BLACKS 1st

SOVEREIGN. A chief ruler with supreme power; a king or other ruler with limited power. In English law. A gold coin of Great Britain. Of the value of 8 pound sterling. SOVEREIGN POWER or SOVEREIGNTY. That power in a state to which none other is superior or equal. SOVEREIGN STATES. States whose subjects or citizens are in the habit of obedience to them, and which are not themselves subject to any other (or paramount) state in any respect. The state is said to be semi-sovereign only, and not sovereign, when in any respect or respects it is liable to be controlled (like certain of the states in India) by a paramount government, (e.g., by the British Empire.) Brown.
"In the intercourse of nations, certain states have a position of entire independence of others, and can perform all those acts which it is possible for any state to perform in this particular sphere. These same states have also entire power of self-government; that is, of independence upon all other states as far as their own territory and citizens not living abroad are concerned. No foreign power or law can have control except by convention. This power of independent action in external and internal relations constitutes complete sovereignty." Wools. Pol. Science, i. 204.

SOVEREIGNTY. The possession of sovereign power; supreme political authority; paramount control of the constitution and frame of government and its administration; the self-sufficient source of political power, from which all specific political powers are derived; the international independence of a state, combined with the right and power of regulating its internal affairs without foreign dictation; also a political society, or state, which is sovereign and independent.
"The freedom of the nation has its correlate in the sovereignty of the nation. Political sovereignty is the assertion of the self-determinate will of the organic people, and in this there is the manifestation of its freedom. It is in and through the determination of its sovereignty that the order of the nation is constituted and maintained." Mulford, Nation, p. 129. "If a determinate human superior, Dot in a habit of obedience to a like superior, receive habitual obedience from the bulk of a given society, that determinate superior is sovereign in that society, and, the society (including the superior) is a society political and independent." Aust. Jur.

SOVERTIE. In old Scotch law. Surety Skene.

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Sovereign. A person, body, or state in which independent and supreme authority is vested; a chief ruler with supreme power; a king or other ruler in a monarchy. See also Clipped sovereignty; Sovereignty. Sovereign immunity. A judicial doctrine which precludes bringing suit against the government without its consent. Founded on the ancient principle that "the King can do no wrong," it bars holding the government or its political subdivisions liable for the torts of its officers or agents unless such immunity is expressly waived by statute or by necessary inference from legislative enactment. Maryland Port Admin. Vs. I.T.O. Corp. of Baltimore, 40 Md. App. 697, 395 A.2d 145, 149. The federal government has generally waived its non-tort action immunity in the Tucker Act, 28 U.S.C.A. 1346(a) (2), 1491, and its tort immunity in the Federal Tort Claims Act, 28 U.S.C.A. 1346(b), 2674. Most states have also waived immunity in various degrees at both the state and local government levels. The immunity from certain suits in federal court granted to states by the Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution. See also Foreign Immunity; Federal Tort Claims Act; Suits in Admiralty Act; Tucker Act. Foreign Sovereign Immunity Act. Subject to existing international agreements to which the U.S. is a party, and to certain statutorily prescribed exceptions, a foreign nation is immune from the jurisdiction of federal and state courts. 28 U.S.C.A. 1601-1611. Sovereign people. The political body, consisting of the entire number of citizens and qualified electors, who, in their collective capacity, possess the powers of sovereignty and exercise them through their chosen representatives. See Scott v. Sandford, 19 How. 404, 15 L. Ed. 691. Sovereign power or sovereign prerogative. That power in a state to which none other is superior or equal, and which includes all the specific powers necessary to accomplish the legitimate ends and purposes of government. ) Etna Casualty & Surety Co. v. Bramwell, D.C. Or, 12 F.2d 307, 309. Sovereign right. A right which the state alone, or some of its governmental agencies, can possess, and which it possesses in the character of a sovereign, for the common benefit, and to enable it to carry out its proper functions; distinguished from such "proprietary" rights as a state, like any private person, may have in property or demands which it owns. Sovereign states. States whose subjects or citizens are in the habit of obedience to them, and which are not themselves subject to any other (or paramount) state in any respect. The state is said to be semi-sovereign only, and not sovereign, when in any respect or respects it is liable to be controlled by a paramount government. In the intercourse of nations, certain states have a position of entire independence of others, and can perform all those acts which it is possible for any state to perform in this particular sphere. These same states have also entire power of self-government; that is, of independence upon all other states as far as their own territory and citizens not living abroad are concerned. No foreign power or law can have control except by convention. This power of independent action in external and internal relations constitutes complete sovereignty. Sovereignty. The supreme, absolute, and uncontrollable power by which any independent state is governed; supreme political authority; the supreme will; paramount control of the constitution and frame of government and its administration; the self-sufficient source of political power, from which all specific political powers are derived; the international independence of a state, combined with the right and power of regulating its internal affairs without foreign dictation; also a political society, or state, which is sovereign and independent. The power to do everything in a state without accountability,----to make laws, to execute and to apply them, to impose and collect taxes and levy contributions, to make war or peace, to form treaties of alliance or of commerce with foreign nations, and the like. Sovereignty in government is that public authority which directs or orders what is to be done by each member associated in relation to the end of the association. It is the supreme power by which any citizen is governed and is the person or body of persons in the state to whom there is politically no superior. The necessary existence of the state and that right and power which necessarily follow is "sovereignty." By "sovereignty" in its largest sense is meant supreme, absolute, uncontrollable power, the absolute right to govern. The word which by itself comes nearest to being the definition of sovereignty is will or volition as applied to political affairs. City of Bisbee v. Cochise County, 52 Ariz. 1, 78 P.2d 982, 986.

