A dissolution is the civil death of the parliament; and this may be effected three ways: 1. By the king's will, expressed either in person or by representation; for, as the king has the sole right of convening the parliament, so also it is a branch of the royal prerogative, that he may whenever he [*188] pleases prorogue the parliament for a time, or put a final period to its existence. If nothing had a right to prorogue or dissolve a parliament but itself, it might happen to become perpetual. And this would be extremely dangerous, if at any time it should attempt to encroach upon the executive power: as was fatally experienced by the unfortunate King Charles the First; who having unadvisedly passed an act to continue the parliament then in being till such time as it should please to dissolve itself, at last fell a sacrifice to that inordinate power, which he himself had consented to give them. It is therefore extremely necessary that the crown should be empowered to regulate the duration of these assemblies, under the limitations which the English constitution has prescribed: so that, on the one hand, they may frequently and regularly come together, for the dispatch of business, and redress of grievances; and may not, on the other, even with the consent of the crown, be continued to an inconvenient or unconstitutional length.

2. A parliament may be dissolved by the demise of the crown. This dissolution formerly happened immediately upon the death of the reigning sovereign: for he being considered in law as the head of the parliament, caput principium, et finis, that failing, the whole body was held to be extinct. But, the calling a new parliament, immediately on the inauguration of the successor, being found inconvenient, and dangers being apprehended from having no parliament in being in case of a disputed succession, it was enacted by the statutes 7 and 8 Wm. III, c. 15, and 6 Ann. c. 7, that the parliament in being shall continue for six months after the death of any king or queen, unless sooner prorogued or dissolved by the successor; that, if the parliament be, at the time of the king's death separated by adjournment or prorogation, it shall, notwithstanding, assemble immediately; and that, if no parliament is then in being, the members of the last parliament shall assemble, and be again a parliament.

*3. Lastly, a parliament may be dissolved or expire by length of time. [*189] For, if either the legislative body were perpetual, or might last for the life of the prince who convened them, as formerly; and were so to be supplied, by occasionally filling the vacancies with new representatives; in these cases, if it were once corrupted, the evil would be past all remedy: but when different bodies succeed each other, if the people see cause to disapprove of the present, they may rectify its faults in the next. A legislative assembly also, which, is sure to be separated again, (whereby its members will themselves become private men, and subject to the full extent of the laws which they have enacted for others,) will think themselves bound, in interest as well as duty, to make only such laws as are good. The utmost extent of time that the same parliament was allowed to sit, by the statute 6 W. and M. c. 2, was three years; after the expiration of which, reckoning from the return of the first summons, the parliament was to have no longer continuance. But, by the statute 1 Geo. I, st. 2, c. 38, (in order, professedly, to prevent the great and continued expenses of frequent elections, and the violent heats and animosities consequent thereupon, and for the peace and security of the government, then just recovering from the late rebellion,) this term was prolonged to seven years: and, what alone is an instance of the vast authority of parliament, the very same house that was chosen for three years, enacted its own continuance for seven. So that, as our constitution now stands, the parliament must expire, or die a natural death, at the end of every seventh year, if not sooner dissolved by the royal prerogative. (60)

(60) In the United States each congress continues for the period for which the members of the popular branch are chosen; that is to say, for two years. Within that period two sessions are held regularly, and more may be, when extra sessions are called by the president or ordered by congress.

CHAPTER III.

OF THE KING AND HIS TITLE.

THE supreme executive power of these kingdoms is vested by our laws in a single person, the king or queen: for it matters not to which sex the crown descends; but the person entitled to it, whether male or female, is immediately invested with all the ensigns, rights, and prerogatives of sovereign power; as is declared by statute 1 Mar. st. 3, c. 1.

In discoursing of the royal rights and authority, I shall consider the king under six distinct views; 1. With regard to his title. 2. His royal family. 4. His duties. 5. His prerogative. 6. His revenue. And, 3. His councils.

first, with regard to his title.

