A NIGHT IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS
1
The House of Commons is the supreme authority in this land. It
should, therefore, be a consoling thought to the people that every
sitting of the House is opened with a prayer for Divine light and
guidance in the exercise of its unlimited powers of legislation.
Both Houses of Parliament have used the prayer since the Restoration
of Charles II in 1660. Besides the spiritual benefit that a Member
derives from attendance at the service, he also gets the material
advantage of a seat during the sitting, which, as the Chamber
provides places only for about half its membership, is an additional
inducement to be present at prayers.
Mr. Speaker stands at the head of the Table. By his side is the
Chaplain in gown and bands. Standing in files along the benches
are the Members—the two great political Parties facing each other
across the floor. The service opens with the 67th Psalm, with its
aspirations for the enlargement of God’s Kingdom, to the joy of the
people and the increase of God’s blessings. “O let the nations be
glad and sing for joy, for Thou shalt judge the people righteously
and govern the nations upon earth.” The sublime maxims of the Lord’s
Prayer are recited. For social policy: “Thy will be done on earth as
it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread;” and for foreign
affairs, “And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that
trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation.” There are
prayers for the King and Queen. Then follows the invocation to God
on behalf of the House of Commons, at which the Members turn to the
walls with bowed heads.
The Chaplain prays:
Send down the Heavenly Wisdom from above to direct and guide us
in all our consultations; and grant that we, having Thy fear
always before our eyes, and laying aside all private interests,
prejudices, and partial affections, the result of all our counsels
may be to the Glory of Thy blessed Name, the maintenance of true
religion and justice, the safety, honour and happiness of the King,
the public welfare, peace and tranquillity of the realm, and the
uniting and knitting together of the hearts of all persons and
estates within the same in true Christian love and charity one
towards another, through Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour. Amen.
Strangers are not admitted to the galleries until prayers are
over. If they were present they could not fail to notice a strange
thing. That is, that the Treasury Bench is always empty during the
service. Ministers may be really more in need of prayers than private
Members, but then their seats in the Chamber are secured to them by
prescriptive right.
The first sight of the plain architectural features of the House
of Commons must be disappointing to anyone swayed by the great
and stirring historical associations of the place. If there be
any secular institution to which something of religious solemnity
should attach, it surely is the free Legislature of a Nation, where
the habits, customs and institutions of the people are largely
moulded, where, at any rate, the morality or ethics of the country
find expression in laws. The Chamber is unadorned. The prevailing
colour is dull brown, conveyed by the oak framework of galleries
and panelled walls plainly carved. In the daylight a warm dimness
prevails. At night the Chamber looks more impressive, when a mellow
radiance streaming from the lights through its glass ceiling
falls upon the crowded benches. But to the uninstructed stranger
accidentally straying into it on an off-day, its stiff arrangement of
tiers of benches, upholstered in dark green, on each side, and the
absence of any pictorial background, would suggest an assembly-room
or debating-hall, with a certain air of distinction, it is true, but
lacking character and soul. Is it really in this simple Chamber of
modest dimensions and severe aspect that the elected and principal
House of the Imperial Parliament is content to meet? Is it here that
since 1852—the year the Chamber was first occupied—so many exciting
and momentous battles over political principles have been fought? Is
it from this narrow hall that influences radiate which are felt to
the farthest confines of the world, in the wigwams of savage tribes
as well as in the Chancelleries of the Great Powers? You would do
well, indeed, when you visit the House of Commons and desire to fall
under its spell, to come with your historical memories refreshed, for
you will there see nothing in the way of portraits of its immortal
Members, or pictures from its storied past, to tell of its greatness
and renown.
What emotions have there found vent! These walls, sheathed in oak,
have echoed to the voices of the great Parliamentarians of three
reigns—Victoria, Edward and George—Palmerston, Lord John Russell,
Cobden, Disraeli, Bright, Parnell, Randolph Churchill, Gladstone,
Chamberlain, Balfour, Asquith, John Redmond, Lloyd George, Winston
Churchill, Lord Hugh Cecil—laying down beneficent truths or
pernicious fallacies. Think of the groans of despair and the shouts
of exultation these forcible and vibrating personages have aroused!
