propriated for particular
ends. But in 1787 Pitt simplified the procedure
involved by creating a single Consolidated Fund
into which all revenues were turned and from which
all expenditures were met.]

[Footnote 66: Accuracy requires mention of the fact
that, by exception, the crown still enjoys the
revenues of the Duchy of Lancaster and the Duchy of
Cornwall, the latter being part of the appanage of
the Prince of Wales.]

[Footnote 67: On the history of the Civil List see
May and Holland, Constitutional History of England,
I., 152-175.]

The sovereign enjoys unrestricted immunity from political
responsibility and from personal distraint. The theory of the law has
long been that the king can do no wrong, which means that for his
public acts the sovereign's ministers must bear complete responsibility
and for his private conduct he may not be called to account in any
court of law or by any legal process. He cannot be arrested, his goods
cannot be distrained, and as long as a palace remains a royal
residence no sort of judicial proceeding can be executed in it. (p. 052)
Strictly, the revenues are the king's, whence it arises that the king
is himself exempt from taxation, though lands purchased by the privy
purse are taxed. And there are numerous minor privileges, such as the
use of special liveries and a right to the royal salute, to which the
sovereign, as such, is regularly entitled.

II. THE POWERS OF THE CROWN

*52. Sources: the Prerogative.*--Vested in the crown is, in the last
analysis, an enormous measure of authority. The sum total of powers,
whether or not actually exercised by the sovereign immediately, is of
two-fold origin. There are powers, in the first place, which have been
defined, or conferred outright, by parliamentary enactment. Others
there are, however--more numerous and more important--which rest upon
the simple basis of custom or the Common Law. Those powers which
belong to the statutory group are, as a rule, specific and easily
ascertainable. But those which comprise the ancient customary rights
of the crown, i.e., the prerogative, are not always possible of exact
delimitation. The prerogative is defined by Dicey as "the residue of
discretionary or arbitrary author