The Government of England Part 49

[Sidenote: Personal Influence of the Peers.]

The personal influence of the Lords is far greater than their collective authority. With the waning of the landed gentry the respect for the old territorial aristocracy has been replaced by a veneration for t.i.tles, and this has inured to the benefit of the peerage. One sees it even in business affairs, although the Lords as a cla.s.s are little qualified by experience for dealing with matters of that kind, the n.o.bility having until recently been debarred by tradition from commercial life. One of the devices of that arch promoter Hooley for inducing the public to embark in his schemes was to include a number of peers in his list of directors--guinea-pig directors, as they were called, because their most visible function was to pocket a guinea for attendance at each meeting.

The Hooley revelations some years ago checked this practice; but the fact that it should have existed shows the confidence that t.i.tles were believed to inspire among a large cla.s.s of investors.

The glamour of rank appears to be if anything more dazzling as one descends in the social scale; and a scion of a n.o.ble family, even when he has no landed interest at his back, is usually a strong Parliamentary candidate in a working-cla.s.s const.i.tuency. The extension of the franchise has thus rather increased than diminished the influence of the n.o.bility. The House of Commons, no doubt, makes a show of insisting that the peers shall take no part in general elections; but they are, nevertheless, active in politics and even in great electioneering organisations, particularly in those that stand, like the Primrose League, a little outside of the regular party machinery. When a general election is not in progress the leaders of the House of Lords speak constantly in public; and at the present day speeches from the platform are reported in the daily press quite as fully, and read at least as widely, as those delivered in the House of Commons. A foreigner is impressed by the popular confidence in those peers who have attained a position in the forefront of politics. There seems to be a feeling that they are raised above the scrimmage of public life; that in rank, wealth, and reputation they possess already the goal of ambition, and are beyond the reach of the temptations that beset the ordinary man.

[Sidenote: Reform of the House of Lords.]

[Sidenote: Objects of Reform.]

The adoption by the Lords, in the autumn of 1906, of amendments to the Education Bill, so contrary to its spirit that they were rejected in the Commons by an overwhelming majority without any attempt at compromise, has brought the question of a reform of the upper House again prominently before the country. No one would now think of creating the House of Lords as it stands; but, as Mr. (now Lord) Courtney remarks, "The public judgment may long tolerate a machine which works without unnecessary friction, although it would not construct it in the same fashion if it had to be for the first time devised."[414:1] This is particularly true if it is difficult to propose something that would work better; and therefore in discussing the reform of the House of Lords it is important to have clearly in mind the objects to be attained. Now, there are four possible objects of a reform: to make the House less powerful; to make it more powerful; to change the nature of its power; or to bring it into greater harmony with the popular elements in the state; and it may be interesting to examine these objects in turn.

[Sidenote: To Reduce the Power of the House.]

The National Liberal Federation has repeatedly pa.s.sed resolutions in favour of restricting what is called the veto of the House of Lords.

This is most natural, for besides the objection in principle to hereditary legislators, there is the galling fact that the House is always hostile to the Liberal party. No one would suggest that so long as a second chamber is suffered to exist it should be wholly deprived of the right to reject or amend bills sent to it from the Commons. It is proposed, however, that the veto shall not be repeated after a certain interval, and the vital question is what that interval shall be. A provision that the Lords should not reject a bill pa.s.sed by the Commons in two successive Parliaments, would probably be a mere legal ratification of their present const.i.tutional position; for although, after a fresh general election has proved that the cabinet retains the confidence of the nation, the Lords may refuse a second time to enact one of its measures, they have never done so, and are not very likely to venture so far. A provision, on the other hand, that the Lords should not reject or amend a bill pa.s.sed by the Commons in two successive sessions of the same Parliament would mean that except in the last session of an expiring Parliament, they could reject or amend seriously no government bill, whether convinced that the nation approved of it or not.[415:1] This would be almost equivalent to an entire abolition of the second chamber so far as government measures are concerned, because the shred of authority left would amount to little more than that of requiring the ministers to reconsider their position, which they could hardly do without stultifying themselves. The President of the French Republic has a similar right in relation to the chambers, but it is never exercised. A change of this kind could certainly be made, but whether it would be wise or not is another question.

Moreover, if a rule that the Lords should not reject or amend a government bill pa.s.sed by the Commons in two successive sessions did not virtually destroy the power of the House of Lords altogether, it would not accomplish the object of the Liberals. It would not put them upon a footing of equality with the Conservatives, for it would mean that it would take them two sessions to pa.s.s any legislation of a far-reaching character, while the Conservatives could do it in one.

We are not concerned now with the question of reducing the power of the hereditary members of the House, by introducing other members in their stead; but of reducing the power of the House as a whole. Those persons who are seriously interested in reforming the composition of the body are usually more anxious to increase than to diminish its authority, and it would be somewhat strange to make the House of Lords more representative or more popular, while at the same time taking away the last remnants of its power in political questions.

