The post of Lord High Treasurer or Lord Treasurer was an English government position and has been a British government position since the Acts of Union of 1707. A holder of the post would be the third highest ranked Great Officer of State, below the Lord High Chancellor and above the Lord President of the Council.
The Lord High Treasurer functions as the head of Her Majesty's Treasury. Since the 17th century the office has often been held, not by a single person, but placed in commission, so that a board of individuals jointly exercise the powers of the Lord High Treasurer. Such persons are known as Lords Commissioners of the Treasury. The office has been in commission continuously since the resignation of Charles Talbot, 1st Duke of Shrewsbury in 1714.
In modern times, by convention, the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury include the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, usually serving as the "First Lord of the Treasury", and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, serving as the "Second Lord of the Treasury". Other members of the government, usually whips in the House of Commons, are appointed to serve as the junior Lords Commissioners of the Treasury.
Read more about Lord High Treasurer: Origins, The Modern Commissioners
Famous quotes containing the words lord and/or high:
“It is impossible for a stranger traveling through the United States to tell from the appearance of the people or the country whether he is in Toledo, Ohio, or Portland, Oregon. Ninety million Americans cut their hair in the same way, eat each morning exactly the same breakfast, tie up the small girls’ curls with precisely the same kind of ribbon fashioned into bows exactly alike; and in every way all try to look and act as much like all the others as they can.”
—Alfred Harmsworth, Lord Northcliffe (1865–1922)
“It was a high counsel that I once heard given to a young person,—”Always do what you are afraid to do.””
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)