the Irish Parliament was in session and explicitly asserted the crown's right to 
amend. The legislative competence of the Irish Parliament was restricted to 
such acts as the King had approved. 
Whatever were the defects of this system in furthering self-government, 
without doubt it possessed certain virtues for imperial administrative purposes. 
The issue of the suspensive clause never came up as it did in regard to 
the American acts of assembly, because the Irish acts had no force as law until 
the King's approval had been signified. Furthermore, the provision for amendment 
by the crown left room for political give and take and avoided the shortcomings 
of the mere disallowance as it was used in the system of plantation 
review, a procedure that led to endless friction, because no provision for quick 
compromise was present. 199 
It is apparent from what has been said that the machinery of Poyning's Law 
did not serve as a model for the less efficient measures later taken to police the 
output of American provincial legislatures, although in the early stages of 
contriving a scheme for overseeing colonial laws the Irish usage was recommended 
by a committee of the Privy Council, actually attempted for Jamaica 
and then, under pressure, abandoned. 200 The main significance of the Irish 
statute is what is contributed in affirmation of a constitutional right of the 
King to control the legislative processes in his dominions, and its influence in 
this respect was, we think, the more because it was a continuing precedent on 
the matter. Beyond this role as a vital link between the legal theory of the 
Middle Ages and that of the age of American settlement, the statute had certain 
direct effects upon the administration of the royal prerogative. The most 
important of these was the centering of the supervisory function in the Privy 
Council, historically the jorum conveniens, for dominion business. This not 
only assured the existence of an area of jurisdiction when new dominions were 
acquired but also contributed to the survival of the same after the Long Parliament 
had otherwise disemboweled the Council. 201 Moreover, the establishment 
within this area of certain patterns of policy and procedure to some 
extent determined the course of things upon the accretion of new responsibilities. 
An indication that this was so is to be found in the practice of submitting 
Irish bills to the law officers of the crown, pursued in the reign of James I, 
189 In the early years of the Board of Trade 
there were a few occasions when the board 
undertook upon legislative review to draft acceptable 
acts or to specify upon disallowance 
what was needed to make the act acceptable. In 
a few cases the colonists sent drafts of acts to 
England for opinions (cf. Russell, The Review 
of American Colonial Legislation by the King 
in Council [1915] 91-92)- In general, however, 
there was nothing resembling a consistent 
policy of co-operation with the colonies on securing 
acceptable or properly drafted acts (cf. 
infra, p. 503). 
200 1 APC, Col. no. 1177 (1677). The Irish 
method was rejected April 4, 1679 (ibid., no. 
1257). Cf. also ibid., no. 1274. 
201 St. i6Ch.I, c. 10