ears after the
Revolution that the king discovered and adopted the two fundamental
principles of a constitutional executive government, namely, that a
ministry should consist of statesmen holding the same political principles
and identified with each other; and, secondly, that the ministry should
stand upon a parliamentary basis, that is, that it must command and retain
the majority of votes in the legislature. It was long before these
principles were thoroughly worked out and understood, and the perfection to
which they have been brought in modern times is the result of time,
experience and in part of accident. But the result is that the cabinet
council for the time being _is_ the government of Great Britain; that all
the powers vested in the sovereign (with one or two exceptions) are
practically exercised by the members of this body; that all the members of
the cabinet are jointly and severally responsible for all its measures, for
if differences of opinion arise their existence is unknown as long as the
cabinet lasts--when publicly manifested the cabinet is at an end; and
lastly, that the cabinet, being responsible to the sovereign for the
conduct of executive business, is also collectively responsible to
parliament both for its executive conduct and for its legislative measures,
the same men being as members of the cabinet the servants of the crown, and
as members of parliament and leaders of the majority responsible to those
who support them by their votes and may challenge in debate every one of
their actions. In this latter sense the cabinet has sometimes been
described as a standing committee of both Houses of Parliament.

One of the consequences of the close connexion of the cabinet with the
legislature is that it is desirable to divide the strength of the ministry
between the two Houses of Parliament. Pitt's cabinet of 1783 consisted of
himself in the House of Commons and seven peers. But so aristocratic a
government would now be impracticable. In Gladstone's cabinet of 1868,
eight, and afterwards nine, ministers were in the House of Commons and six
in the House of Lords. Great efforts were made to strengthen the
ministerial bench in the Commons, and a new principle was introduced, that
the representatives of what are called the spending departments--that is,
the secretary of state for war and the first lord of the admiralty--should,
if possible, be members of the House which votes the supplies. Disraeli
follow