SECRETARY OF STATE. The office of secretary of state is one of very ancient date, and the person who fills it has been called variously "the king's chief secretary, " principal secretary," and, after the Restoration. " principal secretary of state." lie was in fact the king's private secretary, and had custody of the king's signet. The duties of the office were originally performed by a single person, who had the aid of four clerks. The statute 27 Henry VIII., c. 11, regu lating the fent to be taken by " the king's clerks of his grace's signet and privy seal," directs that all grants to be passed under any of his majesty's seals shall, before they are so sealed, be brought and delivered to the icing's principal secretary or to one of the clerks of the signet. The division of the office between two persona is said to have occurred at the end of the reign of Henry VIII., but it is probable that the two secretaries were not until long afterwards of equal rank. Thus we find Sir Francis Walsinghain, iu the time of Queen Elizabeth, addressed as her majcety'a principal secretary of state, although Dr. Thomas Wilson was his colleague in the office. Clarendon, when describing the chief ministers at the beginning of the reign of Charles I., mentions the two secretaries of state, "who were not in those days officers of that magnitude they have been since; being only to make despatches upon the conclusions 'of councils, not to govern or preside in those councils." Nevertheless the principal secretary of state must, by his immediate and constant access to the king, have been always a person of great influence in the state. The 'statute 31 Henry VII f., c. 10, gives the king's chief secretary, if lie is a baron or a bishop, place above all peers of the same degree; and it enacts that if lie is not a peer, lie shall have a seat reserved for him on the woolsack in parliament ; and in the Star Chamber and other conferences of the council, that he shall be placed next to the ten great officers of state named in the statute. Ile probably was always a member of the privy council. Cardinal Wolney.in his disgrace earnestly implores Secretary Gardiner (afterwards bishop of Winchester), whom he addresses as a privy coun cillor, to intercede for him with the king. (Ellis's `Letters; vol. ii.) Lord Camden, in hisjudgment in the case of Entick r. Carrington (II Har grave's State Trials,' p. 317), attributes the growth of the secretary of state's importance to his intercourse with ambassadors and the management of all the foreign correspondence of the state, after the policy of having resident ministers in foreign courts was established in Europe. Lord Camden indeed denies that he was anciently a privy
counsellor.' The number of secretaries of state seems to have varied from time to time : in the reign of George III. there were often only two; but there are now five principal secretaries of state, whose duties are divided into five departments, namely, for home affairs, foreign affairs, for war, for the colonies, and a fifth, first appointed in 1858, for the management of the affairs of India. They are always made members of the privy council and the cabinet. They are appointed (without patent) by mere delivery to them of the seals of office by the sovereign. Each is capable of performing the duties of all the departments, and the offices are all so much counted to be one and the same, that if removed from one secretaryship of state to another, a member of the House of Commons does not vacate his seat.
To the secretary of state for the home department belongs the maintenance of the peace within the kingdom, and the administration of justice so far as the royal prerogative is involved in it. All patents, charters of incorporation, commissions of the peace and of inquiry, pass through his office. He superintends the administration of aflairs in Ireland. The secretary for foreign affairs conducts the correspondence with foreign states, and negotiates treaties with them, either through British ministers resident there, or personally with foreign ministers at this court. He recommends to the crown ambassadors, ministers, and consuls to represent Great Britain abroad, and countersigns their warrants'. The secretary for the colonial department performs for the colonies the same functions that the secretary for the home department performs for Great Britain. The secretary for war has the manage ment of the army, in which he has the assistance of the commander in-chief. Each is assisted by two under-accretaries of state, nominated by himself ; the one being usually permanent, the other dependent upon the administration then in power. The secretary for India has one under-secretary, and the assistance of a council. There is likewise in each department a large establishment of clerks appointed by the principal secretary.