Ministers together. The "Ministry," as the term is sometimes used, differs from the "Cabinet" in that it includes a larger number of officers. The Cabinet is composed of fifteen, more or less, of the chief executive officers. The Ministry includes additional high officials. When a Cabinet resigns, and a new one is formed, it involves a change of three times as many officers as are in the Cabinet. As the terms are generally used, however, they have the same meaning. "Government" is a frequent substitute for "Cabinet." The Opposition criticise the Government, the Cabinet, the Ministry, and sometimes the Executive. But when the Executive is made the subject of hostile criticism, the term is used as synonymous with the other three. The Crown is not usually made the subject of hostile criticism, nor is the Executive criticised when the term is intended to include the Monarch.

The key to the reconciliation of the conflicting theories of the Constitution is found in the statement already made, that the Queen cannot on her own responsibility perform any executive act. She is not made the subject of criticism, nor is there any way known to the Constitution whereby the Monarch may be punished for wrong-doing. She may not be sued, she may not be impeached. But the Ministers of the Crown may be sued, they may be impeached, and, as we have seen, they may be driven from office for official wrong-doing. In order that some one may be held amenable to the laws and to public criticism, it is understood that for every executive act there must intervene an executive agent who may be publicly arraigned for the act, criticised, and, if need be, punished.

This is not a mere understanding; it is law. Read again the list of high-handed acts which, as Mr. Bagehot has told us, the Queen may perform by her sole prerogative without consulting Parliament. Notice that we are not told that the Queen can do those things on her own responsibility. Not one of those things can she do except through a public official, and the public and the courts of law hold the Minister answerable for the act. As thus construed the prerogative of the Crown means certain acts which may be done by the Executive without consulting Parliament. For all these acts the Cabinet is called to an account in the House of Commons. Every day the Ministers are questioned about their conduct of public business, and their acts are thus brought to the light of day. If those acts are not satisfactory to the people's representatives, the Ministers are driven from office, and others are chosen who will do the business as the people want it done.

This point may be illustrated by the following passage from Mr. Dicey: "The survival of the prerogative, conferring as it does wide discretionary authority upon the

At

Cabinet [note here the substitution of the word "Cabinet" for the word "Crown"], involves a consequence which constantly escapes attention. It immensely increases the authority of the House of Commons, and ultimately the constituencies by which the House is returned. Ministers must in the exercise of all discretionary powers inevitably obey the predominant authority in the state. When the King was the chief member of the sovereign body, Ministers were in fact, no less than in name, the King's servants. periods of our history when the Peers were the most influential body in the country, the conduct of the Ministry represented with more or less fidelity the wishes of the Peerage. Now that the House of Commons has become by far the most important part of the sovereign body, the Ministry in all matters of discretion carry out, or tend to carry out, the will of the House. . . . The prerogatives of the Crown have become the privileges of the people, and any one who wants to see how widely these privileges may conceivably be stretched as the House of Commons becomes more and more the direct representative of the true sovereign, should weigh well the words in which Bagehot describes the powers which can still legally be exercised by the Crown without consulting Parliament; and remember that these powers can now be exercised by a Cabinet who are really servants, not of the Crown, but of a representative chamber which in its turn obeys the behests of the electors." Then follows in Mr. Dicey's book the quotation from Bagehot which I have given. If we now read the passage from Mr. Bagehot, and substitute throughout the word "Cabinet" in the place of the word "Queen," we may perceive how prerogative may be reconciled with a democratic Constitution.

The House of Lords is not democratic in its structure, nor has it thus far been democratic in its practical work1 The Law of the Constitution, p. 392.

ing. The Lords may furnish a good deal of resistance to the measures of the Commons, and when they do resist, there is no way to overcome their opposition but by a process almost revolutionary in its character; that is, by filling the House with new members or by withholding necessary supplies. We now reach the conclusion, upon the high authority of Mr. Dicey, that through the conferring of many high prerogatives upon the Crown by the form of English law, the English Democracy are provided with an additional means of making the government still more democratic. The Cabinet has a sort of two-edged weapon. The edge for daily use is Parliament. Yet, if the Upper House of Parliament become obstructive, a democratic Cabinet may resort to the use of prerogative, and thus accomplish its end without reference to the will of the aristocratic House.

Mr. Dicey does not rest his case upon a mere theory; he gives an actual instance. In the conduct of executive business there had long existed the custom of purchasing the salaried offices in the Army. In 1871 a Liberal Cabinet passed a bill through the House of Commons to abolish Purchase in the Army. The Lords refused to pass the bill. The Cabinet immediately removed the abuse by using the prerogative of the Crown. Mr. Dicey thinks that had it not been for this second weapon in the hands of the Cabinet the practice of Army Purchase might have continued to the present day.1 This may be reconciled with former statements as to the power of the Commons over the Lords by the reflection that while theoretically the Cabinet has the power to force the hand of the Lords, it is in fact inconvenient and sometimes impossible for it to do so. In respect to all that branch of business which is covered by the prerogative of the Crown the thing desired may be done without consult! Dicey, The Law of the Constitution, p. 393.