The executive power of the English nation being vested in a single person, by the general consent of the people, the evidence of which general consent is long and immemorial usage, it became necessary to the freedom and peace of the state, that a rule should be laid down, uniform, universal, and permanent; in order to mark out with precision, who is that single person, to whom are committed (in subservience to the law of the land) the care and protection of the community; and to whom, in return, the duty and allegiance of every individual are due. It is of the highest importance to the public tranquility, and to the [*191] consciences of private men, that this rule should be clear and indisupon putable and our constitution has not left us in the dark material occasion. It will therefore be the endeavour of this chapter to trace out the constitutional doctrine of the royal succession, with that freedom and regard to truth, yet mixed with that reverence and respect, which the principles of liberty and the dignity of the subject require.

this

The grand fundamental maxim upon which the jus coronæ, or right of succession to the throne of these kingdoms, depends, I take to be this: "that the crown is, by common law and constitutional custom, hereditary; and this in a manner peculiar to itself: but that the right of inheritance may from time to time be changed or limited by act of parliament; under which limitations the crown still continues hereditary." And this proposition it will be the business of this chapter to prove, in all its branches; first, that the crown is hereditary; secondly, that it is hereditary in a manner peculiar to itself; thirdly, that this inheritance is subject to limitation by parliament; lastly, that when it is so limited, it is hereditary in the new proprietor.

1. First, it is in general hereditary, or descendible to the next heir, on the death or demise of the last proprietor. All regal governments must be either hereditary or elective: and, as I believe there is no instance wherein the crown of England has ever been asserted to be elective, except by the regicides at the infamous and unparalleled trial of King Charles I, it must of consequence be hereditary. Yet, while I assert an hereditary, I by no means intend a jure divino, title to the throne. Such a title may be allowed to have subsisted under the theocratic establishments of the children of Israel in Palestine: but it never yet subsisted in any other country; save only so far as kingdoms, like other human fabrics, are subject to the general and ordinary dispensations of Providence. Nor indeed have a jure divino and an hereditary right any necessary connexion with each other; as some have very weakly imagined.. The titles of David and Jehu were equally jure divino, as those of either Solomon or Ahab; and yet David slew the sons of his predecessor, and Jehu his predecessor [*192] himself. And when our kings have the same warrant as they had, whether it be to sit upon the throne of their fathers, or to destroy the house of the preceding sovereign, they will then, and not before, possess the crown of England by a right like theirs, immediately derived from heaven. The hereditary right which

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the laws of England acknowledge, owes its origin to the founders of our constitution, and to them only. It has no relation to, nor depends upon, the civil laws of the Jews, the Greeks, the Romans, or any other nation upon earth: the municipal laws of one society having no connexion with, or influence upon, the fundamental polity of another. The founders of our English monarchy might perhaps, if they had thought proper, have made it an elective monarchy: but they rather chose, and upon good reason, to establish originally a succession by inheritance. This has been acquiesced in by general consent; and ripened by degrees into common law: the very same title that every private man has to his own estate. Lands are not naturally descendible any more than thrones: but the law has thought proper, for the benefit and peace of the public, to establish hereditary succession in the one as well as the other.

It must be owned, an elective monarchy seems to be the most obvious, and best suited of any to the rational principles of government, and the freedom of human nature: and accordingly we find from history that, in the infancy and first rudiments of almost every state, the leader, chief magistrate, or prince, hath usually been elective. And, if the individuals who compose that state could always continue true to first principals, uninfluenced by passion or prejudice, unassailed by corruption, and unawed by violence, elective succession were as much to be desired in a kingdom, as in other inferior communities. The best, the wisest, and the bravest man, would then be sure of receiving that crown, which his endowments have merited; and the sense of an unbiassed majority would be dutifully acquiesced in by the few who were *of different [*193] opinions. But history and observation will inform us, that elections of every kind (in the present state of human nature) are too frequently brought about by influence, partiality, and artifice and, even where the case is otherwise, these practices will be often suspected, and as constantly charged upon the successful, by a splenetic disappointed minority. This is an evil to which all societies are liable; as well those of a private and domestic kind, as the great community of the public, which regulates and includes the rest. But in the former there is this advantage; that such suspicions, if false, proceed no farther than jealousies and murmurs, which time will effectually suppress; and, if true, the injustice may be remedied by legal means, by an appeal to the tribunals to which every member of society has (by becoming such) virtually engaged to submit. Whereas in the great and independent society, which every nation composes, there is no superior to resort to but the law of nature: no method to redress the infringements of that law, but the actual exertion of private force. As therefore between two nations, complaining of mutual injuries, the quarrel can only be decided by the law of arms; so in one and the same nation, when the fundamental principles of their common union are supposed to be invaded, and more especially when the appointment of their chief magistrate is alleged to be unduly made, the only tribunal to which the complainants can appeal is that of the God of battles, the only process by which the appeal can be carried on is that of a civil and intestine war. An hereditary succession to the crown is therefore now established, in this and most other countries, in order to prevent that periodical bloodshed and misery, which the history of ancient imperial Rome, and the more modern experience of Poland and Germany, may shew us are the consequences of elective kingdoms.

