TITLE OF PRIME MINISTER

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 123, 20 November 1926, Page 20

TITLE OF PRIME MINISTER

UNKNOWN IN ENGLISH LAW. A recent trial at Old Bailey in London of a person charged with "casting a certain destructive substance at the Prime Minister and other persons with intent to do grievous bodily harm," has caused an inquiry in British law circles as to_ the legal authority for tho designation "Prime Minister." The question was raised by Justice Rowlatt, presiding at the trial, when he asked, "Is the Prime Minister a designation known to the law?" The Justice wanted to know if the indictment against the prisoner, one Hugh Daly, sufficiently described jthe ( person as the subject of attempted assault. The prosecuting attorney then assured the Court that "Prime Minister" was a sufficient designation, and that it was not necessary to mention a specific • person. An inquiry into the subject has disclosed that Mr. Gladstone, writing in 1878, said that nothing could be more curiously illustrative of the political genius of the people than the position of the Prime Minister. Departmentally, he is* no more than the first named of five perstns, by whom joint? ly the'powers of the Lord Treasurership are exercised; ho is not their master, or, otherwise than by mere priority, their head, and he has no special function or prerogative under the formal constitution of the office. He has no official rank except that of Privy Councillor. Eight members of the Cabinet, including five Secretaries of State and several other members of the Government, take official precedence of him. His rights and duties as head of the Administration are nowhere recorded.

The term "Prime Minister" is first found in the writings of Swift, who used the term in his preface tor the "History of the Last Four Years of Queen Anne," with a recognition of its novelty—"those who are now called Prime Ministers."

Walpole^.was most unwilling to be called Prime Minister, but in 1741 a number of peers drew up a protest against Walpole's Government on the ground that "a sole or even a first minister is an officer unknown to the law of Great Britain."