Commissions of Inquiry in Germany

1936 ◽  
Vol 30 (6) ◽  
pp. 1134-1143
Author(s):  
Fritz Morstein Marx
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Procedure ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Grand Jury ◽  
Representative Government ◽  
Legislative Control ◽  
Commissions Of Inquiry ◽  
Recent Addition

Inquiries are ventures into the unknown. As instrumentalities of government, officially organized investigations are a relatively recent addition to the mechanism of politics. Leaving aside regular agencies of criminal procedure such as the grand jury, one may say that the emergence of investigating committees is closely connected with the growth of representative government. Parliamentary inquiries have come to be regarded as essential implements of legislative control over the executive branch. The present brief survey of German experience undertakes to show the potentialities and limitations of a different type of officially organized investigation: the executive inquiry.

Legislatures and Foreign Relations

1917 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 643-684 ◽  
Author(s):  
Denys P. Myers
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Relations ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
The State ◽  
Foreign Affairs ◽  
Treaty Ratification ◽  
Legislative Control ◽  
Complete Independence ◽  
The Government ◽  
International Phenomenon ◽  
Complete Dependence

In a previous paper foreign relations as a phase of governmental activity were considered chiefly as an international phenomenon. Such relations were there discussed largely in their political bearing and some attempt was made to deduce from practice the considerations which affect foreign offices and the conditions encountered by diplomatic personnel. The problems of secrecy in negotiations and of secret treaties were examined and an effort made to indicate how much knowledge of both may be justifiably concealed. The present paper is a study of legislative control over foreign relations.Systems of legislative handling of foreign relations may be distinguished as of three types, which we may designate as the continental, the executive, and the American. The American type is characterized by an imposed agreement between the executive and legislative departments of government before treaties can become binding upon the state. The continental type is characterized by a less complete dependence of the executive upon the legislative department in respect to treaty ratification. The executive type is characterized by an almost complete independence of the executive respecting treaty ratification.All systems recognize definitely that the conduct of foreign relations is an executive function. None denies the patent facts that it is the place of the executive to speak and act for the state, and that, in all matters not definable as legislation, the minister can definitely bind the state. Innumerable decisions under all systems are reached by the department of foreign affairs without any but the executive branch of the government knowing anything of them until they are recorded facts.

Pleas of the Crown

2019 ◽  
pp. 540-561
Author(s):  
John Baker
Keyword(s):  
Capital Punishment ◽  
Criminal Procedure ◽  
Grand Jury ◽  
History Of ◽  
Convicted Felons

This chapter traces the history of criminal procedure. The early ‘appeal’ of felony gave way to the indictment, a written presentment approved by a grand jury. Until Georgian times there were few safeguards for the accused other than whatever care was taken by judge and jury. Counsel were rarely involved, except in treason cases; trials were brief; and there were no appeals. The capital punishment imposed on all convicted felons was adjusted in practice by the mechanisms of sanctuary, benefit of clergy, ‘pious perjury’ by jurors, and pardons. Benefit of clergy was originally a privilege of ordained clergy, but the judges contrived to extend it to any man who could read, and Parliament perfected the fiction by extending it to women and the illiterate. Pardons were widely available underlay both the system of transportation and a form of criminal appeal.

12. Votes, Elections, Legislatures, and Legislators

Politics ◽  
2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Ferdinand ◽  
Robert Garner ◽  
Stephanie Lawson
Keyword(s):  
Gender Equality ◽  
Internal Structure ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Representative Government ◽  
Political Class ◽  
Members Of Parliament

This chapter explores the interrelationships among votes, elections, legislatures, and legislators in the context of politics. It first considers the two basic paradoxes of voting before discussing elections and their outcomes, which tend to have different virtues: stronger government versus more representative government. It then describes the functions of legislatures as well as measures for establishing quotas to increase gender equality in legislative recruitment. It also introduces a classification of legislatures based upon their capability to stand up to the executive branch of government before concluding with an analysis of the internal structure of legislatures as well as the backgrounds of members of parliament in various countries, focusing in particular on the criticism that lawmakers constitute a ‘political class’.

Prospects for Expanding the Subject of Penal Law

Lex Russica ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 114-122
Author(s):  
V. Е. Yuzhanin
Keyword(s):  
Social Relations ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
Criminal Responsibility ◽  
Criminal Procedure ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Social Adaptation ◽  
House Arrest ◽  
Penal Law ◽  
Criminal Procedure Law ◽  
The Subject

The paper notes that the issue of the independence of penal law as a branch is not relevant; still the issue on the subject of this branch of law, which is understood in a narrow (classical) and broad senses, remains acute. The classical definition of the subject consists of social relations arising in the execution of all punishments, and now other measures of a criminal law nature. Currently, scientists are increasingly talking about the need to expand the subject of penal law due to the inclusion of public relations in the execution of measures of restraint in form of detention and house arrest; assistance in social adaptation of the persons released from serving of punishment and other measures of criminal legal character; and when applying the non-punitive means of influence on prisoners.The author does not agree that the penal law should regulate only punishments and other measures of a criminal legal nature, which are a form of realization of criminal responsibility. In this regard, compulsory medical measures, confiscation of property and a court fine cannot be considered as such. If we consider criminal responsibility in a broad sense — as having a coercive rather than punitive character, then all measures of a criminal nature should be covered by it and be the subject of this branch of law. Penal law is not penal executive law but penal law.The paper notes that not legally, but practically, the execution of detention and house arrest is included in the subject of penal law, as they are executed by institutions and bodies of the Federal Enforcement Service and are included in the course of penal law at the Russian Federal Enforcement Service universities. The author of the paper admits that these preventive measures may be the subject of penal law, which, as in relation to criminal law, is the executive branch in relation to criminal procedure law.Many scholars believe that post-penitentiary relations are the subject of penal law. Agreeing with them, the author of the paper believes that in this case it is necessary to provide for the purpose of penal legislation — the resocialization of convicts, which includes correction, preparation of convicts for release and their social adaptation after release from punishment. As an example, the author refers to the regulation of such relations in the Penal Code of the Republic of Belarus and Ukraine.Thus, the subject of penal law should be the criminal executive social relations that develop in the implementation of compulsory institutions of criminal and criminal procedure law, having an executive direction.

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