TtiE LIBRARY. 123 



'' In representative Governments the King alone is 

 inviolable ; all the other public functionaries are respon- 

 sible for their acts, as strictly speaking there is no 

 sovereign power but the legislature. 



' The responsibility of the Ministerial Secretaries of 

 Despatch is to the Congress and Judges of the Senate sitting 

 as a constituted tribunal of justice. Accomplices of Ministers 

 in delinquincies, are however, judged by the Senate itself. 

 In the trials of other functionaries these are heard 

 according to their classes by the tribunals to which they 

 severally pertain. 



'The King holds by the Constitution the power of 

 submitting to the cognisance of the Senate, as tribunal of 

 justice, grave crimes committed against his person or 

 dignity, and against the security of the State. 



' The Senate sits, moreover, as a tribunal in criminal 

 trials of Senators. 



'The King exercises the government of the State as 

 Supreme Chief of the Executive power, by means of 

 seven Ministers. These are that of the State, that of 

 Grace and Justice, that of War, that of the Navy, that 

 De Haciendo, that of the Government, and that De Fomento. 



1 The seven Ministers form a Council, which is under 

 the presidency of one of their number, with or without a 

 portfolio, who is usually he who has been entrusted by 

 the King with the formation of the Cabinet. In this 

 Council are treated the general business of the State, and 

 those special matters which give form to the law. The 

 Royal Decrees are always issued with the accord of the 

 Council of Ministers, and to that extent involve obligations 

 on all the authorities and dependencies of those Ministers. 



' The president ought to take upon himself the direction 

 of foreign affairs, and what relates to the general statistics 

 of the kingdom. If he do not do so he delegates these 

 functions to other Ministers, by virtue of Royal Decrees. 



c The responsibility involved in resolutions of the 

 Council of Ministers is collective, and cannot be confined 

 to any particular Minister. 



