Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1871.djvu/67

 takes place. The Chamber has the parliamentary initiative and the preliminary vote in all cases relating to the receipts and expenses of the State and the contingent of the army.

The Senate is composed of exactly one-half the number of members comprising the Chamber of Representatives, and the senators are elected by the same citizens who appoint the deputies. The senators are chosen for eight years; they retire in one moiety every four years; but in case of dissolution the election must comprise the whole number of which the Senate is composed. The qualifications necessary for a senator are, that he must be a Belgian by birth or naturalisation; in full possession of all political and civil rights; resident within the kingdom; at least forty years of age; and paying in direct taxes not less than 84 £ sterling. In those provinces where the list of citizens who possess this last-mentioned qualification does not reach to the proportion of one in 6,000 of the population, that list is enlarged by the admission into it of those citizens who pay the greatest amount of direct taxes, so that the list shall always contain at least one person who is eligible to the Senate for every 6,000 inhabitants of the province. The senators do not receive any pay. The presumptive heir to the throne is of right a senator at the age of eighteen, but he has no voice in the proceedings until twenty-five years of age. All the proceedings of the Senate during the time the Chamber of Representatives is not sitting are without force.

The Executive Government consists of six departments, as follows:—

1. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs.—Baron J. d'Anethan, appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs, and President of the Council of Ministers, July 2, 1870.

2. The Ministry of Finance.—Victor Jacobs, appointed Aug. 3, 1870.

3. The Ministry of Justice.—Pierre Cornesse, appointed July 2, 1870.

4. The Ministry of Public Works.—Armand Wassiège, appointed Sept. 12, 1870.

5. The Ministry of War.—Major-General Guillaume, appointed July 2, 1870.

6. The Ministry of the Interior.—Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, appointed July 2, 1870.

Besides the above responsible heads of departments there are a number of so-called ministers of State without portfolio, who form a privy council called together on special occasions by the sovereign.