Talk:Uncodified constitution

Sweden

I don't know why Sweden was listed as currently having an uncodified constitution. I moved it to "former". The current Instrument of Government (Regeringsformen) states at paragraph 3 that it, together with three other (written) laws, is the constitution of Sweden. See my edit and the source referenced. --HAdG (talk) 14:07, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

Jersey

Jersey not a sovereign state. Removed from list.

Proposed move

Any objections to moving this article to Uncodified constitution (which is currently a redirect), which is clearly the right location? ;) DWaterson (talk) 21:50, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

No objections, done today. DWaterson (talk) 20:56, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Correct?

"Although these principles are not codified in a single law, they are still recognized by courts, legislators, and executives as binding upon government, limiting its powers. Thus, a court might cite "the constitution" in forbidding an exercise of power, even though no document exists." Are there any examples of this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 114.255.56.196 (talk) 07:28, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Just Plain Wrong

'An uncodified or unwritten constitution' - uncodified and unwritten are different things. The UK has a written, but uncodified constitution. The constitution is drawn from a number of written sources (the Magna Carta, Hansard, and so on), but they are not codified into a single document. You'll find this distinction explained quite early on in any politics textbook... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.4.12.193 (talk) 10:47, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

I disagree. UK and other Commonwealth realms have plenty of constitutional customs and practices that are unwritten, like, it could be argued, the person embodying the Crown (there are succession laws, sure, but they don't say "directly descended from so-and-so in particular," just refer generically to whoever happens to have been the monarch when the succession act was enacted--but where's THAT person's authority?...and so on back in time. The answer: unwritten tradition (ahem)coups d'etat(ahem)).2601:204:D502:1837:2908:778C:5CC:C155 (talk) 05:06, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

Empire without constitution

Imperial Russia, and the pre-Petrine state, should be added to the section on former states without a constitution. Well into the reign of Peter the Great, Russia had no real codified and coherent constitution: matters that implied defining different kinds of state authority were essentially decided ad hoc in a perpetual tug-of-war between the Tsar, the church, the high nobles and a makeshift bureaucracy where different bureaus (prikazy) were set up and scrapped as the Tsar and his advisers saw fit. Peter weeded much of this out but he didn't come up with much in the way of a constitution, and for two hundred years after him, the idea that the powers and position of the Tsar would have to be defined by law, rather than simply him being taken for granted as an all-powerful sovereign placed above the law, was something the Tsars (most of them) and the establishment (and the Slavophiles) had major trouble accepting. Strausszek (talk) 01:37, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Remove Canada - Original Research

The current text says:

Canada: The preamble to the Constitution of Canada declares that the constitution is to be "similar in principle to that of the United Kingdom" (which is largely unwritten.)[3] This applies at the federal level and to the provinces,[4] although each does have the power to modify or enact their own within their exclusive areas of responsibility. To date only British Columbia has done so (see Constitution of British Columbia), though all of the provinces' roles and powers are spelled out in section 93 of the Constitution Act, 1867, and through amendments to it dealing with particular provinces such as the Manitoba Act and the Newfoundland Act.

This material is referenced by the following: ^ Constitution Act, retrieved 2012-03-25 ^ Ontario (Attorney General) v. OPSEU, [1987] 2 S.C.R. 2

The Constitution Act does not say Canada has an uncodified constitution. The other says "The constitution of Ontario, like that of the other provinces and that of the United Kingdom, but unlike that of many states, is not to be found in a comprehensive, written instrument called a constitution." Canada's federal government is omitted from this list because it does have a written constitution.

The following law article assumes Canada has a written constitution: http://www.thelawjournal.co.uk/Article%20a_written_constitution.htm

I am at least making the statement ambiguous in the text 221.219.127.250 (talk) 19:24, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Citing English constitutional authority

I have removed "Two written constitutions were enacted during The Commonwealth of Oliver Cromwell - the Instrument of Government of 1653 and the Humble Petition and Advice of 1657. These were invalidated by the Restoration of the Crown in 1660." from the article. It is not clear why these should be cited (i) because they are English, pre-Union examples and not UK constitutional enactments (they therefore technically pertain to a different state); and (ii) no examples are given from pre-Union Scottish constitutional law, which is typical of the dominant "English version" of the UK constitution, which never tells the whole story. If anything, the Treaty of Union 1707 should be cited as it is the closest the UK has ever come to a constitutional code. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.24.161.55 (talk) 20:48, 18 October 2012 (UTC)

The entire wording of this article feels rather ad lib and lacking in structure. It lacks in a useful description of the general contrast between codified and uncodified constitutions. The very relevant legal histories concerning the traditions of both civil law and common law and how they relate to codification of (constitutional) law, ought to be included in this article for the same reason. DaanTimmer (talk) 21:46, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

"Not unwritten"

Given that the UK's "uncodified constitution" is clearly the least "codified" -- and the least resembling a constitution in the sense that it'd otherwise be understood -- it seems unhelpful to flatly assert that it's not "unwritten". Without any whiff of a reference for this. Sure, one can argue (in a rather circular fashion) that some Acts of Parliament form part of the constitution, and some do not, but the (supposed) constitution as a whole is much fuzzier than that. As it stands the article seems rather contradictory by alt-titling "unwritten constitution", then in effect asserting there's no such thing. In the same section the wording on "constitutional statutes" apparently needs to be changed too, so if anyone has any thoughts on how best to clean both of these up... 109.255.211.6 (talk) 04:19, 27 January 2023 (UTC)

Million Years?

It says million years, "This custom was observed for nearly a million years and a half, unbroken, without any enforcement mechanism until it was ignored by Franklin Roosevelt, after which it was added to the written."

This is wrong I am positive 75.209.87.26 (talk) 01:14, 15 February 2024 (UTC)