2. But, secondly, as to the particular mode of inheritance, it in general corresponds with the feudal path of descents, chalked out by the common law in the succession to landed estates; yet with one or two material exceptions. Like estates, the crown will descend lineally to the issue of the reigning monarch; as it did from King John to Řichard II, through *a regular pedigree of [ *194] six lineal generations. As in common descents, the preference of males to females, and the right of primogeniture among the males, are strictly adhered to. Thus Edward V succeeded to the crown, in preference to Richard, his younger brother, and Elizabeth, his elder sister. Like lands or tenements, the crown, on failure of the male line, descends to the issue female; according to

the ancient British custom remarked by Tacitus; (a) "solent fæminarum duota bellare, et sexum in imperiis non discernere." Thus Mary I succeeded to Edward VI; and the line of Margaret Queen of Scots, the daughter of Henry VII, succeeded on failure of the line of Henry VIII, his son. But among the females, the crown descends by right of primogeniture to the eldest daughter only and her issue; and not as in common inheritances, to all the daughters at once; the evident necessity of a sole succession to the throne having occasioned the royal law of descents to depart from the common law in this respect: and therefore Queen Mary on the death of her brother succeeded to the crown alone, and not in partnership with her sister Elizabeth. Again: the doctrine of representation prevails in the descent of the crown, as it does in other inheritances; whereby the lineal descendants of any person deceased, stand in the same place as their ancestor, if living, would have done. Thus Richard II succeeded his grandfather Edward III, in right of his father the Black Prince, to the exclusion of all his uncles, his grandfather's younger children. Lastly, on failure of lineal descendants, the crown goes to the next collateral relations of the late king; provided they are lineally descended from the blood royal, that is, from that royal stock which originally acquired the crown. Thus Henry I succeeded to William II, John to Richard I, and James I to Elizabeth; being all derived from the Conquerer, who was then the only regal stock. But herein there is no objection (as in the case of common descents) to the succession of a brother, an uncle, or other collateral relation, of the half blood; that is, where the relationship proceeds not from the same couple of ancestors (which constitutes a kinsman of the whole blood) but from a single ancestor only; as when two persons are derived from the same father, and not from the same *mother, [*195] or vice versa; provided only that the one ancestor, from whom both are descended, be that from whose veins the blood royal is communicated to each. Thus Mary I inherited to Edward VI, and Elizabeth inherited to Mary; all children of the same father, King Henry VIII, but all by different mothers. (1) The reason of which diversity, between royal and common descents, will be better understood hereafter, when we examine the nature of inheritances in general.

The doctrine of hereditary right does by no means imply an indefeasible right to the throne. No man will, I think, assert this, that has considered our laws, constitution, and history, without prejudice, and with any degree of attention. It is unquestionably in the breast of the supreme legislative authority of this kingdom, the king and both houses of parliament, to defeat this hereditary right; and, by particular entails, limitations, and provisions, to exclude the immediate heir, and vest the inheritance in any one else. This is strictly consonant to our laws and constitution; as may be gathered from the expression so frequently used in our statute book, of the king's majesty, his heirs, and successors." In which we may observe, that as the word, "heirs," necessarily implies an inheritance or hereditary right, generally subsisting in the royal person; so the word, "successors," distinctly taken, must imply that this

(a) In vit. Agricolæ.

