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[ease to carry on the business of government. These attributes constitute the royal dignity; and three of them must here be specially noticed.

(1) The law ascribes to the king the attribute of sovereignty, or pre-eminence. He is said to have imperial dignity; and in charters before the Conquest he is frequently styled basileus and imperator (s). His realm is declared to be an empire, and his crown imperial, by many Acts of Parliament, amongst others 24 Henry VIII. (1533) c. 12, and 25 Henry VIII. (1534) c. 22. Formerly, there prevailed a notion, that an emperor could do many things which a king could not do, and that all kings were in some degree subordinate to the Emperor of Germany or Rome (t); the meaning therefore of the legislature, when it useth these terms of empire and imperial, and applies them to the realm and crown of England, is only to assert that our sovereign is equally supreme and independent within these his dominions as any emperor is in his empire, and owes no kind of subjection to any other potentate upon earth.]

By virtue of this prerogative of sovereignty or preeminence, it was a maxim of our law, even while the now abolished doctrine of corruption of blood flourished in full vigour, that there could be no corruption of blood in the monarch; for if the heir to the crown were attainted of treason or felony, and afterwards the crown descended to him, this ipso facto would purge the attainder (u). [Therefore, when Henry the Seventh, who, as Earl of Richmond, stood attainted, came to the crown, it was not thought necessary to pass an Act of Parliament to reverse this attainder; because, as Lord Bacon, in his history of that prince, informs us, it was agreed that the assumption

(*) Seld. Tit. of Hon. 1, 2.

(t) I.e. the ruler, or rather the titular head, of the Holy Roman Empire. [When Blackstone wrote, this curious institution was still in

existence. It was formally dis-
solved in 1806. For a brilliant
sketch of its history, see Bryce,
Holy Roman Empire. -E.J.]
(u) Finch, L. 82.

[of the crown had at once purged the attainder. Neither can the king, as king, ever be, in judgment of the common law, a minor or under age; and therefore his assent to an Act of Parliament is good, even though he have not, in his natural capacity, attained the legal age of twenty-one (a). It hath, however, been usually thought prudent, when the heir apparent has been very young, to appoint a protector, guardian, or regent for a limited time. But the very necessity of such extraordinary provision is sufficient to demonstrate the truth of that maxim of the common law, that in the king is no minority, and therefore he hath no legal guardian.] And the appointment of a regent is only an expedient devised to meet a particular contingency; as when a statute in the late reign, the Lords Justices Act, 1837, provided for the administration of the government by lords justices, in case of the next successor to the crown being out of the realm; and as where, in a former reign, the heir apparent was appointed regent while George the Third was disabled by insanity from conducting affairs of state (y).

[(2) A second attribute of dignity which the law ascribes to the king, in his political capacity, is, an absolute immortality. The king never dies; for Henry, Edward, or George may die, but the king survives them all. For immediately upon the decease of the reigning prince in his natural capacity, his kingship or imperial dignity is vested, by act of law, and without any interregnum, in his heir, who is, eo instanti, king to all intents and purposes. And so tender is the law of even supposing a possibility of the death of the king, that his natural dissolution is generally called his demise, an expression which signifies merely a transfer of property; or, as is observed in Plowden (z), when we say the demise of the Crown, we mean only that,

(x) Co. proim.

Litt.

43;

2 Inst.

(y) 51 Geo. 3 (1811), c. 1.
(2) Plowd. 177, 234.

[in consequence of the disunion of the king's natural body from his body politic, the kingdom is transferred or demised to his successor.

(3) A third attribute of the royal dignity is perfection, it being an ancient fundamental maxim of our law, that the king can do no wrong. This maxim is not to be understood as if everything transacted by the government was of course just and lawful; its proper meaning is only this, that no crime or other misconduct must ever be imputed to the king personally. However tyrannical or arbitrary, therefore, may be the measures pursued or sanctioned by him, he is himself sacred from punishment of every description. For if any foreign jurisdiction had the power to punish him, as was formerly claimed by the Pope, the independence of this kingdom would be no more; and if the power to punish him were vested in any domestic tribunal, there would soon be an end of the constitution, by destroying the free agency of one of the constituent parts of the legislative power. Also, and upon the same principle, no action can be brought against the sovereign, even in civil matters; and indeed, his immunity (a), both from civil suit and from penal proceeding, follows from the circumstance that no court can have jurisdiction over him, all jurisdiction proceeding from the Crown itself (b).]

