Book Reviews and Notices : Ridges' Constitutional Law. By G. A. FORREST. (London: Stevens and Sons, Ltd. 1950. Eighth Edition. Pp. xxviii, 550. 22s.)

• Date: 01 March 1951
• DOI: 10.1177/106591295100400142
• Published date: 01 March 1951
• Subject Matter: Articles

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Ridges’ Constitutional Law. By G. A. FORREST. (London: Stevens and
Sons, Ltd. 1950. Eighth Edition. Pp. xxviii, 550. 22s.)
A treatise under a standard label, covering a constitutional system
with origins as ancient as those of Great Britain, and which in its eighth
edition brings to date material previously revised as recently as 1939, might
not be expected to call for much attention-but here is a new work. Every
chapter supplies proof of the author’s reference to that relatively short
period as one of &dquo;great alterations in every branch of constitutional law,&dquo;
and justifies his venturing &dquo;to doubt whether the rate of change has ever
been faster.&dquo; One needs only to run over a partial list of major statutes
since 1945, containing the Statutory Instruments, Crown Proceedings,
Ministers of the Crown (Treasury Secretaries), British Nationality, Parlia-
ment, and Representation of the People Acts, to observe the f ar-reaching
character of recent constitutional alteration.
The volume is no less a new work where it deals with the constitu-
tional innovations of the inter-war period, for the impact of the changes
of those also highly transitional decades is only now becoming fully ap-
preciated. Among the new chapters reflecting those developments are
ones dealing with administrative law, delegated legislation, judicial con-
trol of public authorities, actions by and against the Crown, and local
government. The section on...