THE complacency with which Englishmen have allowed themselves to be saddled during the last six years with ever-increasing burdens and disabilities must fill all reflective students of politics with amazement and misgiving. It is sometimes asserted that Englishmen take their pleasures sadly. Whether that be so or not, it cannot be denied that nowadays they take their politics lightly. Energy, it is true, they possess in abundance. Much solid work, too, is no doubt got through; but Englishmen more often than not devote their time and labour to a business or profession, not that they may excel in their life's work, but that they may the sooner retire and be at rest. The same spirit permeates all classes of the community, and from every side the cry goes up for shorter hours and higher pay. It is not to be expected, in such circumstances, that much attention will be paid to the fundamentals of business or politics, and so it happens that the better educated Englishman usually takes more interest in the vicissitudes of a Test Match than in the progress of a Bill through Parliament, and political opinions are, for the most part, adopted as they appear ready-made in the

public press, and are seldom the outcome of individual analysis and judgment.

armies,

De

are

The Proletariat, on the other hand, always sensitive to the currents of thought which stir the hearts and minds of an intellectual order external and superior to itself, and now at length awakening to a realisation of its possibilities and of its power, is found to be peculiarly receptive of the new moral and political theories which are being so sedulously propagated. Moreover, mocracies, like armies, strangely influenced by the example of their leaders, and throughout the ages the spirit of patriotism has been kindled and kept aglow by the devoted efforts of individual enthusiasts. A nation is not more patriotic than its leaders, and, as Lord Morley has recently pointed out at Manchester, "The star of strength and greatness rises or sinks in a State according to the proportion in its numbers of men and women with courage, energy, will, and open, supple, teachable intelligence, and possessing the power of making their qualities effectively felt."

The Roman Empire crumbled away because the people became indifferent to Imperial ideals.

The Roman people in the end refused even to fight their own battles, and gave their whole minds to attain "panem et circenses."

Upon what are the hearts of many Englishmen set to-day? Is it the maintenance of the Constitution and of the Empire, or cheap food and a pass for the next week's football match? "Crop," says Lord Morley, "depends on soil as well as seed." In our beloved country the soil is prepared and seed will be sown. But what kind of seed will it be, and who will sow it? Let those who can influence their countrymen pause on their way, and consider the signs of the times, lest calamity befall them and their children.

The Parliament Act 1911 has become the law of the land. It is impossible in this article to subject to analytical criticism its many anomalies, —for instance, that under its provisions the House of Commons cannot amend Bills which have been once rejected by the House of Lords; and that Bills may for that reason become law which are not approved by either House of Parliament. But that the Parliament Act violates the fundamentals of the British Constitution no one can doubt, for, since its enactment, the people are no longer in in a position to control their own destinies, and the Crown, for the first time in English history, is involved in the vortex of party politics. "Nobody supposed," Mr Asquith has said, "that the Parliament

Bill was anything but a means to an end it is not an end in itself. The machine is there to do work."

the

If Parliament should enjoy

maximum lease of life

under the Parliament Act (ie., five years), financial legislation, by means of Money Bills, throughout the whole of this period, is placed under the unfettered control of the House of Commons, and so far as legislation in respect of other matters is concerned, the House of Commons is endowed with such supreme authority that Bills passed by the House of Commons during the first three years of its existence will be placed on the Statute Book whether the House of Lords has given its consent to such legislation or not. It is not over-stating the position to assert that, during these periods, the government of the United Kingdom is handed over to the tender mercies of a single autocratic Chamber. Further, the authority of the House of Commons is as wide as it is uncontrolled. No legislation is excluded from the ambit of its jurisdiction, except Bills to extend the maximum duration of Parliament. Nothing is sacrosanct. A House of Commons, elected for example upon the issue of Free Trade or Tariff Reform, is at liberty to use its unfettered powers to abolish the House of Lords, to disintegrate the United Kingdom, or even to convert the Constitution of the country from a Limited Monarchy into into a Republic. Do the people realise that a

Radical Administration has made it possible for legislation to be passed without the consent and, it may be, against the expressed will of the electors? If not, who is responsible for its failure failure to appreciate the position? No sooner had the House of Commons obtained its unfettered powers than it proceeded to vote to each of its members a salary of £400 a-year; and Bills to establish Irish Home Rule, to disestablish the Welsh Dioceses, and to lower the franchise immediately followed the passing of the Act. Can nothing be done to prevent the passage of such Bills as these until the wishes of the electors have been ascertained? If a refusal by the Upper House to pass the Army Bill or the Expiry Laws Continuance Bill be excepted, so long as the Parliament Act remains in force, the dissolution of Parliament by the Sovereign is the the only means by which the opinion of the electors can be taken in respect of legislation passed by the Single Chamber of the House of Commons. But the exercise of the Prerogative for such a purpose is fraught with the utmost danger to to the the Monarchy and to the Empire, the constituent parts of which are bound together by a deep sense of loyalty to the Crown. The abolition of the power of the House of Lords to prevent the passage of Bills sent up from the House of Commons has laid a heavy and invidious responsibility upon the Sovereign. It is no longer the

of

privilege and the duty of the House of Lords to reject legislation which, in its opinion, is opposed to the wishes of the people; for the difficult task of interpreting public opinion is, by the Parliament Act, shifted from the House Lords on to the shoulders of the King. Sometimes, indeed, it is easy to gauge the wishes of the electors-for instance, in the case of the Home Rule Bill in 1893 and the Licensing Bill in 1908. Nevertheless, the position in which the Crown is placed by reason of the provisions of the Parliament Act is one beset with pitfalls; and if the King were to dissolve Parliament, in the mistaken belief that the policy of the House of Commons would not be confirmed by the electors, the result would be a collision -not between the House of Lords and the House of Commons, but between the Sovereign and his people. Who can contemplate without misgiving the outcome of such a crisis?

