view that the only organ of the general will was an assembly of the whole people, they would naturally regard such an assembly as sovereign 'de jure,' and any other power actually supreme as merely sovereign 'de facto.' This opposition, however, really arises out of a confusion in the usage of the term 'sovereign'; out of inability on the one side to hold fast the identification of sovereign with general will, on the other to keep it simply to the sense of the supreme law-making and law-enforcing power. If 'sovereign' = 'general will,' the distinction of 'de facto' and 'de jure' is inapplicable to it. A certain desire either is or is not the general will. A certain interest is or is not an interest in the common good. There is no sense in saying that such desire or interest is general will 'de jure' but not 'de facto,' or _vice versa_. On the other hand, if 'sovereign' = the supreme law-making and law-enforcing power, the distinction is equally inapplicable to it. If any person or persons have this power at all, they cannot be said to have it merely 'de facto' while others have it 'de jure.' 97. It may be urged with much truth that the actual possession of such power by a determinate person or persons is rather a convenient hypothesis of writers on jurisprudence than an actual fact; and, as we have seen, the actual condition of things at certain times in certain states may conveniently be expressed by saying that there was a sovereign 'de facto' that was not so 'de jure,' or vice versa; but only on the supposition that 'sovereign' is not taken necessarily in the full sense of a supreme law-making and law-enforcing power. In a state of things that can be so described, however, there is no 'sovereignty' at all in the sense of an actually supreme power of making and enforcing law resident in a determinate person or persons. Sovereignty in this sense can only exist 'de facto'; and when it so exists, it is obvious that no other can in the same sense exist 'de jure.' It may be denied indeed in particular cases that an actually supreme power of making and enforcing law is exercised 'de jure,' in a sense of that phrase already explained (see section 95). Reasons were given for doubting whether a power could really maintain its sovereign attributes if conflicting with 'jus,' in the sense thus explained. But supposing that it could, the fact that it was not exercised 'de jure' would not entitle us to say that any other person or persons were sovereign 'de jure,' without altering the meaning of 'sovereign.' If any one has supreme power 'de facto,' that which any one else has cannot be supreme power. The qualification of a power as held not 'de facto' but 'de jure' is one which destroys its character as supreme, i.e. as sovereign in the sense before us.