PREROGATIVE

An exclusive or peculiar privilege. The special power, privilege, immunity, or advantage vested in an otfi• cial person, either generally, or in respect to the things of his office, or in· an official body, as a court or legislature. See Attorney General v. Blo om, 1 Wis. 317; Attor,. ney General v. Elau Claire, 37 Wis. 443. In English law. That special pre-eml• nence which the king (or queen) has over and above all other persons, in right of his (or her) regal dignity. A term used to denote those rights and capacities which the sovereign enjoys alone, in contrad.istinctioD to others. 1 Bl. Comm. 239. -Prerogative court. In English Jaw. A; court established for the trial of all test a men• tary causes, where the deceased left bona nota,. bilia within two different dioceses; in which case the probate of wills belonged to the arch• bishop of the province, by way of special prerogative. And all causes relating to the wills, administrations, or legacies of such persons were originally cognizable herein, before a judge appointed by the 11rchbishop, called the "judge of the prerogative court," from whom an appeal Jay to the privy council. 3 BI. Comm. 66; 3 Steph. Comm. 432. In New Jersey the prerogative court is the court of appeal from decrees of the orphans' courts in the several counties of the state. The court is held before the chancellor, under the title of the "ordinary." See In re Coursen'il Will, 4 N. J. Eq. 413; Flanigan l'. Guggenheim Smelting Co., 63 N. J. Law, 647, 44.A.tl. 762; Robinson v. Fair, 128 U. S. 53, 9 Sup. Ct. 30, 32 L. Ed. 415.-Prerogative law. That part of the common law of England which is more -particularly applicable to the king. Com. Dig, tit. "Ley," A.- Prerogative writs. In English law, the name is_ given to certain judicial writs i ued by the courts only upon proper cause shown, never as a mere matter of right, the theory being that they involve a direct interference by the government with the liberty and property of the subject, and therefore are justified only as an exercise of the extraordinary power (prerogative) of the crown. In America, a theory has sometime11 been advanced that these writ a should i ue only in cases p-ublici iuria.and those 1 affecting the sovereignty of the state, or its franchises or prerogatives, or the liberties of the people. But their i uance is now general- · 11 regulated by statute, and the use of the term ''prerogative," in desc;nbing them, amounts only to a reference to their origin and hi.story. These w,rits are the writs of mandamus; proc eden do prohibi~ion, qu_o.wa,rran~ habeaiLCOrp.us, ana certior:ar_!. ·s~ 3 Steph. uomm. 6211. Terdto17 [s. 938]