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■2-20
III. CONSTITUTION AND ADMINISTRATION.
In the Departments of State, which are subdivided into special Bureaus,
not only are cases prepared to be laid before the King-in-Cabinet, but also
the decisions there arrived at are subsequently drawn up in documentary
form. For each department there is a Secretary’s office (kansli). All
these offices, together with those of the Revising Judicial Office and
the Attorney-General, are collectively known as the Government Offices
(Kungl. Maj:ts kansli). Exceptions hereto are found in those divisions
of the defence departments that prepare military matters relating to the
chief command, i.e., such matters as the King, in the capacity of supreme
commander of the military forces by land and sea, has to deal with and
which are prepared by officers.
The Minister is assisted in the work of his department by an
Under-Secretary of State (expeditionschef; in the Department for Foreign
Affairs called kabinettssekreterare), who has to deal with, or supervise
the treatment of, the business that comes before the department. Under
hirn there are Chiefs of the Bureaus (kansliråd). Lower officials are the
Chief Clerk (kanslisekreterare) and Recorder (registrator). The
Under-Secretaries and the Chiefs of the Bureaus are, as a rule, the persons who
introduce business before the Preliminary Ministerial Conference
(statsrådsberedningen), where business is finally prepared for the consideration
of the King-in-Cabinet. In the Preliminary Ministerial Conference there
take part in ordinary cases the heads of the departments and two
Consultative Ministers; but in more important cases other ministers, and even all the
ministers, may take part.
Since the creation of the eigth department (of Agriculture), the
apportionment of business among the Departments of State has been regulated by the
Royal Statute of 31 March 1900 and the alterations made therein. The
eight Departments of State are, according to the Constitution Act, as follows:
the Department of Justice, for Foreign Affairs,’ for Land Defence, for Naval
Defence, for Home Affairs, of Finance, for Ecclesiastical Affairs, and of
Agriculture. These departments are, in general terms, concerned with the business
denoted in general European usage by the denominations given. It may, however,
be mentioned that under the administration of the Navy Department also fall
Pilots, Lighthouses, and Schools of Navigation; that the Finance Department
has charge of Land-registration, institutions for Commerce, Industry, and
Navigation, the Customs, the Central Bureau of Statistics and Civil Service Pensions;
that the Ecclesiastical Department, in addition to Church Affairs, has under its
supervision Public Education, Science and Art; that the Department of
Agriculture exercises control over Public Forests, Crown Desmesnes, Land-Surveying,
General and Geological Maps, High-roads and Posting Relays thereon the
Veterinary-Surgeons and Stud-Establishments, and (for the present) Poor Relief. The
Home Department, which corresponds to what in other countries is called the
"Department of the Interior", has the superintendence of Communications, the
Public Health, Insurance System and social matters in general.
The great part played by the Central Boards of Administration in the
historical development of the Swedish administrative system has already
been indicated in the short preliminary survey at the head of this article.
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