5.2 Principles of Checks and Balances

Checks and balances is separation's practical correction: since ambition must be made to counteract ambition, each organ is armed with legal weapons against the others' excesses while remaining unable to govern alone. The standard catalogue: Legislature checks executive: no-confidence, budget refusal, questions, committees, ratification of appointments and treaties; Legislature checks judiciary: confirmation of appointments, jurisdiction definition, impeachment of judges, constitutional amendment (against judicial interpretation); Executive checks legislature: veto or suspensive veto, dissolution, initiative of money bills, ordinance power, referendum; Executive checks judiciary: appointment of judges, pardon (in Nepal expressly, the President's pardon under Article 276), enforcement of judgments; Judiciary checks both: judicial review — declaring statutes and executive acts unconstitutional or illegal; interpretation as legislation's boundary; contempt powers. The distinction to state clearly: separation of powers divides functions to prevent accumulation; checks and balances re-link the divided organs to prevent abuse of each divided share. Separation without checks isolates tyranny in three departments; checks without separation fuse into one — the pair works only together.