294 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
There is no simpler way of explaining it than by contrasting it with the Unitary Form of Government.
Although the Federal Form of Government is distinct from the Unitary form, it is not easy to see distinction. On the other hand, there is, outwardly at any rate, a great deal of similarity between the two. The Government of almost every country in these days is carried on by an inter-related group of Administrative Units operating in specific areas and discharging specific public functions. This is true of a country with a Federal Form of Government and also of a country with a Unitary form of Government. In a Federal Constitution there is a Central Government and there are interrelated to it several Local Governments. In the same way in an Unitary Constitution there is a Central Government and there are inter-related to it several Local Governments. On the surface, therefore, there appears to be no difference between the two.
There is, however, a real difference between them although it is not obvious. That difference lies in the nature of the inter-relationship between the Central and the Local Administrative Units. This difference may be summed up in this way. In the Unitary Form of Government, the powers of the local bodies are derived from an Act of the Central Government. That being so the powers of the Local Government can always be withdrawn by the Central Government. In the Federal form of Government the powers of the Central Government as well as of the Local Government are derived by the law of the Constitution which neither the Local Government nor the Central Government can alter by its own Act. Both derive their powers from the law of the Constitution and each is required by the Constitution to confine itself to the powers given to it. Not only does the Constitution fix the powers of each but the constitution establishes a judiciary to declare any Act whether of the Local or the Central Government as void if it transgresses the limits fixed for it by the Constitution. This is well stated by Clement in his volume on the Canadian Constitution in the following passage :
“Apart from detail, the term federal union in these modern times implies an agreement .................... to commit .................... people to the control of one common government in relation to such matters as are agreed upon as of common concern, leaving each local government still independent and autonomous in all other matters, as a necessary corollary the whole-arrangement constitutes a fundamental law to be recognised in and enforced through the agency of the Courts.
“The exact position of the line which is to divide matters of common concern to the whole federation from matters of local concern in each unit is not of the essence of federalism. Where it is to be drawn in any proposed scheme depends upon the view adopted by the federating communities as to what, in their actual circumstances, geographical, com