With what volumes of sound, rising from the hearts of men and
expressive of every phase of human feeling—joy and grief, pathos and
humour, pity and contempt, exasperation and rage—has the Chamber
reverberated. Fine things have been said here, and mean things. Great
ideas have been expressed by great men who worthily served them.
The storms of passion, evoked by the clash between opposing reason
and thought in the political controversies that have been fought
out there at close quarters, have made the atmosphere of the House
of Commons humid and warm with emotion, and one with a mind at all
sympathetically attuned to the spirit of places cannot be there very
long before the effluence that emanates from these panelled walls is
thrilling him through and through.
Yet there are objects within the Chamber, made sacred almost by
history and tradition, which at once catch the eye. The visitor will
notice with becoming awe the high-canopied Chair, surmounted by an
oak carving of the Royal Arms, and will look with fitting reverence
on Mr. Speaker in his big grey wig and black silk gown. At the
head of the Table, beneath the Speaker, sits the Clerk of the House
and the two assistant clerks, all in the gowns and short wigs of
barristers-at-law, busily discharging their multifarious duties,
such as sub-editing papers handed in by Members containing questions
to be addressed to Ministers, amendments to be moved to Bills, and
notices of motions to be proposed should opportunity offer, and also
taking minutes of the proceedings for the Journals of the House. The
Table is indeed a “substantial piece of furniture,” as Disraeli once
described it when he spoke of his satisfaction that it lay between
him and Gladstone, who had just concluded a fierce declamatory
attack. It contains pens, ink and stationery for the use of Members,
volumes of the Standing Orders and other works of reference. At
the end of the Table, on either side, are two brass-bound oaken
boxes. These are the famous “dispatch-boxes” on which Ministers and
ex-Ministers lay their notes when addressing the House, and following
the traditional example of great statesmen in the past, thump to give
emphasis to an argument or, metaphorically, to bash the head of an
opponent.
The Table is also made to serve a part in parliamentary procedure.
Important documents, such as the reports of Committees, and Foreign
Office papers have to be “laid on the Table,” or, in other words,
presented to the House, before they can properly be made public;
and Orders of Departments have likewise to be “laid” for specified
periods preliminary to their coming into operation. Even the
floor-covering of the Chamber is a chapter from history. See the red
border-lines on the matting right down the floor, about two feet
from the front benches below the gangways. The opposing parties must
not step beyond that line while in the act of speaking. And why?
Because centuries ago Members were as ready to enforce an argument
with the sword as with the tongue, and, to hedge them in, these lines
of demarcation were drawn down the centre of the House. But of all
the objects in the House calculated to awaken historic memories the
Mace, perhaps, is the most potent. Made of silver and gilt with gold,
its large globular head surmounted by a cross and ball, its staff
artistically embellished, it lies a prominent and luminous object,
when the Speaker is in the Chair, on raised supports at the end of
the Table.
2
Business begins the moment the Speaker takes the Chair. It is noted
for its miscellaneous character. Private Bills—or Bills introduced
on behalf of the promoters of commercial or municipal undertakings
which interfere with rights of property—are first considered. But
the proceedings are formal, and devoid of interest. Petitions are
also presented to the House at this stage of the sitting. A Member
rises in his place and, stating that he has a petition to present,
reads a brief summary of its purport. It invariably ends with the
phrase, “And your petitioners will ever pray, etc.” No one has ever
seen the sentence completed. What, then, can “etc.” imply? It seems
a slovenly and irreverent way of saying one’s prayers, reminiscent
of the backwoodsman who chalked up his pious wishes at the head of
his bed, and, when tumbling in at night, jerked his thumb over his
shoulder saying, “Lord, them’s my sentiments.” “Will the honourable
Member bring it up?” says the Speaker, referring, of course, to the
petition. The Member walks up the floor and drops the roll into
the yawning mouth of a big black bag, hanging at the back of the
Chair. More often than not there is no public mention whatever of
the petition in the House. The Member to whom it is sent contents
himself with privately stowing it away into the bag, without anyone
being made a bit the wiser as to its nature or signatures. Through
the yawning mouth of this big black bag petitions may be said to drop
out of sight and out of mind into the limbo of waste and forgotten
things. Their presentation is recorded in the Journals of the House.
