The Privy Council oversees the administrative and civil service apparatus
of the UK government, and executes the law of the land. Through “Orders-in-Council”
it implements parliamentary legislation and directs the activities of government
employees. All Council Orders require the Queen’s signature. The Council
is the locus of the power the Prime Minister is said to wield over British
government and society - and the Queen is actively, personally involved
in its work. Without her, he’s just another Member of Parliament. And
it is in the context of the Council that Her Majesty exercises her right
“to be consulted, to encourage, and to warn,” especially in her frequent
private (hence Privy) meetings with the Prime Minister and other
Ministers. Tony Blair is usually called the British Prime Minister, but
he is more properly referred to as Queen Elizabeth’s prime minister.
(It is also in the context of the Privy Council that the reported consultation
would have taken place between the Queen and the then-Archbishop of Canterbury
concerning the morality of Thatcher-nomics. We may never know for certain
because it was private.)
The Queen makes law for the UK not by herself but en
parlement or in conversation with her Subjects. This is the origin
of the word Parliament. Hence the British Parliament has three components:
the Monarch herself, Her Majesty’s Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and
Her Majesty’s Commons (i.e., non-lords). This, the Legislative Branch,
is more commonly said to be made up of the House of Lords and the House
of Commons, but as its third component, the Queen’s Royal Assent is required
for all legislation, before it can be promulgated as law in her name. This
Assent is usually provided in the Queen’s name by commissioners appointed
to do so.
Today the House of Lords is made up of senior bishops of the Church
of England (Anglican), the elected representatives of the land’s Hereditary
Nobles, and Life Peers or non-hereditary nobles, who now predominate numerically.
The House of Lords is the older House of Parliament; in a way it is the
successor of the body of barons who in the 13th century forced
the King to issue the Magna Carta, an early royal affirmation of subjects’
inherent rights, which forms the basis of most of the world’s civil and
human rights laws today. Nowadays the chamber may attempt to delay or amend
legislation from the House of Commons, or theoretically even propose laws;
but it has lost its veto power due to 20th-century “reforms.”
Nobles are “created” by the Queen on the advice of her ministers and
others.
The House of Commons is made up of more than 600 elected district representatives
from England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. They are commonly
called MPs or Members of Parliament. As mentioned above, the majority party
or coalition in this chamber controls the Ministry or Cabinet for five
years or less between elections. Actually very early on, the tradition
developed that the British people could not be taxed without their consent;
this is the origin of the American Revolutionary declaration, “Taxation
without representation is tyranny.”
Fundamentally Parliament has two jobs, to present grievances to the
Throne (lawmaking) and to levee taxes for the Throne’s government operations
(“supply” or finance) - hence the “parley” between the Queen and
her Subjects. In the past the quid pro quo was less subtle than today.
But the Queen still summons Parliament, issues writs of election so MPs
can be voted on by their constituents, opens Parliament by informing it
of her Ministers’ plans for the coming session, recesses Parliament,
and dissolves it for immediate new elections.
The Queen dispenses justice to the UK not by herself but by judges who carry out their duties in her name in Her Majesty’s Courts. While judges are appointed by the Queen on the advice of her Ministers, Britain’s tradition of judicial independence or their generally apolitical nature may be the strongest on Earth. These are the judges who have given the English-speaking world the Common Law, so that not all law is made by interested politicians or aristocrats. These are also the judges who administer different legal systems in each of England/Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland...who respected Native law (on a good day) in conquered territories...and who have honored the growing independent Common Law systems in the colonies and former colonies, including the United States. The UK’s highest court is a committee of Law Lords who sit as a sort of supreme court; appeals are no longer taken to the Queen herself. The Sovereign issues pardons on the advice of the appropriate minister.
Although they share a Monarch, the Commonwealth Realms (which now number
16 including the UK) became fully independent of each other under International
Law in the 1920s and ’30s, when the Parliament and Cabinet in London
gave up control of them peacefully. Recall that the Monarch rules “according
to law”: the law is now different in Britain, Canada, Australia, New
Zealand, Jamaica, Belize, etc., and so she rules each according to their
law and structures, including the Advice of her Ministers in each country.
When she visits one of the 15 Realms, she does so as its Queen and not
as Queen of the UK.
And so the Queen rules Canada, for example, not by herself,
but in her Privy Council for Canada, completely independently of
her British council and government. She rules through her Governor General
of Canada, who usually performs the same functions in Council in the Queen’s
name, as the Queen does in Britain. (The title has grown out of colonial
usage.) The Governor General is appointed by the Queen on the advice of
her prime minister for Canada, but here again there’s a tradition of
functional political independence of what would otherwise turn into a mere
patronage post for political hacks or wealthy donors. The Queen makes
law for Canada in her Canadian Parliament, whose chambers are the
House of Commons of Canada (over 300 elected district representatives/MPs)
and the Senate of Canada (105 life appointees representing 8 national regions,
appointed by the Governor General for the Queen on ministerial advice).
Royal Assent to legislation is usually provided in person by the Governor
General or by her deputy. And the Queen dispenses justice
to Canada just as in Britain, by judges in her name in her Canadian Courts,
except that Canada has a distinct Supreme Court as the highest court in
the land, instead of Law Lords.
Additionally, the Queen rules, makes law for, and dispenses justice
to each Canadian Province by way of similar structures, the Province’s
Lieutenant-Governor - a federal office - governing in the Queen’s name.
The Queen also rules, makes law for, and dispenses justice
to Australia as in Canada, through her Governor General of Australia, and
through her Governors (sic) - a State office there - at the State level.
In fact, State Sovereignty in Australia is such that, even if Australians
had recently voted-in a republic and abolished the Monarchy federally,
the Queen might have remained Sovereign of each of the States of Queensland,
New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, and Western Australia...the
theory being that each State could decide on its own whether to be a Monarchy
or a republic.
The Queen is legally a citizen of each of her 16 Realms, just as any naturalized citizen is legally a citizen, fully and equally with any other citizen, born or naturalized, and so it is incorrect to think of Her Majesty as a foreigner in any of them.
Obsession with ‘the power behind the Throne,’ as one might call
the politicians, distracts from the Throne itself and its very real powers
to rein-in political excess and abuse. In the 1970s an Australian Governor
General fired the prime minister when he almost caused the kind of “government
shutdown” that has become routine in the United States at budget time.
Several times in the 20th century representatives of the Sovereign
have withheld or delayed Royal Assent to laws they considered overstepping
bounds; by contrast U.S. lawmakers frequently pass laws they know are unconstitutional
or probably so, requiring years or even decades in court before they can
be struck down - if the Court does the right thing, and doesn’t
become politically captive itself.
No Monarch is perfect. But having one in office who is sincere, apolitical,
conscientious, informed, and involved, can curb the worst of political
abuses.
Tiernan O Faolain, June 7, 2004