one. In every
independent political society, it is assumed by these definitions, there
will be found somewhere or other a sovereign, whether that sovereign be
a single person, or a body of persons, or several bodies of persons. The
commands imposed by the sovereign person or body on the rest of the
society are positive laws, properly so called. The sovereign body not
only makes laws, but has two other leading functions, viz. those of
judicature and administration. Legislation is for the most part
performed directly by the sovereign body itself; judicature and
administration, for the most part, by delegates. The constitution of a
society, accordingly, would show how the sovereign body is composed, and
what are the relations of its members _inter se_, and how the sovereign
functions of legislation, judicature and administration are exercised.
Constitutional law consists of the rules relating to these subjects, and
these rules may either be laws properly so called, or they may not--i.e.
they may or may not be commands imposed by the sovereign body itself.
The English constitutional rule, for example, that the king and
parliament are the sovereign, cannot be called a law; for a law
presupposes the fact which it asserts. And other rules, which are
constantly observed in practice, but have never been enacted by the
sovereign power, are in the same way constitutional laws which are not
laws. It is an undoubted rule of the English constitution that the king
shall not refuse his assent to a bill which has passed both Houses of
Parliament, but it is certainly not a law. Should the king veto such a
bill his action would be unconstitutional, but not illegal. On the other
hand the rules relating to the election of members to the House of
Commons are nearly all positive laws strictly so called. Constitutional
law, as the phrase is commonly used, would include all the laws dealing
with the sovereign body in the exercise of its various functions, and
all the rules, not being laws properly so called, relating to the same
subject.

The above is an attempt to indicate the meaning of the phrases in their
stricter or more technical uses. Some wider meanings may be noticed. In
the phrase constitutional government, a form of government based on
certain principles which may roughly be called popular is the leading
idea. Great Britain, Switzerland, the United States, are all
constitutional governments in this sense of the word. A country where