By the Parliament Act the Monarchy is threatened and the electorate defrauded of its rights. Every amendment suggested by Unionists to safeguard the rights of the people was contemptuously rejected by those who reiterate that they are the representatives of the people. It used to be the boast of Liberals in the past that they put their trust in the people; it is very clear that in the future they intend to legislate without consulting them.

While the Parliament Act

in practice will be fraught with danger to the State, the methods by which the Radical Administration secured its passage into law were both unprecedented and amazing.

To seize the Prerogative of the Crown for the purpose of overcoming resistance to the Parliament Bill in the House of Lords was an outrage on the Constitution; to obtain a pledge from the Crown that a sufficient number of Peers would be created to secure its passage through the Upper House before that Chamber had even considered, much less rejected, the Bill, was an even grosser breach of duty on the part of the Government; but to obtain the Crown's pledge before the

Bill had passed either House of Parliament, proves that His Majesty's present advisers are quite indifferent to the elementary principles of constitutional procedure. In this matter Mr Asquith and his colleagues stand self-condemned, for Mr Asquith in the House of Commons, on February 21, 1910, laid down that "To ask in advance for a blank authority for an indefinite exercise of the Royal Prerogative, in regard to a measure which has never been submitted to or approved by the House of Commons, is a request which, in my judgment, no constitutional statesman can properly make, and it is a concession which the Sovereign cannot be expected to grant. I say this in order that there may be absolutely no misunderstanding on this point." The

whole story is well known, and there is no need to repeat it, but it may be of interest to point out the almost painful analogy between the position taken up by the Radical Government and the course pursued by the Long Parliament of Charles I. The object of the House of Commons, in each case, was to subvert the Constitution and to set up an omnipotent Single Chamber, and the method adopted in each case was the same, both in principle and in detail, the only difference between the Parliamentary proceedings of 1649 and 1911 being, that, whereas Oliver Cromwell with his army and his unflinching character was able to coerce the more violent fanatics who sat in the Long Parliament, Mr Asquith is unable to stem the tide of revolution which is rising among the Radical myrmidons, and is unwilling to sacrifice party or personal expediency to gain a permanent settlement of the constitutional problem.

On July 2, 1912, Mr Bonar Law pithily summed up the position in the House of Commons: "What Mr Asquith has done is to drop the reins, throw them on the neck of the horse, and allow it to gallop where it pleases, on the one condition that he is still allowed to cling to the saddle."

In January 1649, King Charles I. was in the hands of the Revolutionaries. The majority in the Commons were set upon bringing him to trial, but the House of Lords, then a small body, obstructed the

way. On January 2, the House of Commons invited the House of Lords to approve an ordinance appointing 150 Commissioners to try the King, which the House of Lords unanimously refused to do. Thereupon, on January 4, the House of Commons passed the following resolutions:

"Resolved, That the Com-
mons of England in
Parliament assembled do
declare that the people
are, under God, the origi-
nal of all just power;
and do also declare :-
"That the Commons of
England in Parliament
assembled, being chosen
by and representing the
people, have the Supreme
Power in this Nation;"
and do also declare:-
"That whatsoever is enacted

or declared for law by
the Commons in Parlia-
ment assembled hath the
force of law, and all the
People of this Nation
are concluded thereby,
although the consent and
concurrence of King or
House of Peers be not

had there-unto."

These resolutions bear so striking a resemblance to the resolutions passed by the House of Commons under Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman in 1907, and to the terms of the Parliament Act itself, that the similarity cannot well be accidental.

Mr Asquith, who is a master of carefully weighed prevarications and sonorous pronouncements, has stated that the Veto of the House of Lords

ought to be "as dead as Queen Anne." What did he mean by this except that the House of Commons should be made an omnipotent Single Chamber? Moreover, the House of Commons, both in 1649 and in 1911, refused to allow members of the Upper House to have any voice in settling the method of their political destruction.

On February 6, 1649, the House of Commons negatived the following resolution :

"That this House take the

advice of the House of Lords in the exercise of the legislative power in pursuance of the vote of this House, the 4th January."

In like manner, His Majesty's Government intimated to the House of Lords that they would not, under any circumstances, consider amendments which the House of Lords might make to the Parliament Bill, although it would effectively deprive them of their immemorial right to be necessary parties to legislation, for Lord Crewe stated in the House of Lords, on February 16, 1910, "Your Lordships are entitled to express your opinion, as undoubtedly you will, upon the actual propositions of the Parliament Bill, but I may as well say at once that we cannot enter into any discussion of amendments. We are prepared to put this measure before the House, for the House to take or the House to leave it."

On March 17, 1649, the Kingly office, and on March 19th the House of Peers were abolished by "Act" of the