[authority, but by the authority of the Crown alone; although it is provided by the Meeting of Parliament Act, 1797, that, on the demise of the Crown, if there be then no parliament in being, the last parliament shall revive ; and in this case, it sits again for six months, unless sooner dissolved.

It is true that, by the Triennial Act of 1640, if the king neglected to call a parliament for three years, the chancellor or, failing him, the peers might assemble and issue out writs for choosing one; and in case of their neglect, the electors for counties and boroughs might meet and choose their own representatives. But that Act, as being detrimental to the royal prerogative, was repealed by the 16 Car. II. (1664), c. 1. It is true also, that the Convention Parliament, which restored Charles the Second, met above a month before his return, the lords of their own authority, and the commons in pursuance of writs issued in the name of the keepers of the liberty of England by authority of Parliament. But that was for the necessity of the thing; and the first step taken after the king's return in 1660 was to pass an Act (12 Car. II., c. 1), declaring the Convention Parliament to have been a good parliament, notwithstanding the defect of the king's writ, which declaration was reiterated by the 13 Car. II. (1661), st. 1, cc. 7 and 14. It is likewise true, that at the time of the Revolution, A.D. 1688, the lords and commons, of their own authority and upon the summons of the Prince of Orange (afterwards King William), met in a convention, and therein disposed of the crown and kingdom. But this assembling also was of necessity, and upon a full conviction that King James the Second had abdicated the government.

By the antient statutes of the realm, the king was bound to convoke parliament every year, or oftener, if need be (k); and by the Triennial Act of 1640, the sitting

(k) 4 Edw. 3 (1330), c. 14; 36 Edw. 3 (1362), c. 10.

[and holding of parliaments was not to be intermitted above three years at the most. By the Bill of Rights of 1689, parliament was required to be held frequently, for the redress of all grievances, and for the amending, strengthening, and preserving of the laws; and by the 6 & 7 W. & M. (1694), c. 2, s. 2, a new parliament was required to be called within three years after the determination of a former one. The importance of these provisions has been, however, much lessened in modern times by the course of public business, the exigencies of which invariably lead to the assemblage of parliament in every year. And we may here note, that by Magna Carta forty days were required to intervene between the date of the king's writ for the assembling of parliament, and the actual assembling,-a provision re-enacted by the 7 & 8 Will. 3 (1695), c. 25. But by the Meeting of Parliament Act, 1852, the forty days have been reduced to thirty-five; and apparently no particular interval of time need intervene between the end of one session, and the commencement of another session of the same parliament.

II. The constituent parts of parliament.--These are the monarch in his royal or political capacity, and the three estates of the realm, to wit, the lords spiritual, the lords temporal, and the commons. The Crown and these three estates together form the great body politic of the kingdom (1), the Crown being caput, principium, et finis (m). The lords spiritual and temporal sit with the king in one house, and the commons sit by themselves in another (n). It is highly necessary for preserving the balance of the constitution, that the executive power should be a branch,

(7) 4 Inst. 1, 2; 1 Eliz. c. 3 (1559); Hale, Parl. 1.

(m) 4 Inst. 6.

(n) The doctrine that the lords spiritual and temporal form two estates of the realm has grown up

in recent years, with the disappearance of the House of Clergy. Originally the "three estates of the realm" were-the lords, the clergy, and the commons.-E. J.

[and a branch only of the legislature. The king is himself, therefore, a part of parliament, although the share of legislation, which at the present time in theory belongs to him under the constitution, consists in the power of rejecting rather than of resolving; that is to say, the Crown does not of itself begin any alteration in the established laws, but may disapprove of the alterations proposed to be made therein by the two houses.] In practice, however, the Crown's right of veto has long since become obsolete, not having been exercised (with one exception) for more than two hundred years. In the year 1692 William the Third refused his assent to the bill for triennial parliaments, but was prevailed upon to permit it to be enacted two years afterwards; and in 1707 Queen Anne refused her assent to a Scotch militia. bill (o).

[We will first consider the three estates of the realm, passing over for the present the king, who, with his divers prerogatives, will be the subject of later chapters.

And first the "lords spiritual" consist of the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the Bishops of London Durham, and Winchester, and twenty-one other bishops, being twenty-four bishops in all, besides the two archbishops. The spiritual lords have been supposed to hold certain antient baronies under the Crown; for William the Conqueror thought proper to change the spiritual tenure of frank-almoign (or free alms), under which the bishops had held their lands during the Saxon Government, into the feudal or Norman tenure by barony (p). And it is maintained by some writers that it was in right of their succession to those baronies, that the bishops were allowed scats in the house of lords (4),] while according to other

(0) De Lolme, Const. of Engl., p. 404; 18 Lords' Journals, 506. (p) Gilb. Hist. Exch. 55; Spelm. W. I. 291.

n.

