Minister of government

“ Let the Government in power cause the Parliamentary Representatives to understand that they are not to consider themselves entitled to direct the policy of the Cabinet, that Ministers are not their servants, and that a Minister may not be dismissed at their pleasure without necessarily dismissing the whole Cabinet. Let the nation prostrate herself in their temples and implore God to forgive her crimes and errors ”

“ On the death, removal from office or resignation, during the period intervening between the dissolution of Parliament and the conclusion of the General Election, of a Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers or any other Minister, the President may appoint any other Minister to be the Minister in charge of such Ministry or to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of such Minister or may himself take charge of such Ministry or exercise, perform and discharge such powers, duties and functions. ”

“ Furthermore, the President of the Republic shall have the right, in cases provided by the law, to appoint civilian and military officers proposed by the Council of Ministers. Paragraph 2. Every official of the Republic is subject to the orders of the appropriate minister who is responsible to the Diet for his acts. Art. 56. The Council of Ministers as a body shall bear the constitutional and parliamentary responsibility for the policies of the Government. ”

“ All subordinate public officers who are not appointed by some mode of public competition should be selected on the direct responsibility of the minister under whom they serve. The ministers, all but the chief, will naturally be selected by the chief; and the chief himself, though really designated by Parliament, should be, in a regal government, officially appointed by the crown. ”

“ Wherever that constitutional right is admitted in principle and fully operative in practice, there is no fear that the assembly will not be willing to trust its own ministers with any amount of power really desirable; the danger is, on the contrary, lest they should grant it too ungrudgingly, and too indefinite in extent, since the power of the minister is the power of the body who make and who keep him so. ”

“ Parliament does not nominate any minister, but the crown appoints the head of the administration in conformity to the general wishes and inclinations manifested by Parliament, and the other ministers on the recommendation of the chief; while every minister has the undivided moral responsibility of appointing fit persons to the other offices of administration which are not permanent. ”

“ Practically, however, the word minister has in modern states come to be applied to the heads of the great administrative departments who as such are members of the government. On the continent there are, besides, “ministers without portfolio,” i.e. ministers who, without being in charge of any special department, are members of the government. ”

“ If the supreme council once begins to encroach upon the executive fields of government by interferings with the conduct of work in the separate Ministries, by advising as to appointments to be made under the rank of Minister of State, or in any other way taking part in the executive functions of government, it will thereby at once lessen the efficiency and increase the difficulties of every Minister. ”

“ The Prime Minister stands between the Crown and the cabinet; for although the King may, and sometimes does, communicate with a minister about the affairs relating to his own department, it is the Premier who acts as the connecting link with the cabinet as a whole, and communicates to him their collective opinion. ”

“ A minister shall be discharged if he so requests; the Prime Minister shall be discharged by the Speaker, and another minister by the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister may also discharge another minister in other circumstances. ”

“ Each Minister shall carry out the duties in accordance with the law pertaining to his office. Ministers without portfolio, shall perform such duties as prescribed by the decision of the Prime Minister. ”

“ A Minister and a Vice Minister shall be assigned to the Ministry of Government Legislation, and the Minister shall be appointed in political service and the Vice Minister shall be appointed as a state public official in extraordinary civil service who belongs to the Senior Civil Service. ”

“ Article 98 Ministers shall head their respective ministries, shall resolve issues assigned to the competence of their ministries, and shall also discharge other functions prescribed by laws. A Minister may be temporarily substituted only by another member of the Government appointed by the Prime Minister. ”

“ Ministers and Heads of ministerial-level agencies are personally responsible to the Prime Minister, Government and National Assembly for the sectors and fields under their charge and, together with other members of Government, shall assume the collective responsibility for the work of the Government. ”

“ Former ministers are currently prohibited from lobbying government for two years.28 The structure of government Allocation of functions to ministers 3.48 The Prime Minister is responsible for the overall organisation of the Government and the allocation of functions between ministers. It is a fundamental part of the Prime Minister’s role to ensure that Cabinet and the Government are structured in the most effective way. ”

“ A Council of Ministers has been constituted by the Emperor, Ministers being appointed for Justice, Finance, Commerce, War, Foreign Affairs, Posts and Telegraphs, Interior, and a sort of Lord Privy Seal. The most important Minister is the Minister of War. ”

“ The executive power is vested in the council of ministers, at whose head is the minister-president. There are eight ministries, namely, the ministry of the interior, of national defence, of worship and instruction, of finance, of commerce, of agriculture, of justice, and of railways. ”

“ In the United States, where the whole people is the fountain of power, the ministers are the servants of the President, appointed and dismissed by him. In England, while they are still in theory her Majesty's ministers, and the Prime Minister is nominally selected by the sovereign, by a remarkable transformation they have become the servants of the legislature—that is, of the people. ”

“ The ministers, and not the sovereign, may be held to account by parliament for every executive act performed, and it is but logical that they should control the time and tenor of such acts. It falls very generally to the prime minister to speak for and otherwise represent the ministerial group. On the whole, however, it accords best with both law and fact to consider the executive under the working constitution as consisting of the crown as represented and advised by the ministry. ”

“ AND WHEREAS it is a true and admitted principle in all free governments, that the efficient Minister is the best and only judge of what suits the constitution, pleases the appetite, or is adapted to the wants of the subject. ”

“ The Premier shall appoint and may remove on his own responsibility the Ministers of State at the heads of the various Government Ministries. He shall be responsible to the King for the entire work of each Ministry. ”

