1. Supreme dominion, authority, or rule. [Cases: International Law
8. C.J.S. International Law §§ 25–28.]
popular sovereignty. A system of government in which policy choices reflect the preferences of the majority of citizens.
state sovereignty. See STATE SOVEREIGNTY.
2. The supreme political authority of an independent state.
3. The state itself.“It is well to [distinguish] the senses in which the word Sovereignty is used. In the ordinary popular sense it means Supremacy, the right to demand obedience. Although the idea of actual power is not absent, the prominent idea is that of some sort of title to exercise control. An ordinary layman would call that person (or body of persons) Sovereign in a State who is obeyed because he is acknowledged to stand at the top, whose will must be expected to prevail, who can get his own way, and make others go his, because such is the practice of the country. Etymologically the word of course means merely superiority, and familiar usage applies it in monarchies to the monarch, because he stands first in the State, be his real power great or small.” James Bryce, Studies in History and Jurisprudence 504–05 (1901).
external sovereignty. The power of dealing on a nation’s behalf with other national governments.
internal sovereignty. The power enjoyed by a governmental entity of a sovereign state, including affairs within its own territory and powers related to the exercise of external sovereignty.
