sources of the Uk constitution Flashcards
what is statute law?
statute law includes any momentous acts passed by parliament, which contribute to the UK’s uncodified constitution.
what does it mean for a constitution to be uncodified ?
when the constitution isn’t contained within one document and is often made up of multiple sources. An example of a codified constitution is the constitution of the USA which has been amended up to 27 times in previous years.
what is a constitution?
a set of rules which lay out how a country should be fairly and legitmatley run.
an example of statue law
the equality act of 2010, which codifies into one parliamentary statute all previous anti discriminatary legislation.
what is common law?
common law is law which is made by jurys when statue law is unclear or doesn’t cover a specific situation. This is also known as jury made law
example of common / jury made law
somerset v stewart case (1772)
-black slave (james somerset) was wrongly imprisoned by charles stewart. somerset had escaped and lawyers who were acting for him had claimed that he had been wrongly imprisoned as there was no english statute law which justified slavery.
- this was the first case to challenge the legitamacy of slavery before its abolition by parliament in 1833
conventions
a convention is an accustomed way in which political activity is carried out, a convention is often a form of tradition and dosen’t have to legally be carried out.
an example of a convention
an example of a conevention is when in 1963 when lord holmes decided that it would be constitutionally unacceptable for a member of the house of lords to become PM. This is because the members of the house of lords aren’t elected by the public and therefore this would undermine the legitamacey of parliament. Therefore he resigned his perrage in the house of lords in order to run in a by election to gain a seat in the houses of commons. This would therefore allow for the general public to legitmatley vote him to be PM if they so wished
landmark decisions
landmark decisions are similar to conventions. They are momentous historical events which contribute to the constitution of the UK
example of a landmark decision
the Magna Carta of 1215 was the earliest example of challening the power that the monarch / king held and was the first act which limited the power of the monarch and therefore further enforced the principle of the right of law
what is the ‘principle right of law’ ?
everyone including public and government and public officials must adhere to the same set of laws, essentially no one is above the law even the monarch. An example of when the principle right of law was breached was during the 2020 lockdown when Boris Johnson and other government officials threw parties which breached the rules of UK lockdown at this point in time. This is now known as the ‘partygate’ scandal
what are authoritative works?
influential texts which have been seen as so monumentous they are now part of the UK constitution.
example of an authoritative work/s
Walter Bagehot’s explaination of how the monarchy the legislature and the executive are all closely linked/ related. This work is an example of a core constitutional text.
what is a treaty ?
a treaty is a written agreement between two or more political entities(countries).
example of a treaty
the european communities act of 1972, therefore enabled the UK to accept the treaty of accession. Therefore as a result of this the UK could then become signatory to the treaty of Rome and accept all EU community law.