But while the king himself is, in a personal sense, incapable of doing wrong, his acts may in themselves be contrary to law and invalid. Thus, for example, his grants, when they are of that description, are avoided or set aside by the law, but in such manner as to maintain the respect due to the Crown. [Thus, if the Crown should be induced to grant any franchise or privilege to a subject, and the grant should be contrary to reason, or in anywise prejudicial to the commonwealth or to any private person,

(a) Tobin v. The Queen (1864), 16 C. B. (N.S.) 310.

(b) Finch, L. 83.

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[the law will not suppose the king to have meant either an unwise or an injurious action, but declares that the king was deceived in his grant; and such grant is thereupon rendered void, but merely upon the foundation of fraud or deception on the part of those agents whom the Crown has thought proper to employ. So, if any person has a just demand upon the king in respect of property or arising out of contract (c), though he cannot bring an action against him,] he may petition him in the High Court of Justice (d), [and obtain redress; and though in a sense such redress is a matter of grace, and not to be had upon compulsion (e), yet a petition of right will not be refused capriciously, and the prayer of it is grantable ex debito justitiæ (f). This is entirely consonant with what is laid down by the writers on natural law :-" A subject," says Puffendorf, “so long as he continues a subject, hath no "way to oblige his prince to give him his due when he "refuses it; though no wise prince will ever refuse to "stand to a lawful contract. And if the prince gives the subject leave to enter an action against him upon such "contract, in his own courts, the action itself proceeds "rather upon natural equity, than upon the municipal "laws" (g). For the end of such an action is not to compel the prince to observe the contract, but to persuade him.] But as regards any cause of complaint which the subject may have against the Crown in respect of some personal injury of a private kind, being an injury unconnected with property, real or personal, this would seem not to be a proper subject for a petition; and, consequently, no remedy would lie against the Crown in such a case, save

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(c) Windsor and Annapolis Rail. Co. v. The Queen (1886), L. R. 11 App. Ca. 615.

(d) As to the practice in such cases, see the Petitions of Right Act, 1860.

(e) Finch, L. 255.

(f) See Ryres v. Duke of Wellington (1846), 9 Beav. at p. 600.

(g) Law of N. & N. b. viii. ch. 10.

under the express provisions of any Act of Parliament which should give some specific remedy (h). But, of course, the unlawful command of the Crown is no defence to an action by the party injured against any person carrying out the Crown's commands.

[It is also to be observed, that, notwithstanding the personal perfection which the law attributes to the king, the constitution hath allowed a latitude of supposing the contrary, in respect of both houses of parliament; each of which in its turn hath exerted the right of remonstrating with, and complaining to, the king, even of those acts of royalty which are most properly and personally his own, such as messages signed by himself, and speeches delivered from the throne. Yet, such is the reverence which is paid to the royal person, that, though the two houses have an undoubted right to consider these acts of state in any light whatever, and accordingly to treat them in their addresses as proceeding personally from the prince, yet among themselves, to preserve the more perfect decency and for the greater freedom of debate, they usually suppose them to flow from the advice of his administration. The privilege of canvassing thus freely the personal acts of the sovereign belongs, however, to no individual, but is confined to those august assemblies; and the objections which it is desired to propose in parliament, must be proposed with the utmost respect and deference. One member was sent to the Tower for suggesting, that his majesty's answer to the address of the commons "contained high words to "fright the members out of their duty"(); while another was similarly punished for saying, that "a part of "the king's speech seemed rather to be calculated for the "meridian of Germany than Great Britain, and that the king was a stranger to our language and constitu"tion" (k).

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If it be asked, what remedy is afforded to the subject

(h) Tobin v. The Queen (1864), 16 C. B. (N.s.), 310.

(i) Com. Journ. 18th Nov.

1685.

(k) Ibid. 4th Dec. 1717.

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