But they make no impression whatever on the minds of Members as to
the grievances they are intended to expose, and they are heard of
no more, except the Committee on Petitions, before whom, in due
course, they come for scrutiny, find some of the regulations have
been violated—that, for instance, the prayer of a petition, instead
of being in writing, is printed, or lithographed, or typewritten,
or that several of the signatures are in the same handwriting, or
denote persons manifestly fictitious, such as “Charles Piccadilly,”
“John Trafalgar Square”—put down by jokers—when the petition is
either returned for correction to the Member who presented it or its
rejection is recommended. Two municipal bodies have the privilege
of presenting petitions ceremoniously at the Bar of the House of
Commons—the Corporation of the City of London and the Corporation
of Dublin. In the early decades of the nineteenth century petitions
were read in full by Members who presented them, and there were
great debates arising out of them on such questions as Negro slavery
within the Empire, the political emancipation of Catholic or Jew, and
parliamentary reform. I have seen, in the later years of the same
century, huge petitions with hundreds of thousands of signatures
trundled up the floor of the House like enormous cartwheels or big
drums. They related usually to proposed changes in primary education
or the liquor laws—the two chief subjects of controversy in the dull
and happy time I speak of. But the sending of petitions is almost a
thing of the past. The House has become indifferent to any form of
persuasion save that of elections.
The Chamber has now rapidly filled up for “question time,” which
is often the most interesting part of a sitting. One of the most
precious and highly cherished privileges of a Member is the right to
question Ministers—before the House proceeds to business—in relation
to public affairs, matters of administration, policy or legislation.
Moreover, these interrogations and replies are an unfailing source of
interest and also of entertainment. The House then invariably wears
an alert and animated aspect. The benches on both sides are thronged.
Every Member is supplied with a copy of the official programme called
the “Orders of the Day”—a white folio paper of many pages, in which
the questions are printed, with other matter relating to the business
arranged for the sitting—and one of the most characteristic sights
which the House affords is the flutter of these papers on the crowded
benches, as the questions are put and answered. The proceedings are
followed with the closest attention, with, in fact, an absorbed
interest which during a debate is evoked only by a really great
speech on a subject of the first importance. The questions deal with
all sorts of topics, illustrating at once the freedom of inquiry
within the House and the jurisdiction of Parliament within the
far-spreading Empire.
Questions are given in writing to the Clerks at the Table. “A
question,” according to the Standing Orders, “must not contain any
argument, inference, imputation, epithet or ironical expression.” The
judge of the regularity of a question is the Speaker. He disallows
it if in his opinion it is an abuse of the right of questioning, the
sole object of which is to obtain information from the Government.
Questions are sometimes altered by the Clerks on the ground of
impropriety of expression. Members occasionally complain of this
censorship. The Irish Party once resented the insertion at the Table
of the word “Roman” before “Catholic” in a question handed in by
one of their Members. Mr. Speaker Lowther was greatly surprised
that they should have regarded the word as offensive, but promised,
in deference to their feelings, it would not be used again. On the
other hand, they rejoiced over their success in having the term
“land-grabbers”—one of ill-omen, in Irish agrarian agitation—passed
in a question and thus appearing for the first time on the official
records of Parliament. I can also recall instances of Members who
refused to put questions as they appeared in print. They were so
different from the form in which they had been given in manuscript to
the Clerks that their authors absolutely disowned them. But however
questions may be sub-edited, it is rarely that one is rejected
altogether by the Speaker. A question addressed to a Minister must,
of course, relate to some public affair with which he is officially
concerned, or to a matter of policy or administration for which he is
responsible. Subject to these limitations a Member may put down four
questions daily interrogating Ministers on any subject, no matter
how local or trivial, for there are little things as well as great
things in regard to which the House daily exercises supervision or
requires to be informed. The Minister, however, may decline to answer
a question on the ground that it is against the public interest. This
stops the irresponsible interference of Members in the most delicate
functions of the Executive, which, if allowed, especially in foreign
affairs, might be productive of embarrassing and perhaps hazardous
consequences.
Questions of an urgent character, or of exceptional importance, may
be asked without being printed in the “Orders of the Day,” provided
private notice—or notice, by letter—has been given to the particular
Minister and the consent of the Speaker has been previously obtained.
