In the British Constitution, each of the three
co-ordinate members of the sovereignty is invested with powers
which, if fully exercised, would enable it to stop all the machinery
of government. Nominally, therefore, each is invested with equal power
of thwarting and obstructing the others: and if, by exerting that
power, any of the three could hope to better its position, the
ordinary course of human affairs forbids us to doubt that the power
would be exercised. There can be no question that the full powers of
each would be employed defensively if it found itself assailed by
one or both of the others. What then prevents the same powers from
being exerted aggressively? The unwritten maxims of the
Constitution- in other words, the positive political morality of the
country: and this positive political morality is what we must look to,
if we would know in whom the really supreme power in the
Constitution resides.
By constitutional law, the Crown can refuse its assent to any Act of
Parliament, and can appoint to office and maintain in it any Minister,
in opposition to the remonstrances of Parliament. But the
constitutional morality of the country nullifies these powers,
preventing them from being ever used; and, by requiring that the
head of the Administration should always be virtually appointed by the
House of Commons, makes that body the real sovereign of the State.
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