“ One thing alone he can do, and it is an important thing, quite big enough to occupy his attention. He can make sure that the broad policy of the office, and its big new departures, are in accord with the ideas of the majority in Parliament, and are co-ordinated, through the Cabinet, with the policy of the other departments. That, indeed, is the true function of a minister; and if he tries to make his responsibility real beyond that, he may easily neglect his main work. ”

“ Ministers, being public men, are, of course, as Mr. Macdonald means to point out, exposed to the criticism, frequently so absurd, that eminence entails. I recently examined the bye-laws of a literary association in Ross-shire, of which the president is a sheep-farmer, and the secretary, a postman. It is a rule of this association that no minister is ever to be president, the reason assigned being that ministers would try to elevate the natives too hurriedly. ”

“ The World dealeth with Ministers of State as they do with ill Fidlers, ready to kick them down Stairs for playing ill, though few of the Fault-finders understand their Musick enough to be good Judges.
A Minister who undertaketh to make his Master very great, if he faileth, is ruin’d for his folly; if he succeedeth, he is feared for his Skill. ”

“ If two-thirds of the members of the chambers so request, projected treaties of alliance must be laid before Congress, and the appointment and suspension of public officials may be effected only on proposal of the ministers. Every act of the President must be countersigned by at least one minister, and every minister is responsible politically and legally for all acts which he countersigns or executes. One member of the ministerial group, designated by the President, exercises the functions of premier. ”

“ You have now brought the merits of your administration to an issue, on which every Englishman, of the narrowest capacity, may determine for himself. It is not an alarm to the passions, but a calm appeal to the judgment of the people, upon their own most essential interests. A more experienced minister would not have hazarded a direct invasion of the first principles of the constitution, before he had made some progress in subduing the spirit of the people. ”

“ It is seldom that a Prime Minister can give complete satisfaction in the formation of a Ministry, though the task is perhaps lightened by the fact that the possession of rare ability is not an absolute necessity for a Cabinet Minister. ”

“ Very shining ministers, like the sun, are apt to scorch when they shine the brightest: in our constitution, I prefer the milder light of a less glaring minister. His successor is not yet, at least publicly, ‘designatus’. You will easily suppose that many are very willing, and very few able, to fill that post. Various persons are talked of, by different people, for it, according as their interest prompts them to wish, or their ignorance to conjecture. ”

“ Public minister who. A PUBLIC MINISTER, is he, that by the sovereign, whether a monarch or an assembly, is employed in any affairs, with authority to represent in that employment, the person of the commonwealth. ”

“ There is a department of the business of the House that has lately assumed alarming proportions—the putting of questions to Ministers upon every conceivable topic. I would here apply, without hesitation, the printing direct and the plural backing, and sweep away the practice entirely from the public proceedings of the House. No single member unsupported should have the power of trotting out a Minister at will. ”

“ By silent submission and tireless observance of duty he may rise, and rise quickly: he may become Governor, Chief justice, Minister of State, Minister Plenipotentiary; but the higher he rises, the heavier will his bonds become. ”

“ He appoints and dismisses ministers at will, issues ordinances with the force of law, and exercises far-reaching control over the processes of legislation. Upon the failure of the chambers to vote supplies which are held to be essential, he may even collect and expend revenues for a year on no authority apart from his own. For purposes of administrative supervision there are ministers of War, Finance, Justice, Foreign Affairs, the Interior, and Education, and the ministers collectively comprise a Gesammt-Ministerium, or ministry of state. Measures of the crown are countersigned by a minister ”

“ Most Cabinet ministers in charge of considerable departments are men of superior ability; I have heard an eminent living statesman of long experience say that in his time he only knew one instance to the contrary. And there is the best protection that it shall be so. A considerable Cabinet minister has to defend his department in the face of mankind ”

“ The Minister has command of the opinions and views of all officers of the department he administers on matters of public policy. Good stewardship demands from Ministers of the Crown frank, fair, full statements of all opinions of trusted experienced officials to colleagues when they have direct reference to matters of high policy. ”

“ Each member of the Executive Cabinet shall serve as the head of a department or agency of the World Administration or Integrative Complex, and in this capacity shall be designated as Minister of the particular department or agency. ”

“ He descends from a position of transcendent dignity to the obscurity of private life. His ministers are his secretaries, without influence, comparatively, in the halls of Congress,--neither made nor unmade by the legislature, although dependent on the Senate for confirmation, but once appointed, independent of both houses, and responsible only to the irremovable Executive, who can defy even public opinion, unless he aims at re-election, a unique government in the political history of the world. ”

“ Ministerial Responsibility.—In its actual operation the English cabinet system involves the unvarying application of three principles: (1) the responsibility of cabinet ministers to Parliament; (2) the non-publicity of cabinet proceedings; and (3) the close co-ordination of the cabinet group under the leadership of the premier. Every minister whether or not in the cabinet, is responsible individually to Parliament, which in effect means to the House of Commons, for all of his public acts. If he is accorded a vote of censure he must retire. ”

“ Even in the country where the people were less fortunate, where Ministers govern, a change of Ministers never produced any solid advantage to the nation. It was merely an expedient of the moment, to smother a popular clamor. But, even proceeding upon the gentleman's hypothesis, which Mr. G. thought wholly inadmissible, he submitted to the gentleman to determine, whether a positive submission by foreigners to the avaricious regulations of a Minister, be the most likely mean to render him unpopular at home? ”