These special interrogations are always put when the printed
questions are disposed of. But the usual custom is for two or three
days’ notice to be given, in order to afford time for the preparation
of the replies. It is not the Ministers who discharge the task of
obtaining the information that is asked for. The questions are sent
to the different departments, to whose parliamentary chiefs they are
addressed, and the answers are drafted by the permanent staff. In
most cases all the Minister has to do with the replies is to read
them in the House of Commons. The day’s questions are printed, as I
have said, in the “Orders of the Day.” They are prefixed with the
names of the Members responsible for them and are also numbered. The
way in which they are put is direct and simple. Each Member rises
in his place when called on, in succession, by the Speaker, and
says: “I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department
question No. 1,” or, “I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty
question No. 40.” The Treasury Bench, be it understood, is crowded
with Ministers, each of them in possession of a bundle of typewritten
answers supplied to him by the clerks of his department. Accordingly,
the Home Secretary looks up question No. 1, or the First Lord of the
Admiralty question No. 40, from his bundle and reads it to the House.
The growth of this practice of questioning Ministers has been very
remarkable. It was not until the middle of the nineteenth century
that it became an established feature of the proceedings of the House
of Commons. In 1849 a special place was assigned to questions in
the “Orders of the Day.” Before that year they were few in number;
they referred mainly to the arrangement and progress of business,
and were rarely printed. The first time a question appeared in the
“Orders of the Day” was in 1835. But after 1849 questions were
printed regularly in the “Orders of the Day,” and the subjects
inquired about—confined, previously, to pending legislation—extended
gradually to public affairs and matters of administration. Still, it
was rare to see more than twelve, or at the most twenty, questions on
the paper for thirty years subsequently. In the session of 1860 the
number of questions asked was 699; in 1870, 1,203; in 1880, 1,546;
in 1890, 4,407, and in 1920 over 5,000. The questions occasionally
exceed 200 per day. The average number is about 150. All this shows
how interpellation, like other functions of the House of Commons,
came almost haphazardly into operation, and now rests immovably
on the foundation of privilege. And the Committee on National
Expenditure reported during the Great War that each question costs
the country thirty shillings.
Until 1880 it was the practice of Members to read every question when
putting it to the Minister, although it was printed in the “Orders of
the Day.” On July 8, 1880, after question time, Joseph Cowen called
attention to the fact that two hours had been occupied in asking
and answering questions. Yet the number of questions put that day
was only thirty. He added that, having taken the time on his watch,
he had found the mere reading of the questions occupied an hour;
and he asked the Speaker whether, as the questions were printed in
the “Orders of the Day,” it was necessary they should be read. Mr.
Speaker Brand, in reply, said: “It has been the general practice for
many years for hon. Members, in putting questions, to read these
questions, and it has been generally found to be a convenient course.
There is, however, no absolute rule on the subject.” From that day,
however, the reading of questions was gradually discontinued; and
questions were put simply by a reference to the numbers as they
appeared in the “Orders of the Day.” It was only a month later that
an Irish Member, named Finigan, on reading a question, was received
with loud cries of “Order!” The Speaker was asked whether it was not
“a great abuse of the rules of the House” for the hon. Member to
have read his question. “The matter is not so much one of order as
of propriety,” replied Mr. Speaker Brand. “I consider that the hon.
Member in reading the question of which he has given notice was,
strictly speaking, not out of order. With regard to the propriety
of his doing so, I give no opinion.” This was the last occasion a
question appearing in the “Orders of the Day” was read on being put
to the Minister.
Often the real interest of a question and answer only develops when
the Minister has read his typewritten reply. This arises from the
custom of putting what are known as supplementary questions. “Arising
out of the right hon. gentleman’s answer, may I ask ——?” the Member
begins. His purpose is to extract further information from the
reluctant Minister. If the subject is controversial, the Minister is
made the target of inquisitorial arrows, which he meets or parries as
best he can. Mr. Speaker Peel never attempted to set up any limit to
the liberty of a Member—dissatisfied with the answer to the question
he had placed on the paper or, as often happened, anxious to show off
his humour—to cross-examine, as it were, the Minister by means of
supplementary questions.
