social law, contemporary legal history, and the history of public law Second, the former role of the king created some unexpected trouble after the new Instrument of Government was adopted. When the new fundamental law came into force on 1 January 1975, there were no provisions in the new constitution for the transitional status of the counsellors appointed by the king under the 1809 Instrument of Government. The prime minister, Olof Palme, and the other ministers simply stayed in office and continued to act as the government under the new constitution. As far as I have been able to establish, this was not identified as a problem in advance, let alone discussed. The pragmatic Swedes, having lived with the partly obsolete 1809 Instrument of Government for so long, apparently did not bother too much with such formalities.The king’s appointed counsellors were treated by the Riksdag as the legitimate government under the new constitution. However, a tax case before Regeringsrätten (the Supreme Administrative Court) dealt with the Act on the Taxation of Advertisements promulgated on behalf of the government by the Minister of Finance Gunnar Sträng, in 1975, after the 1974 Instrument of Government came into force. The question arose of whether the act should be considered invalid because it was promulgated by an illegitimate government. The majority of the court did not comment on the alleged deficiency of the act and applied the act. The well-known Supreme Administrative Court judge and proponent of individual rights Gustaf Petrén gave adissenting opinion, discussing the relation between judicial and political power at length. Eventually, however, he concluded that the court in this case should apply the act.24 Third, the role of the government as a legislator is also explained by the division of powers between king and Riksdag under the old constitution. Thegovernment in this respect is parallel to the Riksdag, despite the popular sovereignty ideology of the 1974 Instrument of Government. Here, continuity proved much stronger than ideology. These government ordinances may even have a status parallel to that of Acts of Law. For example, exceptions to the provisions in the Administrative Procedure Act – notably an act of law, adopted by the Riksdag – can be made either in an 24 Regeringsrätten, Regeringsrättens årsbok (RÅ) 1976 Aa 23; Bull 2004, 75–6 n 2. 173
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