CHAPTER III. 

 Of the Several Functions of Government. 



§27. Of the Function of Organization and That of Administration. 



The ordinary functions of government, or, as they may be called, the 

 functions of the government, are to be distinguished from the extraordi- 

 nary function, necessarily vested in every State, of organizing a govern- 

 ment. The latter may be called the function of political organization ; 

 the former, the function of political administration — using the term in its 

 wider sense, as including the administration of justice. This will be first 

 considered. 



§28. 0^ the Sovereign and Subordinate Functions of the Oovernment. 



The functions of the government are either sovereign or subordinate — 

 the former being those exercised by sovereign officers or departments, 

 which maybe defined as ofllcers or departments having no superior in the 

 government ; the latter, those exercised by inferior ofiicials. 



§ 29. Of the Received Classification of the Functions of the Government. 



The sovereign functions of the government are commonly classified as 

 being legislative, executive, and judicial— a division suggested by Aris- 

 totle (a), and afterwards more fully expounded by Montesquieu (5), 

 from whom it has passed into common use. It was especially familiar to 

 the founders of our government, and is thus the source of the provisions 

 in the American Constitutions, State and Federal, vesting these several 

 powers in three coordinate departments, known as the Legislative, the 

 Executive, and the Judicial, respectively, (c) 



But this division of the functions of the government — though founded 

 upon a real and essential difference of nature, and, as practically adopted 

 in the several American Constitutions, constituting a great step in advance 

 in political organization — lacks scientific accuracy in several particulars ; 

 and of the terms used to denote the several kinds of functions, two, viz., 

 " legislative " and "executive " are inappropriate and misleading. 



§30. Of the So-called Executive Functions. 



Thus, there are included under the term, " executive functions," two 

 classes of functions essentially different in their nature, namely, first, the 

 functions belonging to the Chief Executive, whether king, president, gov- 

 ernor, protector, or of other name ; and, secondly, executive functions, 

 properly so called, which consist in executing the enactments of the Leg- 

 islature, the judgments of the courts, and the commands of the Chief 



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