I remember many instances of Arthur Balfour, when Chief Secretary
for Ireland, being subjected for a quarter of an hour to a harassing
fusillade of supplementary questions arising out of the question on
one paper, and Mr. Speaker Peel saw no occasion for interference.
But a totally different line was taken by Mr. Speaker Gully. When
a Member rose to put a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker Gully
interposed with a cry of “Order, order!” and informed the hon.
gentleman that his question did not arise out of the question on
the paper. The rule regulating supplementary questions previously
was that they must arise out of the answer of the Minister. Some
Members, notably the most pertinacious hecklers of the Government,
chafed under this unwonted restraint, and occasionally showed signs
of a disposition to revolt against the Chair, but Gully had might
on his side, at least, and could not be trifled with. Mr. Speaker
Lowther was disposed to follow the precedent set by Gully. “If,” he
said on one occasion, “questions are at all important they should
be put on the notice-paper, and if they are not important, they
should not be asked.” Under Peel there was no limit to the duration
of question time. It was limited to an hour under Lowther, and a
point he repeatedly urged was that supplementary questions were
unfair to Members who had questions on the notice-paper because they
lessened the chance of these questions being reached within the time
allowed. The answer to such questions as are not reached within the
hour, and therefore are not read by the Ministers, are printed with
those orally given by the Ministers in the official report of the
proceedings of the House. Of questions generally it may be said that
while great principles are frequently raised or indirectly suggested
by them, many of them are concerned with what appears to be small
details of administration interesting only to the individuals whom
they affect.
3
New Members are introduced after questions. Quaint indeed are the
contradictions of parliamentary procedure. Rules that are entirely
different regulate the taking of the oath of allegiance and their
seats in the House of Commons by M.P.’s returned at the General
Election, and M.P.’s who come in at by-elections. We have seen on
the opening days of Parliament hundreds of men appear at Westminster
and being permitted to take the oath and their seats without any
examination of credentials or any evidence of identification.
It was quite possible, on the occasion of a large influx of new
representatives, unknown by appearance to the officials, for a
“stranger,” impudent enough and sufficiently strong of nerve, to
pass in with the crowd, and snatch the fearful joy of sitting on
the sacred Treasury Bench or Opposition Bench—in front even of the
brass-bound box associated with leadership and quite close to the
Mace—without anyone saying him nay. On the other hand, there is an
elaborate ceremony of introduction prescribed for those returned at
by-elections. The new Member has to be escorted to the Table, to take
the oath of allegiance and sign the Test Roll, by two full-blown
Members of the House. This custom has survived from a remote past
when, in order to prevent personation, two Members of the House
were required to identify the claimant of a seat after a by-election
as the person named by the returning officer in the return to the
writ. This precaution has been unnecessary for many a year. But
such is the reluctance of the House of Commons to part with any of
its historic ceremonies, such is its scrupulous regard for ancient
precedents—no matter how incongruous they may appear owing to the
changes effected by time—that this formality is still retained; and
though a representative may appear at the Bar of the House as the
unanimous choice of a constituency of 20,000 electors, and produce
the certificate of the official return of his election, he will not
be sworn in and permitted to take his seat unless two Members act as
his sponsors, and so declare that, as the conjurers say, there is
positively no deception.
There is the famous case of Dr. Kenealy, counsel for “The Claimant,”
in the Tichborne Trial, who was disbarred by the Benchers of
Grey’s Inn, and afterwards returned for Stoke-upon-Trent at a
by-election in February 1875. He came to the Table alone. It is
not clearly established whether he failed to find two Members who
would accompany him as sponsors, or whether he wanted to put to the
test a custom which, in his opinion, was no part of constitutional
law. At any rate, the Speaker informed him that as he had not been
introduced by two Members, in accordance with the ancient usage of
the House—founded on a Standing Order dating from 1688—he could
not be sworn in or take his seat. Kenealy was, therefore, obliged
to withdraw from the House. No objection could be raised to Dr.