(2) Co. Litt. by Harg. 134 b,

(1); Hallam, Mid. vol. iii. pp. 4, 5 (12th ed.).

Ages,

authorities they sat in virtue of their official wisdom (r) ; but they are not, strictly speaking, “ peers of the realm” (s).

And we may here observe, that, prior to the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry the Eighth, the spiritual lords comprised also twenty-seven mitred abbots and two priors (t); also, that after the union with Ireland, in 1801, there sat and voted in the house of lords the Archbishops of Dublin and of Armagh alternately, together with three other Irish bishops. But, under the Irish Church Disestablishment Act, 1869, no archbishop or bishop of the Church of Ireland has, since the 1st January, 1871, a seat in the house of lords.

The lords spiritual are usually spoken of as a distinct estate from the lords temporal, and are so distinguished in many Acts of Parliament; yet in practice they are usually blended together under the one name of "the lords." They vote together, and the majority of votes binds both estates. And from this want of a separate assembly and separate negative of the prelates, some writers have argued very cogently, that the lords temporal and spiritual are now, in reality, only one estate (u).

And here we may observe, that the Bishop of Sodor and Man is not entitled to vote as a spiritual lord; but that, with regard to bishoprics of recent creation (such as Manchester, St. Albans, Truro, Liverpool, &c.), the bishops are summoned as spiritual lords successively, according to their seniorities, on the occurrence of any vacancy in one or other of the twenty-four antient bishoprics, other than those of London, Durham, and Winchester, which always entitle to seats in the house (c).

(r) Medley, Constitutional Hist. of England (2nd ed.) pp. 145-148. (8) Staunford, P. C. 158.

(t) Co. Litt. 97; Seld. Tit. Hon. 2, 5, 27.

(u) Whitelock, Parliam. ch. 72; Warburt. Alliance, b. ii. ch. 3;

Dyer, 60; Baronage, p. 1, ch. 6; Keilw. 184; 2 Inst. 585-587 ; 4 Inst. 25. See above, p. 365, note (n).

() As to Manchester, see the Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act, 1847; St. Albans, the St. Albans

Secondly, the "lords temporal" consist exclusively of peers, or persons of the rank of nobility, whether they be dukes, marquesses, earls, viscounts, or barons. Of the lords temporal the majority sit in their own right as peers of the United Kingdom, but a certain number of them sit in a representative capacity, while the four Lords of Appeal in Ordinary are lords of parliament during their lives (y). The representative peers are those who, under the respective Acts of Union with Scotland and Ireland (), are elected to represent respectively in the House of Lords the bodies of the Scottish and Irish nobility, the Scottish representative peers being sixteen in number, elected for one parliament only, and the Irish twenty-eight, elected for life (a).

[The aggregate number of the lords temporal for the time being is indefinite, and may be increased at will by the power of the Crown. The distinction of rank is necessary in every well governed state, in order to reward eminent public services in a manner the most desirable to individuals, and the least burdensome to the community; and the nobility being thus expedient to the state, it is expedient also that they should form an independent

Bishopric Act, 1875; and Truro, the Truro Bishopric Act, 1876. See also the Bishoprics Act, 1878, providing for the foundation of additional bishoprics at Liverpool, Newcastle, Southwell, and Wakefield; and the Bishopric of Bristol Act, 1884, providing for the constitution of a bishopric of Bristol separate from that of Gloucester and Bristol. Under the earlier Act, bishoprics of Liverpool, Newcastle, Southwark, and Wakefield have been already established; and under the later Act (amended by the Bishopric of Bristol Amendment Acts, 1894 and 1896), the separate

bishopric of Bristol has been established.

(y) The Appellate Jurisdiction Acts, 1876 and 1887.

() Vide sup. vol. i. pp. 47-55. (a) See (as to the election of the sixteen Scottish peers), the Union with Scotland Act, 1706, the Representative Peers (Scotland) Act, 1847, and the Representative Peers (Scotland) Act, 1851; and (as to the election of the

twenty-eight Irish peers) the Union with Ireland Act, 1800, the Representative Peers (Ireland) Act, 1857, and the Election of Representative Peers (Ireland) Act, 1882.