5] The Lord Chancellor is invariably a member of the
Cabinet. He is the chief judge in the High Court of Justice and in the
Court of Appeal. He appoints and removes the justices of the peace and
the judges of the county courts and wields large influence in
appointments to higher judicial posts. He affixes the Great Seal where
it is required to give validity to the acts of the crown and he
performs a wide variety of other more or less formal services.
Finally, it is the Lord High Chancellor who presides in the House of
Lords.

[Footnote 85: Government of England, I., 131.]

*65. The Five Secretaries of State.*--Five of the great departments
to-day represent the product of a curious evolution of the ancient
secretariat of state. Originally there was but a single official who
bore the designation of secretary of state. In the earlier eighteenth
century a second official was added, although no new office was
created. At the close of the century a third was added, after the
Crimean War a fourth, and after the Indian Mutiny of 1857 a fifth.
There are now, accordingly, five "principal secretaries of state," all
in theory occupying the same office and each, save for a few statutory
restrictions, competent legally to exercise the functions of any or
all of the others. In practice each of the five holds strictly to his
own domain. The group comprises: (1) the Secretary of State for the
Home Department, assisted by a parliamentary under-secretary and a
large staff of permanent officials, and possessing functions of a
highly miscellaneous sort--those, in general, belonging to the (p. 064)
ancient secretariat which have not been assigned to the care of other
departments; (2) the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, at the
head of a department which not only conducts foreign relations but
administers the affairs of such protectorates as are not closely
connected with any of the colonies; (3) the Secretary of State for the
Colonies; (4) the Secretary of State for War; and (5) the Secretary of
State for India, assisted by a special India Council of ten to
fourteen members.

*66. The Administrative Boards.*--The third general group of departments
comprises those which have arisen through the establishment in
comparatively recent years of a variety of administrative boards
or commissions. Two--the Board of Trade and the Board of
Education--originated as committees of the Privy Council. Three
others--the Boar