Kenealy’s election. He produced the certificate of his return as
Member for Stoke-upon-Trent. Everyone in the House knew that he was
the person named in the official document. He laboured under no legal
disability. Had he been returned at the General Election he could
have taken, without question, the oath and his seat. But coming
in at a by-election he was not allowed to do so solely because of
his inability to comply with what, after all, in this age is but a
mere ceremonial function. The position was, indeed, absurd. It was
impossible that a duly elected representative of the people could be
excluded from Parliament for so unsubstantial a cause. Accordingly, a
special resolution, moved by Disraeli, who was then Prime Minister,
was carried dispensing with the ancient introductory ceremony in the
particular case of Dr. Kenealy. In the course of the discussion John
Bright and another Member named Whalley intimated that they were
willing to walk up the floor with Kenealy “out of deference,” as
Bright put it, “to the will of a large constituency.” The Member for
Stoke-upon-Trent once more came to the Table unaccompanied; the oath
was administered to him and he signed the Roll—the sole instance of a
departure from a custom observed since 1688. Kenealy then disappeared
in the mass of Members among whom he could not count two friends.
“He was in the House, but not of it,” said Joseph Cowen, speaking in
1881. He was effectually and completely boycotted.
Sometimes the new M.P., returned at a by-election, forgets to
bring to the Table the certificate of the return to the writ. This
document, which is sent by the Clerk of the Crown to the Clerk of
the House, is given to the new Member on application at the Vote
Office, in the Lobby, just before the ceremony of initiation, and
must be presented to the Clerk of the House at the Table as evidence
that he is the person named in the return to the writ as having been
duly elected, before the oath can be administered to him. As a rule,
therefore, the new Member takes care that he has this indispensable
official paper in his possession before he starts to walk, between
his two sponsors, from the Bar to the Table. But Hardinge Giffard,
afterwards Earl Halsbury and Lord Chancellor, when elected at a
by-election in 1877, found on reaching the Table that the little blue
document was missing. In his consternation he hurriedly turned out
all the contents of his pockets, piling them upon the Table—letters,
a purse, some loose coppers and silver, a bunch of keys, a briar-wood
pipe—all sorts of things but the essential certificate. In this case
the Speaker refused to accept any evidence—not even the testimony
of identification by the two sponsors—but the Clerk of the Crown’s
certificate that the man at the Table was the man that had been
duly returned at the recent election for Launceston. The House, of
course, was amused at the spectacle. Happily, one of the Whips who
went in search of the missing return found it in the hat of the new
Member, under the cross-bench below the Bar, where Hardinge Giffard
had sat with his sponsors awaiting the time for the Speaker to make
the customary announcement—“New Members desirous of taking their
places will, please, come to the Table.”
Yet it would seem, after all, as if the production of the certificate
of the return to the writ were not absolutely necessary before a
new Member, coming in at a by-election, can take his seat. On March
11, 1848, Mr. Hames was elected for the Irish borough of Kinsale;
on the 15th he took the oath and his seat, but it was not until the
18th that the return to the writ was received by the Clerk of the
Crown. The Clerk of the House of Commons had neglected to ask for
the certificate on the appearance of the new Member at the Table,
thinking that the formality might be dispensed with as the return
to the writ had not arrived. When the mistake was discovered there
was great wagging of official heads. But none of the authorities
could suggest a way out of the difficulty. It was unprecedented. The
Clerk went about haunted by visions of the deepest dungeon under
the moat of the Tower of London. At last a committee of the House
was appointed to make inquiries; and after due investigation they
reported that the Clerk had done a perfectly sensible thing, however
unwittingly. They said it was true that the return to the writ had
always been required by the House as “the best evidence of a Member’s
title to be sworn.” “Nevertheless,” continued they, “the absence
of that proof cannot affect the validity of the election, nor the
right of a person duly elected to be held a Member of the House.”
Truly, a most proper decision! Still, the committee recommended a
strict adherence to the practice of requiring the production of the
document. This much, at least, can be said for it, that it is a
picturesque detail in the initiation of a new Member of the House of
Commons.