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Sovereign, adj. (Of a state) characteristic of or endowed with supreme authority <sovereign nation> <sovereign immunity>. Sovereign, n. 1. A person, body, or state vested with independent and supreme authority. 2. The ruler of an independent state. Also spelled Sovran. See SOVEREIGNTY. Sovereign Equality. Int'l law. The principle that nations have the right to enjoy territorial integrity and political independence, free from intervention by other nations. The United Nations is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members. UN Charter art. 2, 1. Sovereign People. The political body consisting of the collective number of citizens and qualified electors who possess the powers of sovereignty and exercise them through their chosen representatives. Sovereign Power. The power to make and enforce laws. See sovereign political power under POLITICAL POWER. Sovereign Right. A unique right possessed by a state or its agencies that enables it to carry out its official functions for the public benefit, as distinguished from certain proprietary rights that it may possess like any other private person. [Cases: States 21. C.J.S. States 36 37.] Sovereign State. 1. A state that possesses an independent existence, being complete in itself, without being merely part of a larger whole to whose government it is subject. 2. A political community whose members are bound together by the tie of common subjection to some central authority, whose commands those members must obey. Also termed independent state. Cf. client state and nonsovereign state under STATE. [Cases: International Law 3. C.J.S. International Law 68, 13.]
The essence of statehood is sovereignty, the principle that each nation answers only to its own domestic order and is not accountable to a larger international community, save only to the extent it has consented to do so. Sovereign states are thus conceived as hermetically sealed units, atoms that spin around an international orbit, sometimes colliding, sometimes cooperating, but always separate and apart. David J. Bederman, International Law Frameworks 50 (2001). Part-Sovereign State. A political community in which part of the powers of external sovereignty are exercised by the home government, and part are vested in or controlled by some other political body or bodies. Such a state is not fully independe nt because by the conditions of its existence it is not allowed full freedom of action in external affairs.

Sovereignty (sahv-[<<schwa>>-]rin-tee). 1. Supreme dominion, authority, or rule. [Cases: International Law 8. C.J.S. International Law 25 28.] Popular Sovereignty. A system of government in which policy choices reflect the preferences of the majority of citizens. State Sovereignty. See STATE SOVEREIGNTY. 2. The supreme political authority of an independent state. 3. The state itself.
It is well to [distinguish] the senses in which the word Sovereignty is used. In the ordinary popular sense it means Supremacy, the right to demand obedience. Although the idea of actual power is not absent, the prominent idea is that of some sort of title to exercise control. An ordinary layman would call that person (or body of persons) Sovereign in a State who is obeyed because he is acknowledged to stand at the top, whose will must be expected to prevail, who can get his own way, and make others go his, because such is the practice of the country. Etymologically the word of course means merely superiority, and familiar usage applies it in monarchies to the monarch, because he stands first in the State, be his real power great or small. James Bryce, Studies in History and Jurisprudence 50405 (1901).

External sovereignty. The power of dealing on a nation's behalf with other national governments. Internal sovereignty. The power enjoyed by a governmental entity of a sovereign state, including affairs within its own territory and powers related to the exercise of external sovereignty. Sovran. See SOVEREIGN.