But after the sovereignty of parliament was established, ministers, acting in the monarch's name, used the prerogative to legitimise decisions which they took without parliamentary approval. There was even some talk of John Major using the device to ratify the Maastricht Treaty if the House of Commons would not pass the necessary resolution. No government could have survived so gigantic an affront to parliamentary government. But the royal prerogative is still used to legitimise smaller acts of autocracy. In Britain, ministers take office and parliament is dissolved under the royal prerogative.
Power lies with politicians.
So does the opportunity for power's abuse. The aura of the privy council is attached to both institutions because of two peculiarly English diseases - the belief that association with the sovereign reinforces authority and the conviction that antiquity increases respect. So the privy council is not just an anachronism. It is one of those elements in our constitution which, because they have arcane rules and archaic associations, exist to prove that real power lies in places remote from everyday life. The mystery and magic of the monarchy and everything which flows from it are meant to be living proof of the distinction between them and us.