Note (Back) — Chapter XX

418. The Chambers: Organization.—The constitution does not prescribe definitely that the parliament shall be assembled annually. It stipulates merely that the sessions of the two houses shall begin and end at the same time, that a meeting of one house at a time when the other is not in session is illegal, and that measures enacted under such circumstances are void.[556] Custom and the necessities of administration, however, render it incumbent upon the crown to convoke the chambers in at least one session each year, unless, indeed, as has sometimes happened, a session is so prolonged as to extend, with occasional recesses, over an entire year, or even two years.