Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1890 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER II. THE ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF CONSTITUTIONAL LAW. The constitution of a state may be described y. as the definition of the order and structure of the body politic, while constitutional law consists of those fundamental principles and rules in accordance with which the government is constructed and its orderly administration is conducted. Constitutional law may be described as the anatomy and physiology of the body politic. If these definitions be accepted as true, the conclusion is irresistible that the fundamental principles which form the constitution of a state cannot be created by any governmental or popular edict; they are necessarily found imbedded in the national character and are developed in accordance with the national growth. This doctrine is admitted in its application to the so-called unwritten constitutions, like that of England, whose changes are effected by ordinary parliamentary action, and which cannot be found in any one written instrument, but whose prin 16 ciples are to be found scattered along the pathway of the nation's history, and serving more or less as landmarks to indicate its political growth. The English Constitution is to be found in the Magna Charta, the Petition of Right, the Habeas Corpus act, and the Bill of Rights. It is plain to the most superficial observer that the English Constitution was not the conscious and voluntary creation of the English people; that it was an evolution from the simple political principles and formulae of the Teutonic race, finding its beginning in the tribal government of the German barbarians, so graphically described by Tacitus. But when, the so-called written constitutions of America and Europe, which are promulgated by the supreme power of the respective...