COMMISSIONER, in general an officer appointed to carry out some particular work, or to discharge the duty of a particular office; one who is a member of a commission (q.v.). He is legally defined as a person authorized by letters patent, act of parliament or other lawful warrant to execute any public office. The Com missioners Clauses Act of 1847 provides that commissioners exe cuting undertakings of a public nature under an act of parliament are immune from personal liability. In this sense the word is ap plied to members of a permanently constituted department of the administration, as civil service commissioners, commissioners of income tax, commissioners in lunacy, etc. It is also the title given to the heads of or important officials in various governmental de partments, as commissioner of customs. In some British posses sions in Africa and the Pacific the head of the Government is styled high commissioner. In India a commissioner is the chief administrative official of a division which includes several districts. The office does not exist in Madras, where the same duties are discharged by a board of revenue, but is found in most of the other provinces. The commissioner comes midway between the local government and the district officer. In the regulation prov inces the district officer is called a collector (q.v.), and in the non regulation provinces a deputy-commissioner. In the former he must always be a member of the covenanted civil service, but in the latter he may be a military officer.
A chief commissioner is a high Indian official, governing a prov ince inferior in status to a lieutenant-governorship, but in direct subordination to the governor-general in council. Of the 15 provinces of British India, nine are administered by lieutenant governors and the remaining six by chief commissioners.
A commissioner for oaths in England is a solicitor appointed by the lord chancellor to administer oaths to persons making affida vits for the purpose of any cause or matter. The Commissioner for Oaths Act 1889 (with an amending act 1891), amending and consolidating various other acts, regulates the appointment and powers of such commissioners. Under the Rules of the Supreme Court (R.S.C. O. 37 r. s) the High Court may order that any witness, whose attendance in court ought for sufficient cause to be dispensed with, be examined on oath by an officer of the court or a commissioner appointed for that purpose. In such cases the evidence is said to be taken "on commission."