The House then comes to the real business of the sitting. At this
stage of the proceedings leave may be asked for to move the
adjournment of the House, but, even if it be granted, action is not
immediately taken. The object of such a motion is to obtain from
the Government an explanation of some act of commission or omission
on their part; of something which, in the opinion of the Opposition
or any other section of the House, they have wrongly done or left
undone. The matter complained of must be—as the Standing Order
says—“a definite matter of urgent public importance” in the opinion
of the Speaker, and the motion must also have the concurrence of at
least forty members. Therefore, when a Member rises after questions
and asks leave to move the adjournment of the House, stating at the
same time the object he has in view, the Speaker, should he consider
the subject definite and urgent, asks whether the hon. Member is
supported by forty Members. Immediately the Members in favour of
the motion rise in their places, and if they muster forty, leave
is granted, but the debate stands over until a quarter past eight
o’clock. Forty members make a quorum, without which no business
can be done. If leave is not given because it lacks the necessary
support, the Member who asks for it may challenge a division in
the hope of winning in the lobbies, or for the purpose of getting
a record of those for and against his motion. I remember in the
session of 1912 when George Lansbury the Socialist startled everyone
by claiming that a division should be taken on a motion for the
adjournment, in support of which only 38 Members had risen. The
Speaker, Mr. Lowther, had recourse to the little book containing
the rules of the House which he always has by him on the arm of the
Chair, for this was probably the first time that such a request had
been made, and satisfied himself that Lansbury was within his rights.
The motion was lost by 115 against 86.
4
This being disposed of, the Speaker rises and says: “The Clerk will
now proceed to read the Orders of the Day,” and the Clerk, with a
copy of the Order Paper in his hand, reads the title of the first
of the list of Bills down for consideration. It may be the second
reading or the third reading stage, at which, on all great Bills,
there is usually a big debate. Disraeli is said to have described
the House of Commons as a dull place, with some great moments. In
my opinion, it would be difficult for the House of Commons ever to
be downright dull. Its great moments are, indeed, many. The variety
and vitality of the questions at issue there and its personalities
secure it against tediousness. For Disraeli—as for most of those
who have once breathed its intoxicating atmosphere—it always had
an absorbing charm. Joseph Gilles Biggar, one of the best known of
the Irish Party, lived in the House and for the House. Outside it
he had no interest or amusement. I happened to be talking to him
in the Lobby during a sitting that was supposed to be dull, when a
colleague asked him whether he might go to a theatre for the evening.
Biggar was then the Chief Whip of the Nationalist Party, and a stern
martinet. “Theatre!” he exclaimed contemptuously. “This is better
than a play, Mister. It is all real here.” Yet he was the man who,
by the invention of obstruction, and its use, did most violence to
its time-honoured and dearly cherished customs. The House of Commons
is, indeed, a most alluring place. It has an interest of the highest
dramatic intensity on the occasion of a big debate relating to the
predominant political question of the day, which deeply stirs Party
passions and prejudices, and brings down into the arena of the floor
the great chiefs to fight for principle with the keen and subtle
weapon of the tongue.
“Mr. Speaker.” So begins each Member who rises to address the House.
Of all the speakers in the Chamber, Mr. Speaker speaks seldomest, and
in the fewest words. The Speaker sits in his high-canopied Chair,
not to talk but to listen to talkers. Hours may pass, and “Order,
order,” may be the only words spoken by Mr. Speaker. He guides the
deliberations of the House. He names the Member who is to continue
the debate. This is not a matter simply of “catching the Speaker’s
eye,” as it is popularly called. The Speaker does not always name
the Member upon whom his eye may first rest. On both sides of the
House Members jump to their feet, eager to join in the debate, each
straining forward, or shaking his notes to attract the attention
of Mr. Speaker. The Speaker’s selection of one from among these
competitors to fix his wandering eye is careful and deliberate. If
an opponent of the Bill has just spoken, it is almost certain that a
supporter will be selected to follow. The aim of the Speaker is to
secure that, as far as possible, every phase of opinion shall find
expression. In this he is assisted by lists given to him beforehand
by the Whips of the different Parties, containing the names of
their chief spokesmen in the debate. Therefore it is that Members
on opposite sides follow each other alternately, the only exception
to the rule being that should a Minister, or one of the leading
occupants of the Front Opposition Bench, intervene at any moment,
he has the right, more or less prescriptive, to be called on by the
Speaker.
