Advice and consent

Advice and consent is an English phrase frequently used in enacting formulae of bills and in other legal or constitutional contexts. It may describe two situations, either where a weak executive branch of a government enacts something previously approved of by the legislative branch or where the legislative branch concurs and approves something previously enacted by a strong executive branch.

General

The concept serves to moderate the power of one branch of government by requiring the concurrence of another branch for selected actions. The expression is frequently used in weak executive systems where the head of state has little practical power, and in practice the important part of the passage of a law is in its adoption by the legislature.

United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, a constitutional monarchy, bills are headed:

This enacting formula emphasizes that, although legally the bill is being enacted by the Queen of the United Kingdom (specifically, by the Queen-in-Parliament), it is not through her initiative but through that of Parliament that legislation is created.

Advice

Advice (noun) or advise (verb) may refer to:

Supreme court

A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of many legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, instance court, judgment court, apex court, and highest court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of a supreme court are not subject to further review by any other court. Supreme courts typically function primarily as appellate courts, hearing appeals from decisions of lower trial courts, or from intermediate-level appellate courts.

However, not all highest courts are named as such. Civil law states do not tend to have singular highest courts. Additionally, the highest court in some jurisdictions is not named the "Supreme Court", for example, the High Court of Australia; this is because decisions by the High Court could formerly be appealed to the Privy Council. On the other hand, in some places the court named the "Supreme Court" is not in fact the highest court; examples include the New York Supreme Court, the Supreme Courts of several Canadian provinces/territories and the former Supreme Court of Judicature of England and Wales, which are all superseded by higher Courts of Appeal.

Advise and Consent

Advise and Consent is a 1959 political novel by Allen Drury that explores the United States Senate confirmation of controversial Secretary of State nominee Robert Leffingwell, who is a former member of the Communist Party. The novel spent 102 weeks on The New York Times Best Seller list, won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1960 and was adapted into a successful 1962 film starring Henry Fonda. It was followed by Drury's A Shade of Difference in 1962, and four additional sequels.

Background

This Pulitzer Prize-winning novel's title comes from the United States Constitution's Article II, Sec. 2, cl. 2, which provides that the President of the United States "shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consults, Judges of the Supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States...."

Author Drury, a staunch anti-Communist, believed most Americans were naive about the dangers of the Soviet-led communist threat to undermine the government of the United States:

Charles Laughton

Charles Laughton (1 July 1899 – 15 December 1962) was an English stage and film character actor, director, producer and screenwriter who had a successful career in Hollywood.

Laughton was trained in London at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and first appeared professionally on the stage in 1926. In 1927, he was cast in a play with his future wife Elsa Lanchester, with whom he lived and worked until his death; they had no children.

He played a wide range of classical and modern parts, making a big impact in Shakespeare at the Old Vic. His film career took him to Broadway and then Hollywood, but he also collaborated with Alexander Korda on some of the most notable British films of the era, including The Private Life of Henry VIII.

Laughton, was one of the most recognisable and beloved character actors of his generation, and portrayed everything from monsters and misfits to kings. Among Laughton's biggest film-hits were The Barretts of Wimpole Street, Mutiny on the Bounty, Ruggles of Red Gap, Jamaica Inn, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and The Big Clock. In his later career, he took up stage directing, notably in The Caine Mutiny Court Martial, and George Bernard Shaw's Don Juan in Hell, in which he also starred. He directed one film, the acclaimed thriller The Night of the Hunter.