The King and His Dominion Governors, 1936

First Published in 1967. The method or system of government in the United Kingdom and the self-governing Dominions may be described with sufficient accuracy as that of a political democracy under the Crown. This study is published because the author is convinced that constant research into, and analysis of, all the present-day implications and tendencies of such method or system are essential.

Herbert Vere Evatt

The general problem of the reserve power of the crown; the reserve power in relation to the doctrine of responsible government; the reserve power in relation to the origin of colonial responsible government; an important Tasmanian precedent of 1914; the double dissolution of the Commonwealth parliament in 1914; refusals of dissolution in the Commonwealth prior to 1914; Lord Byng and the Canadian crisis of 1926; the Ramsay MacDonald dissolution of 1924; the monarch's reserve power - the struggle of 1909-11; the monarch's prerogative of dismissal in relation to the home rule bill; Dicey's treatment of the crown's reserve power of dismissal; Dicey's theory of the conventions of the constitution as applied to the power of dissolution; the reserve power in relation of the question of sanctions; the New South Wales constitutional crisis of 1926; Lord Chelmsford's exercise of reserve powers - the Queensland crisis of 1907-8; upper house appointments - the Queensland precedent of 1920; the Strickland-Holman crisis of 1916 - recall of the governor; the reserve power and the doctrine of the parliament situation - a Commonwealth precedent of 1918; Sir Philip Game's exercise of the power of dismissal in 1932; exercise of the reserve power on the ground of illegality; the in relation to the imperial conference declarations of 1926 and 1930; the constitutional status of the Australian states and Canadian provinces; Todd's thesis as to a governor's power to refuse a dissolution; the grant of dissolution in Victoria in 1908-9; two recent exercises of the power of dissolution in the Commonwealth; two older precedents affecting the governor's power of dismissal; Todd's generalizations as to the reserve powers of dismissal and dissolution; leading text-writers on the reserve power of the crown; the arguments in favour of the elasticity of the reserve power; the Irish free state's control of the reserve powers; some practical aspects of the problem of defining the reserve power; consideration of some related problems; appendix - the new status of South Africa.