The Speaker follows the flow of discursive talk with what appears
to be the most absorbing interest. Indeed, it is into his ears that
the Member “in possession of the House”—to use the traditional
phrase—pours all his views and prognostications, all his fears and
expectations. It is, “Now, Mr. Speaker, let me say,” or “With great
respect, Mr. Speaker, I submit.” Accordingly, the Speaker may not
betake himself, even for a little while, to his own select and
profitable thoughts. He must always be seized of the drift of the
argument of the Member who is addressing him. At any moment he may be
called upon to rule a point of order. His faculties must always be
wide awake. At any moment some emergency may arise, without the least
forewarning, when all his authority, tact, and common sense will be
needed.
It is said there are Judges of the High Court who can sleep during
the speeches of counsel, and wake up at the moment that the
slumberous presentation of argument is concluded. The atmosphere of
the House of Commons is often drowsy. Members may be seen asleep on
the benches at all hours. Yet it is a remarkable fact that there is
only one instance on record of a Speaker—impassive figure though
he be, in a big wig and a flowing gown, reclining in a large Chair
under a spreading canopy—having been caught nodding or napping. It
was to Shaw-Lefevre, the only Speaker over whom tired Nature asserted
itself, and whose weighted lids, despite his desperate resistance,
were finally closed in slumber, that Mackworth Praed addressed these
lines:
Sleep, Mr. Speaker; it’s only fair,
If you don’t in your bed, you should in your Chair,
Longer and longer still they grow,
Tory and Radical, Aye and No.
Talking by night and talking by day;
Sleep, Mr. Speaker, sleep while you may.
END VOL. I.
_Printed in Great Britain by_
UNWIN BROTHERS, LIMITED
WOKING AND LONDON
FOOTNOTES:
[1] This statutory provision was temporarily suspended during the
Great War. It was provided by an Act passed in December 1916, making
certain new Ministerial appointments, and additional Secretaries or
Under-Secretaries, that during the continuance of the War, and for
six months afterwards, the limitation on the number of Principal
Secretaries and Under-Secretaries who may sit and vote in the House
of Commons, shall not have effect.
[2] In the Coalition Government during the Great War there were two
Chief Whips, one Liberal, the other Unionist, each styled “Joint
Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury,” and paid £2,000.
[3] Sir Edward Grey, speaking at a public meeting in 1911, when he
was Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, humorously objected to
being referred to as the “Foreign Secretary.” “I am told,” said
he, “it gives the impression that, if I am not in the service of
foreigners, I am at least an alien.”
[4] Three other Ministries were temporarily created for the purposes
of the War—Munitions and Shipping and Food. They were brought to an
end in 1921.
[5] A Committee of the House of Commons appointed to consider the
salaries of Ministers, owing to the great rise in the cost of living,
following the World War, recommended, in 1921, that the salary of the
Prime Minister be raised to £8,000, that the salary of all Ministers
of Cabinet rank be £5,000; that the salary of second class Ministers
be £3,000, third class Ministers, £2,000, and that Under-Secretaries
and Parliamentary Secretaries be paid £1,500.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE
Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been
corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within
the text and consultation of external sources.
Some hyphens in words have been silently removed, some added,
when a predominant preference was found in the original book.
Except for those changes noted below, all misspellings in the text,
and inconsistent or archaic usage, have been retained.
Pg 21: ‘emanate fron the’ replaced by ‘emanate from the’.
Pg 25: ‘by a votor’ replaced by ‘by a voter’.
Pg 29: ‘petitions impunging’ replaced by ‘petitions impugning’.
Pg 37: ‘in order to forestal’ replaced by ‘in order to forestall’.
Pg 38: ‘in still in vogue’ replaced by ‘is still in vogue’.
Pg 41: ‘the custon for’ replaced by ‘the custom for’.
Pg 82: ‘seemed eminent’ replaced by ‘seemed imminent’.
Pg 92: ‘appropriating portion’ replaced by ‘appropriating a portion’.
Pg 95: ‘It weights’ replaced by ‘It weighs’.
Pg 98: ‘not tongue to’ replaced by ‘nor tongue to’.
Pg 163: ‘George Cornewell’ replaced by ‘George Cornewall’.
Pg 174: ‘red dispatch box’ replaced by ‘red despatch box’.
Pg 198: ‘or the prefessions’ replaced by ‘or the professions’.
Pg 228: ‘the House wi hout’ replaced by ‘the House without’.
Pg 247: ‘said Joseph Cowan’ replaced by ‘said Joseph Cowen’.