Page 68 - DPOL202_COMPARATIVE_POLITICS_AND_GOVERNMENT_ENGLISH

Unit 3: Constitutions and Constitutionalism

fixed form; it should be treated as a dynamic affair that changes with the emergence of new Notes
conditions, new challenges, new problems and new issues. And change “is not something to be
feared and avoided, as Aristotle thought, but it is of the very warp and weft of modern
constitutionalism.”
Self-Assessment
1. Fill in the blanks:
(i) The post of president of the American Republic came as a result of the 22nd amendment
of ............... .
(ii) Monarchy terminated around ............... .
(iii) The Great Reform Acts were passed in 1832, 1867 and ............... .
(iv) Philadelphia convention took place in ............... .
(v) The constitution of a state is defined as a body of ............... and ..............., written as well
as ............... .

3.6 Summary

• In simple terms, the constitution of a state may be defined as a body of rules and regulations,
written as well as unwritten, whereby the government is organised and it functions.
• Thus, a constitution “may be said to be a collection of principles according to which the
powers of the government, the rights of the governed, and the relations between the two are
adjusted.”
• The rules of a constitution may be in a written form, whether in detail or in brief, or most of
them may be in the form of maxims, usages, precedents and customs, it is essential that these
rules as a whole determine the organisation and working of the government of a state. It may
be a deliberate creation on paper in the form of a single document prepared by some assembly
or convention, or it may be in the form of a bundle of documents having authority of the law
of the state the best example of which may be seen in the case of the English constitution.
• It is used to describe the whole system of the government of a country, the collection of rules
which establish and regulate or govern the government. These rules are partly legal, in the
sense, that the courts of law will recognise and apply them and partly non-legal or extra-
legal, taking the form of usages, understandings, customs, or conventions which courts do
not recognise as law but which are no less effective in regulating the government than the
rules of law strictly called.
• Every constitution grows with the passage of time. It means that the rules of a constitution
have a Darwinian character. James McIntosh and Sir Henry Maine recognise this fact when
they hold that a constitution is not made, it grows. It well applied to the case of England
where the constitution is an evolved instrument; it is a growth and not a make. But its first
part does not apply to a country having an enacted constitution like the United States where
the constitution is regarded both as a make and a growth.
• Every constitution has a procedure by which it can be amended in response to the needs of
the time. The process may be very simple making the constitution an example of a flexible
instrument (as in England), or it may be very difficult (as in USA and Switzerland), or a
mixture of the two (as in India), it is certain that a constitution is changed from time to time
by following the procedure laid down for that purpose.
• A new constitution certainly has new provisions, or it may restore some of the old provisions
with necessary alterations. For instance, the new constitution of China (1982) restores the
office of the Chairman (President) of the republic. In Pakistan the Ayub Constitution of 1962
established presidential form of government, but the Bhutto Constitution of 1977 restored
the parliamentary system.

LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY 63