356 PARLIAMENTS OF THE DOMINIONS [PART ITT 
Calcutta Gazelte, should declare that it should so apply, and 
it was argued that the power given to the Lieutenant- 
Governor was ulira vires the Legislative Council of India. 
In giving the decision of the Judicial Committee, Lord 
Selborne pointed out that it was left to the Lieutenant- 
Governor to determine both whether the law should apply 
and if so when, and he added that legislation which did not 
fix the period for its own commencement, but left that to 
be done by an external authority, might with quite as much 
reason be called incomplete as that which did not itself 
immediately determine the whole area to which it was to 
be applied, but left this to be done bv the same external 
authority. 
If it was an act of legislation on the part of the external 
authority, so trusted, to enlarge the area within which a law 
actually in operation was to be applied, it would seem a fortior: 
to be an act of legislation to bring the law into operation 
by fixing the time for its commencement. It had never been 
doubted that the latter power might be conferred by the Legis- 
lature upon the Lieutenant-Governor in Council. It was in 
fact a power continually exercised, and it had never occurred 
to anv one to dispute it. Lord Selborne went on to say :— 
Their Lordships think that it is a fallacy to speak of 
the powers thus conferred upon the Lieutenant-Governor 
(peculiar as they undoubtedly are) as if when they were 
exercised the efficacy of the acts done under them would 
be due to any other legislative authority than that of the 
Governor-General in Council. Their whole operation is 
directly and immediately in and by virtue of this Act (22 of 
1869) itself. 
The proper Legislature has exercised its judgement as to 
place, person, laws, powers ; and the result of that judgement 
has been to legislate conditionally as to all these things. 
The conditions having been fulfilled the legislation is now 
absolute. . 
Where plenary powers of legislation exist as to particular 
subjects, whether in an Imperial or in a Provincial Legis- 
lature, they may in their Lordships’ judgement be well 
exercised either absolutely or conditionally. Legislation con- 
ditional on the use of particular powers, or on the exercise