THE PREVIOUS QUESTION.
When any question is before the House, any member may move a previous
question, "Whether that question (called the main question) shall now
be put?" If it pass in the affirmative, then the main question is to be
put immediately, and no man may speak anything further to it, either to
add or alter.--_Memor. in Hakew._ 28; 4 _Grey_, 27.
$The previous question being moved and seconded, the question from the
chair shall be, "Shall the main question be now put?" and if the nays
prevail, the main question shall not then be put--_Rule_ 9.$
This kind of question is understood by Mr. Hatsell to have been introduced
in 1604.--2 _Hats._ 80. Sir Henry Vane introduced it.--2 _Grey_, 113,
114; 3 _Grey_, 384. When the question was put in this form, "Shall the
main question be put?" a determination in the negative suppressed the
main question during the session; but since the words "now put" are
used, they exclude it for the present only. Formerly, indeed, only till
the present debate was over; 4 _Grey_, 43; but now for that day and no
longer.--2 _Grey_, 113, 114.
Before the question, "Whether the main question shall now be put?" any
person might formerly have spoken to the main question, because otherwise
he would be precluded from speaking to it at all.--_Mem. in Hakew._ 28.
The proper occasion for the previous question is, when a subject is
brought forward of a delicate nature as to high personages, &c., or
the discussion of which may call forth observations which might be of
injurious consequences. Then the previous question is proposed, and, in
the modern usage, the discussion of the main question is suspended, and
the debate confined to the previous question. The use of it has been
extended abusively to other cases; but in these, it is an embarrassing
procedure: its uses would be as well answered by other more simple
Parliamentary forms, and therefore it should not be favored, but
restricted within as narrow limits as possible.
Whether a main question may be amended after the previous question on
it has been moved and seconded? 2 _Hatsell_, 88, says, If the previous
question had been moved and seconded, and also proposed from the chair,
(by which he means, stated by the Speaker for debate,) it has been
doubted whether an amendment can be admitted to the main question. He
thinks it may, after the previous question moved and seconded; but not
after it has been proposed from the chair.
In this case he thinks the friends to the amendment must vote that the
main question be not now put, and then move their amended question,
which being made new by the amendment, is no longer the same which
has been just suppressed, and therefore may be proposed as a new one.
But this proceeding certainly endangers the main question, by dividing
its friends, some of whom may choose it unamended, rather than lose it
altogether; while others of them may vote, as Hatsell advises, that the
main question be not now put, with a view to move it again in an amended
form. The enemies of the main question by this manœuvre to the previous
question, get the enemies to the amendment added to them on the first
vote, and throw the friends of the main question under the embarrassment
of rallying again as they can. To support his opinion, too, he makes the
deciding circumstance, whether an amendment may or may not be made, to be,
that the previous question has been proposed from the chair. But as the
rule is, that the House is in possession of a question as soon as it is
moved and seconded, it cannot be more than possessed of it by its being
also proposed from the chair. It may be said, indeed, that the object of
the previous question being to get rid of a question, which it is not
expedient should be discussed, this object may be defeated by moving
to amend, and, in the discussion of that motion, involving the subject
of the main question. But so may the object of the previous question be
defeated by moving the amended question, as Mr. Hatsell proposes, after
the decision against putting the original question. He acknowledges,
too, that the practice has been to admit previous amendment, and only
cites a few late instances to the contrary. On the whole, I should
think it best to decide it _ab inconvenienti_; to wit, Which is most
inconvenient, to put it in the power of one side of the House to defeat
a proposition by hastily moving the previous question, and thus forcing
the main question to be put amended? or to put it in the power of the
other side to force on, incidentally at least, a discussion which would
be better avoided? Perhaps the last is the least inconvenience; inasmuch
as the Speaker, by confining the discussion rigorously to the amendment
only, may prevent their going into the main question; and inasmuch also,
as so great a proportion of the cases, in which the previous question
is called for, are fair and proper subjects of public discussion, and
ought not to be obstructed by a formality introduced for questions of
a peculiar character.