(I) It is not very easy to say whether Mary and Elizabeth took the crown by inheritance, or special parliamentary limitation. When the 35 Henry VIII, c. 1, passed, they had both, by a preceding statute, the 28 Hen. VIII, c. 7, been declared illegitimate, and not capable of inheriting the crown; that statute, without repealing the former, limited the succession to them and the heirs of their bodies respectively under certain circumstances and upon certain conditions. On the accession of Mary the clauses in 28 Hen. VIII, c. 7, by which her illegitimacy had been declared, were repealed: 1 M. st. 2, c. 1; and in 1 M. st. 3, c. 1, she is called "the inheritrix to the imperial crown," but the 35 Hen. VIII, c. 1, was not formally repealed. Elizabeth did not formally repeal the clauses of the 28 Hen, VIII, c. 7, which affected her legitimacy, but by 1 Eliz. c. 3, she was recognized as being lineally and lawfully descended of the blood royal of the realm; at the same time, however, the limitation of the crown by the 35 Hen. VIII, c. 1, was expressly confirmed. The inference from the whole seems to be, that though neither of them chose to rely on the parliamentary limitation alone, neither thought it right entirely to forgo the security which it afforded.]

inheritance may sometimes be broken through; or, that there may be a successor, without being the heir, of the king. And this is so extremely reasonable, that without such a power, lodged somewhere, our polity would be very defective. For, let us barely suppose so melancholy a case, as that the heir apparent should be a lunatic an idiot, or otherwise incapable of reigning: how miserable would the condition of the nation be, if he were also incapable of being set aside! It is therefore necessary that this power should be lodged somewhere; and yet the inheritance, and regal dignity, would be very precarious indeed, if this power were expressly and avowedly lodged in the hands of the subject only, to be exerted whenever prejudice, caprice, or discontent, should happen to take the lead. Consequently it can no where be so properly lodged as in the two houses [*196] of parliament, by and with the *consent of the reigning king; who, it is not to be supposed, will agree to any thing improperly prejudicial to the rights of his own descendants. And therefore in the king, lords, and commons, in parliament assembled, our laws have expressly lodged it.

4. But, fourthly; however the crown may be limited or transferred, it still retains its descendible quality, and becomes hereditary in the wearer of it. And hence in our law the king is said never to die, in his political capacity; though, in common with other men, he is subject to mortality in his natural: because immediately upon the natural death of Henry, William, or Edward, the king survives in his successor. For the right of the crown vests, eo instanti, upon his heir; either the hæres natus, if the course of descent remains unimpeached, or the hæres factus, if the inheritance be under any particular settlement. So that there can be no interregnum; 2 but, as Sir Matthew Hale (b) observes, the right of sovereignty is fully invested in the successor by the very descent of the crown. And therefore, however acquired, it becomes in him absolutely hereditary, unless by the rules of the limitation it is otherwise ordered and determined. In the same manner as landed estates, to continue our former comparison, are by the law hereditary, or descendible to the heirs of the owner; but still there exists a power, by which the property of those lands may be transferred to another person, If this transfer be made simply and absolutely, the lands will be hereditary in the new owner, and descend to his heir at law but if the transfer be clogged with any limitations, conditions, or entails, the lands must descend in that channel, so limited and prescribed, and no other.

In these four points consists, as I take it, the constitutional notion of herediitary right to the throne: which will be still farther elucidated, and made clear beyond all dispute, from a short historical view of the successions to the crown of England, the doctrines of our ancient lawyers, and the several acts of parliament that have from time to time been made, to create, to declare, to confirm, *[197] to limit, or to bar, the hereditary *title to the throne. And in the pursuit of this inquiry we shall find, that, from the days of Egbert, the first sole monarch of this kingdom, even to the present, the four cardinal maxims above mentioned have ever been held the constitutional canons of succession, It is true, the succession, through fraud, or force, or sometimes through necessity, when in hostile times the crown descended on a minor or the like, has been very frequently suspended; but has generally at last returned back into the old hereditary channel, though sometimes a very considerable period has intervened. And, even in those instances where the succession has been violated, the crown has ever been looked upon as hereditary in the wearer of it. Of which the usurpers themselves were so sensible, that they for the most part endeavored to vamp up some feeble shew of title by descent, in order to amuse the people, while they gained the possession of the kingdom. And, when possession was once gained, they considered it as the purchase or acquisi

(b) 1 Hist. P. C. 61.

(2) It is upon this principle that the whole period of the commonwealth is reckoned as a part of the reign of Charles II, who was considered as succeeding to the crown immediately on the execution of his father, though not in possession until the restoration in 1660.