Various objects of the schemes. Possible interests?" There is no such distinction. The scheme which I am propounding gives representation to all numbers and to all interests 1.' The schemes which have been propounded under the general description of the representation of minorities in Parliament have, as it would seem, set forth with different objects. There is the attempt to secure additional power in the representation for the educated, the thrifty, and the well-to-do. This is the object of the so-called 'fancy franchises.' There is the attempt to secure representation for every opinion which can find supporters in the country equalling in number the result of the division of voters by seats; this is Mr. Hare's scheme. There is the attempt to break the power of the majority by increasing the size of the minority through the instrumentality of such a machine as the so-called 'three-cornered constituency;' and lastly, there is the attempt of the advocates of proportional representation to offer a wider choice to the voter, and to secure the return of independent members. The practical form which the difficulty assumes under our existing system, may be tentatively stated thus :-The single member constituencies may produce a variety of representation, but must needs do so by accident; they can only do so when the ward or division of town or county happens to contain a majority of voters of a special class or character. In the great majority of such constituencies candidates will be chosen on strictly party lines; and since large bodies of men have some difficulty in coming to conclusions, the candidates of each side will be selected by the really eager or extreme representatives of each party in the division. The electors of such a constituency will only be able to vote for one candidate. They will have to choose between two, effect of and each of the two will be the nominee of the most zealous singlemember and pronounced members of the two political parties. It is very possible that to a great many electors the two candidates constituen cies. 1 Hansard, vol. 294, p. 675. Debate of Dec. 4, 1884. may be alike distasteful. Men of independent judgment may not care to vote for a candidate whose chief recommendation is, that under no circumstances will he withdraw his support from a given statesman, the leader of his party; or that he accepts with implicit faith a set of dogmas or a scheme of proposed legislation drawn up by active party managers. Yet if they do not vote for such a candidate, if they will not submit to what Mr. Courtney calls the pain and ignominy of being compelled to vote as some one tells you,' they must vote for his opponent, whose opinions may be yet more distasteful to them, or they must cease to exercise the privileges of an elector. 6 Without pronouncing upon the merits of the last of the Summary. schemes which I have endeavoured to describe, it is not difficult to condemn all the others. It is impossible with a very extended suffrage to pick and choose among electors, and by means of fancy franchises to give greater political power to certain qualities. It is unnecessary to contrive elaborate devices for ensuring a hearing to eccentric or unpopular opinions: the press and the platform give us ample security against the misfortune of failing to be informed of every crotchet which has ever vexed the soul of man. It is idle to endeavour to avert the tyranny of the majority' by making the minority a little larger; a minority must needs be a minority in a world where two and three make five; and the tyranny attributed to a majority merely expresses the natural dislike to being beaten. But it is not desirable that politics should fall entirely into the hands of party organisers, as may not impossibly happen under the new system of single-member constituencies with an extended franchise; and it is not desirable that the voter's choice should be limited to an alternative of extremes, and that politics should become the business or the recreation of fanatics, adventurers, or intriguers. The question resolves itself into a choice of risks-the risk lest party discipline, which in a large deliberative assembly is practically necessary for the transaction of business, should be too far relaxed by the representation of opinions on a graduated scale; and the risk lest party organisation, drawn too close, should exclude from political life practical men who do not care to see opinions pushed to their logical results, and independent men who like sometimes to make up their own minds on the questions of the hour. SECTION IV. PRIVILEGES OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. The privileges of the House of Commons have been the topic of much legal discussion, and difficulties have arisen, not unnaturally, in ascertaining the rules of which they consist; for they are only susceptible of legal definition when cast in a statutory form, or when they have come into collision with Courts of Law. Statute Law on the subject is scanty. Privilege exists chiefly for the maintenance of the dignity of the House of Commons, and it is no wonder that the House thinks itself capable of maintaining its dignity without the aid of the legislature. Such Statute Law as exists has for its object the limitation of the prerogative of the Crown as against the House of Commons, and the limitation of the privileges of the House of Commons as against private rights. There remains the mass of judicial decision, dealing for the most part with cases in which the Courts and the House have come into conflict, and from this it is not easy to select so much as is interesting and important from a purely legal point of view. It will be well therefore that I should make clear at starting the topics with which I am going to deal and their connection. First, in order to simplify what follows, it is necessary to state that the House possesses certain officers for the general conduct of its business; that through these officers its privileges are enforced, and enforced by process of which the course has been under discussion, and the validity admitted by Courts of Law. demanded. Next, we come to the privileges themselves. Of these, Privileges some are specifically asserted and demanded of the Crown at the commencement of every Parliament. Three deal more especially with the relations of the House and the Crown-the privilege of free speech, of access to the Crown, and of having the most favourable construction put upon all their proceedings. One deals with the relations of the members of the House and other subjects of the realm-the privilege of freedom from arrest. not de But there are other privileges not specifically mentioned on Privileges this occasion, though regularly asserted and enforced by the manded. House. These are, the right to provide for the due constitution of its own body, the right to regulate its own proceedings, and the right to enforce its privileges by fine or imprisonment, or, in the case of its own members, by expulsion. between Lastly, we come to the questions of dispute which have Disputes arisen between the House and the Courts, and in these it House and would seem that the House has in the first instance mis- Courts. conceived the limitations on its undoubted privileges, and has then endeavoured to cure its error by an arbitrary assertion of exclusive right to define its privilege; in other words, to assume to itself what privileges it pleased. Thus it has disputed the legality of a legal act, as in Ashby v. White, and treated such an act as a contempt. Again, it has endeavoured to legalise an illegal act, as in Stockdale v. Hansard. When the right of the House to do these things has been disputed, it has tried to settle the question off-hand by a resolution that its privilege covers the case, and that no court has jurisdiction to discuss the legality of anything which its vote has ordered. This is the issue on which the conflict has turned between the House and the Courts. It is safe to say that the Courts have won the day. Rules as to commitment. The The only other question of importance is comparatively technical. It relates to the power possessed by the House to commit for contempt, without assigning any other cause, or any cause at all, in the warrant of commitment, or the return to a writ of habeas corpus. § 1. Officers of the House, and procedure for Contempt. A consideration of the privileges of the House of Commons may be assisted by some preliminary words as to the position and duties of the Speaker, by whom these privileges are claimed and through whom they are enforced; and further as to the machinery which the House possesses for recording its proceedings and for putting its privileges into effect. Little needs to be said of the history of the office of Speaker. From the first the Commons required and possessed a spokesman, to be their medium of communication with the Crown. At any rate, after 1377 there is a regular succession of Speakers described as 'pourparlour' or 'parlour et procuratour.' The forms of election by the House and of approval by the Crown were settled early in the fifteenth century, and have Ante, p. 63. varied but little 1 from the proceedings already described. The office is one of high dignity. The Speaker takes precedence of all Commoners, not merely by courtesy or by custom but by legislative enactment. An Act of 16892 provides that the Lords Commissioners of the Great Seal not being peers shall have and take place next after the peers of the realm and the Speaker of the House of Commons.' his precedence; his duties(1) as spokesman, 1 The duties of the Speaker are twofold. He is, firstly, the spokesman and representative of the House; as such he demands its privileges, communicates its resolutions, its thanks, its censures, its admonitions. He issues warrants by order of the House for the commitment of offenders against its privileges, for the issue of writs to fill vacancies among its members, for the attendance of witnesses, or the bringing of 1 In the sixteenth century the Speaker was practically selected by the Crown and employed to express the royal wishes to the Commons. Stubbs, Const. Hist. iii. 468; Lectures, Mediæval and Modern History, 272. 2 I Will. & Mary, c. 21, s. 2. |