Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource The Monarch and the Westminster Government Subject The topic of the resource Monarch Description An account of the resource These documents illustrate the relationship between the Monarch and the Government at Westminster. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Jason Loch Ministerial Submission This is a minister's formal advice to the Sovereign. Transcript A transcript of the document. Mr. Secretary Akers-Douglas with his humble duty begs leave to enclose a Memorandum which he has prepared at Your Majesty’s desire on the Royal Prerogative of Mercy—or rather on the constitutional practice as to the exercise of the prerogative. Mr. Douglas thinks it is most important that the practice of the last 80 years at any rate, should not be departed from. He would particularly emphasize the three following points. <ol> <li>There are from 5000 to 6000 petitions every year against convictions and sentences. If Your Majesty is to deal personally with any of them, you ought to deal personally with all. It would be invidious to pick and choose.</li> <li>If Your Majesty is to deal with death sentences your attention must be available at all times from sentence to final decision. The practice of the S[ecretary] of S[tate] is to deal not only on the evidence at the trial: but on evidence which accumulates until the last moment.</li> <li>The power of reprieve involves the power, and duty to refuse to reprieve. This latter power is sometimes bitterly attacked, and public opinion is lashed up by an unscrupulous partisan press. For instance the Radical Press took up Lipski’s case—in Mr. Secretary Matthews’s time—and if my memory serves me Mr. Stead in one of his papers said, ‘So an innocent man is to be sent to the gallows to gratify the wounded vanity of the Home Secretary.’ Such cases may always arise from time to time—and it must be borne in mind that ‘yellow journalism’ is on the increase. It would be intolerable that Your Majesty’s name should be dragged into the mire to serve the temporary purposes of some wretched newspaper.</li> </ol> Again suppose a man of good position is reprieved strictly according to the traditional exercise of the prerogative (say great temptation and sudden passion) a section of the Press would not hesitate to attribute it to personal influence and raise the cry of ‘one law for the rich and another for the poor’. It is in Mr. Douglas’s opinion the Home Secretary’s duty to bear the brunt of such attacks, and to defend himself if necessary in Parliament. Signatures The person who signed the document even if there isn't a wet-ink signature. Aretas Akers-Douglas (Secretary of State for the Home Department) Recipient(s) King Edward VII Special Features This is a place to enter any distinguishing features. This is an example of a submission that doesn't explicitly ask the Monarch to do something, yet it arguably constitutes advice in a constitutional sense. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Submission - Memorandum on the Royal Prerogative of Mercy [1903-09-26] Subject The topic of the resource Royal Prerogative Criminal Law Description An account of the resource Letter from Aretas Akers-Douglas, to King Edward VII containing a memorandum on the exercise of the Royal Prerogative of Mercy. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Aretas Akers-Douglas (Secretary of State for the Home Department) Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived H. J. Hanham, ed., The Nineteenth Century Constitution 1815-1914: Documents and Commentary (Cambridge University Press, 1969), 52-53. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1903-09-26 Home Secretary Monarch Royal Prerogative