Page:Japan by the Japanese (1904).djvu/90

legal, why ask the subsequent approval of the Diet to them? Because it is thereby intended to keep harmony and close connection between the administrative necessities and the control of the legislative. When the Diet discovers that any extravagant expenses have been illegally incurred, and does not recognise the necessity of such expenses, it may take the matter up as a political question, though it cannot make it a subject of legal contention. But the action of the Diet in such cases cannot affect the consequences of the expenditures already incurred by the Government, or of the obligations thereby devolving upon the Government. ‘Expenditures overpassing the appropriations set forth in the titles and paragraphs of the Budget’ are those expenditures that exceed the amounts voted by the Diet. ‘Expenditures that are not provided for in the Budget’ refers to those expenditures that are incurred, apart from the titles and paragraphs mentioned in the Budget, on account of unforeseen circumstances.

65. It is provided in the present article that, as regards the Budget, the right of priority shall be given to the House of Representatives. In discussing the Budget, the object sought for is to arrive at a clear conception of the resources of the people as compared with the financial condition of the Government, so that a just mean may be secured. This is the most important duty to be discharged by representatives elected by the people.

66. In Article 64 it is provided that the consent of the Imperial Diet shall be required to the Budget. But in the present article an exceptional case is mentioned. The expenditures of the Imperial House are those that are indispensable for maintaining the dignity of the Emperor, and to meet them is the first duty of the Treasury. The employment of the funds is an affair of the Court, and not one for interference by the Diet; consequently, neither consent to these expenditures nor verification of them is required by the Diet. The amount of the expenditures of the Imperial House is, however, stated in the Budget, and also in the statement of the final accounts. But this is merely for the purpose of completing the sum total of public expenditures, and not for the purpose of submission to the deliberation of the Diet. The reason the consent of the Diet is required when it has become necessary to increase the amount of expenditures under review is that the affair in question has a close relation to the taxes contributed by the subjects, and that therefore it is to be submitted to the deliberations of their representatives.

67. ‘Already fixed expenditures based by the Constitution upon the powers appertaining to the Emperor’ include all the expenditures which are based upon the sovereign powers of the