The Iceland year-book - 01.01.1926, Qupperneq 61

official duties. Such cases are tried by a special
tribunal which exists only for that purpose.
The ministry is divided into three departments,
and is at present thus constituted:—
Jon Magnusson; Minister of Justice and Ecclesi-
astics. Prime Minister.
Permanent Secretary: Gudmundur Sveinbjorns-
son.
Magnus Gu&mundsson; Minister of Industries
and Commerce.
Permanent Secretary: Oddur Hermannsson.
(Acting Permanent Secretary: Vigfus Einars-
son).
Jon Thorlaksson; Minister of Finance.
Permanent Secretary: Gisli Isleifsson.
After various coalition ministries had for a
period of eight years succeeded one another, the
present Conservative Government came into power
in 1924. It has, however, not an absolute majority
in the Althing, where the party division is as fol-
lows :■—21 Conservatives, 15 Progressives, 5
Independents, 1 Socialist.
The ordinary judicial authority has only two
instances: the Supreme Court, which consists of
five judges, and the Lower Courts, in each of which
there is only one judge, and from which an ap-
peal lies direct to the Supreme Court.
For administrative purposes the country is
divided into 7 urban municipalities and 16
provinces, or prefectures, which are in turn sub-
divided into 226 parishes with a certain amount of
autonomy. The magistrate and chief executive of-
ficer of each province is the Prefect (sgslumadur).
The chief executive officer of an urban munici-