How Like an Angel
Robin Cooke “How Like an Angel” in Mool Chand Sharma and Raju Ramachandran (eds) Constitutionalism Human Rights and the Rule of Law: Essays in Honour of Soli J Sorabjee (Universal Law Publishing Co Pvt Ltd, Delhi, 2005) 34
Victoria University of Wellington Legal Research Paper Series, Cooke Paper No. 53/2017
16 Pages Posted: 22 Jul 2014 Last revised: 22 Mar 2017
Date Written: July 20, 2005
Abstract
This chapter is the third paper that Lord Cooke has written on Indian constitutional law (the first and second being the papers titled Making Angels Weep and Where Angels Fear to Tread). This chapter is divided into two parts. The first part comprises Lord Cooke’s general observations on the “myth” of parliamentary sovereignty in the New Zealand context. Lord Cooke argues that neither the Government, nor Parliament, nor the courts has a monopoly on power, and, in particular, he rejects the notion of absolute parliamentary sovereignty, describing it as a “common illusion, tidy but superficial”. In the second part, Lord Cooke tests his ideas of sovereignty in light of the Indian Constitution. He concludes that the Indian Constitution contains a mélange of powers: no single institution is omnipotent or absolutely sovereign.
Note: Abstract by Elizabeth Chan.
Keywords: Lord Cooke, parliamentary sovereignty, Indian Constitution, power, institutions, public law, constitutional law, basic structure, constitutional amendments
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation