Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1871.djvu/432

 396 SPAIN.

the presence of the King. No project can become law until after it has been voted in both bodies. Projects of law on taxation, public credit, and military forces, must be presented to the Congress before being submitted to the Senate, and if in the latter assembly the) ? suffer any alteration which the former cannot admit, the resolu- tion of the Congress is to prevail.'

The executive rests, under the King, in a Ministry divided into seven departments, namely : —

1. Ministerio de Estado, or Ministry of State and Foreign Affairs.

2. Ministerio de la Gobernacion, or Ministry of the Interior.

3. Ministerio de Hacienda, or Ministry of Finance.

4. Ministerio de la Guerra, or Ministry of War.

5. Ministerio de Marina, or Ministry of Marine.

G. Ministerio de Gracia y Justicia, or Ministry of Justice.

7. Ministerio de Fomento, or Ministry of Public Works.

It is enacted by section 89 of the Constitution that the Ministers shall be responsible to the Cortes for all acts committed in the ex- ercise of their functions — ' los Ministros son responsables ante las Cortes de los delitos que cometan en el ejercicio de sus funciones.' In these cases, the Congress has to form itself into a chamber ot accusation, and the Senate into a chamber of judgment.

Church and Education.

The national Church of Spain is the Roman Catholic, and the whole population of the kingdom, with the exception of about 60,000 persons, adhere to the same faith. According to section 21 of the Charter of 1869, ' the nation binds itself to maintain the worship and ministers of the Catholic religion.' It is further enacted, that ' the public or private exercise of any other form of worship is guaranteed to all foreigners resident in Spain without any further limitations than the universal rules of morality and right — las reglas universales de la moral y del derecho. If any Spaniards profess a religion other than the Catholic, all that the last clause provides is applicable to them.' Resolutions of former legislative bodies, not repealed in the Constitution of 1869, settled that the clergy of the established Church are to be maintained by the State. On the other hand, by two decrees of the Cortes, passed July 23, 1835, and March 9, 1836, all conventual establishments were suppressed, and their property confiscated for the benefit of the nation. These decrees gave rise to a long dispute with the head of the Roman Catholic Church, which ended in the sovereign pontiff conceding the principle of the measure. By a concordat with Rome, concluded in August, 1859, the Spanish Government was authorised to sell the