(Vol. ii., p. 17.)
As far as my observation extends, i.e. the last thirty-one years, no
alteration has taken place in the practice of the House of Commons with
respect to the admission of strangers. In 1844 the House adopted the
usual sessional order regarding strangers, which I transcribe, inserting
within brackets the only material words added by Mr. Christie in 1845:--
"That the Serjeant-at-Arms attending this house do, from time to
time, take into his custody any stranger or strangers that he
shall see or be informed of to be in the house or gallery
[appropriated to the members of this house, and also any
stranger who, having been admitted into any other part of the
house or gallery, shall misconduct himself, or shall not
withdraw when strangers are directed to withdraw] while the
House or any committee of the whole House is sitting, and that
no person so taken into custody be discharged out of custody
without the special order of the House.
"That no member of the House do presume to bring any stranger or
strangers into the house, or the gallery thereof, while the
House is sitting."
This order appears to have been framed at a time when there was no
separate gallery exclusively appropriated to strangers, and when they
were introduced by members into the gallery of what is called the "body
of the house." This state of things had passed away: and for a long
series of years strangers had been admitted to a gallery in the House of
Commons in the face of the sessional order, by which your correspondent
CH. imagines their presence was "absolutely prohibited."
When I speak of strangers being admitted, it must not be supposed that
this was done by order of the House. No, every thing relating to the
admission of strangers to, and their accommodation in the House of
Commons, is effected by some mysterious agency for which no one is
directly responsible. Mr. Barry has built galleries for strangers in the
new house; but if the matter were made a subject of inquiry, it probably
would puzzle him to state under what authority he has acted.
Mr. Christie wished to make the sessional order applicable to existing
circumstances; and, it may be, he desired to draw from the House a
direct sanction for the admission of strangers. In the latter purpose,
however, if he ever entertained it, he failed. The wording of his
amendment is obscure, but necessarily so. The word "gallery," as
employed by him, can only refer to the gallery appropriated to members
of the House; but he intended it to apply to the strangers' gallery. The
order should have run thus, "admitted into any other part of the house,
or into the gallery appropriated to strangers;" but Mr. Christie well
knew that the House would not adopt those words, because they contain an
admission that strangers _are_ present whilst the House is sitting,
whereas it is a parliamentary fiction that they are _not_. If a member
in debate should inadvertently allude to the possibility of his
observations being heard by a stranger, the Speaker would immediately
call him to order; yet at other times the right honourable gentleman
will listen complacently to discussions {84} arising out of the
complaints of members that strangers will not publish to the world all
that they hear pass in debate. This is one of the consistencies
resulting from the determination of the House not expressly to recognise
the presence of strangers; but, after all, I am not aware that any
practical inconvenience flows from it. The non-reporting strangers
occupy a gallery at the end of the house immediately opposite the
Speaker's chair; but the right hon. gentleman, proving the truth of the
saying, "None so blind as he who will not see," never perceives them
until just as a division is about to take place, when he invariably
orders them to withdraw. When a member wishes to exclude strangers he
addresses the Speaker, saying, "I think, Sir, I see a stranger or
strangers in the house," whereupon the Speaker instantly directs
strangers to withdraw. The Speaker issues his order in these
words:--"Strangers must withdraw."