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 III THE ROYAL PREROGATIVE References : Todd's Parliamentary Government in England, i. 76-218; Anson's Law and Custom of the Constitution, ii. 1-56 and 303-354; Bagehot's English Constitution, 101-156; Courtney's Working Constitution of the United Kingdom, 123-135; TrailPs Central Government, i-n; Taswell- Langmead's English Constitutional History, 716-741; Fonblanquc's How We Are Governed, 18-25; Ewald's Crown and its Advisers, The Lecture on the Crown. PREROGATIVE," says Professor Dicey, "is the discretionary authority of the executive." Adopting this concise statement as a satisfactory working definition, it will be our purpose to determine the extent, in theory and practice, of this " discretionary authority " in so far as we may be able to do so within the limits of a brief discussion. We are sometimes inclined to think that the power of an hereditary monarch must of necessity be very extensive; as a matter of fact, however, the actual participation of the King in the government of England is comparatively slight, —almost insignificant. Neither has the power of the Crown remained the same at all times in the history of England; on the contrary, it has been a very changeable quantity. A consideration of the sources and history of the royal prerogative will not, however, constitute any considerable part of our discussion. Our present concern is with the authority of the Crown as it now exists. The year 1688 marks an epoch in the history of the royal prerogative. " In outer seeming," says John R. Green in his " Short History of the English People," " the Revolution of 1688 had only transferred the sovereignty over England from James to William and Mary. In actual fact, it was transferring the sovereignty from the King to the House of Commons." The House of Com...