Note (Back) — Chapter III
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54. Executive Powers.—Disregarding for the moment the means of their actual exercise, the powers of the crown to-day may be said to fall into two principal groups. The first comprises those which are essentially executive in character; the second, those which are shared with the two houses of Parliament, being, therefore chiefly legislative. The first group is distinctly the more important. It includes: (1) the appointment, directly or indirectly, of all national public officers, except some of the officials of the parliamentary chambers and a few unimportant hereditary dignitaries; (2) the removal, upon occasion, of all appointed officers except judges, members of the Council of India, and the Comptroller and Auditor General; (3) the execution of all laws and the supervision of the executive machinery of the state throughout all its branches; (4) the expenditure of public money in accordance with appropriations voted by Parliament; (5) the pardoning of offenders against the criminal law, with some exceptions, either before or after conviction;[71] (6) the granting, in so far as not prohibited by statute, of charters of incorporation; (7) the creating of all peers and the conferring of all titles and honors; (8) the coining of all money; (9) the summoning of Convocation and, by reason of the headship of the Established Church, the virtual appointment of the archbishops, bishops, and most of the deans and canons; (10) the supreme command of the army and navy, involving the raising and control of the armed forces of the nation, subject to such conditions only as Parliament may impose; (11) the representing of the nation in all of its dealings with foreign powers, including the appointment of all diplomatic and consular agents and the negotiation and conclusion of peace; and (12) the exercise, largely under statutory authority conferred within the past half-century, of supervision or control in respect to local government, education, public health, pauperism, housing, and a wide variety of other social and industrial interests.