[Sidenote: To Increase its Power.]

In considering suggestions to reform the House of Lords for the sake of increasing its efficiency we are met by the question whether with a parliamentary system, that is with government by party, as highly developed as it is in England, a more powerful upper House is possible.

Fifty years ago second chambers were defended on the ground that they acted as a drag on radical legislation. But, as we have seen, the House of Lords does not really perform that function. It does not try to check legislation by one of the parties, and only under peculiar circ.u.mstances can it seriously restrain the other. Nor could any upper House render that service effectively in England to-day. The fact is that although historically the position of the House of Lords may have been the consequence of its hereditary, non-representative character, it is now doomed to its present condition by the inexorable logic of a political system. Its limitations in dealing with government bills are imposed by the principle of a ministry responsible to the popular chamber, and working through highly developed parties; its inability to exert a substantial influence upon other public legislation is the result, not of its own inherent weakness, but of the condition of the House of Commons; while in private bill legislation, which lies outside the domain of politics, it shares in full measure the authority of a coordinate branch of Parliament.

[Sidenote: To Change the Nature of its Power.]

The same reasoning would apply to any proposal to alter in character the powers exercised by the Lords. The channels of possible activity of any second chamber are fixed in England by the system itself, and they are not far from the ones in which the House of Lords now moves. The House could, no doubt, be shorn of the remnant of political authority that it still wields, and it could be deprived of its right to take part in private bill legislation; but it would seem that, except by merely reducing their extent, the nature of its powers cannot be very materially changed.

[Sidenote: To Bring it into Harmony with the Nation.]

[Sidenote: Creation of Peers.]

During the generation following the Reform Act of 1832, men spoke of the possibility of making new peers as a sufficient safeguard against obstinacy on the part of the upper House. It was felt that a ministry with the nation at its back could, if necessary, force the Lords to yield by advising the Crown to create peers enough to turn the scale.

Lord Grey's government proposed to do this as a last resort to pa.s.s the Reform Bill of 1832, and obtained the consent of William IV.; but the threat was enough, and the Lords gave way. Such a drastic means of coercion is probably useless to-day; and would be only a temporary remedy. It is really not with the Commons that the House of Lords now comes into serious conflict, but with the cabinet which represents, or claims to represent, the nation, or to be more accurate the major part of the nation; and no creation of peers would be made to force a bill through the House of Lords unless the party in power had a mandate from the people to pa.s.s it. This is the real meaning of the saying that the House of Lords can force a referendum, or appeal to the nation, on a measure to which they object. A creation of peers to swamp the upper House would, therefore, not be tried until a general election had proved the persistent will of the electorate upon the measure in question, and then the Lords would in any case submit. Differences of opinion may, of course, arise on the question whether there is sufficient evidence of the popular will or not. In 1893, for example, the Liberals contended that the preceding general election had been carried on the issue of Home Rule, while the Conservatives insisted that it had really turned on other matters; and the same thing happened in the case of the Education Bill of 1906. Such a discussion may be conducted with heat, but especially with the enormous number of peers now required to turn a majority in their House, there is little danger of precipitate action.

It is one of many cases where the conventions of the Const.i.tution may appear to be strained, but where one may be sure they will not be broken.[417:1]

Moreover, if the creation of peers were within the region of practical politics to-day, it would be only a temporary remedy for existing grievances. Contrary to the prevalent opinion, Lord John Russell thought that in 1832 the authority of the House of Lords suffered, on the whole, more from the abstention of its members under threat, than it would have from an actual creation of peers that might have brought it into harmony with the people. He remarks that the Tory majority of eighty, hostile to Lord Grey's government, was held back by Wellington, but employed by Lyndhurst to kill unpretending but useful measures.[418:1] Subsequent events have shown the impossibility of maintaining harmony between the Houses by a single creation of peers, for had a batch of Lord Grey's supporters been given seats in the Lords in 1832, the House would have been heavily Conservative again within a generation.

The difficulty to-day is not so much that the peers are permanently out of accord with the nation, as that they are bound to one of the two parties into which the country is divided. A mere reduction in the size of the Tory majority would do little or no good; nor would the difficulty be solved if the majority were transferred to the other party, or even if it shifted at different periods. In a country governed by party as strictly as England is to-day, the majority in the upper House must at any one time belong to one side or the other. If the majority shifted, there would not be permanent irritation in the same quarter; but first one side, and then the other, would complain that the Lords thwarted the popular will. While, therefore, the occasional creation of a large number of peers, either hereditary or for life, might, at a sacrifice of the self-respect of the House of Lords, produce for the moment a greater similarity of views between the two branches of Parliament, a constant political harmony could be attained only by such additions to the upper House by each new set of ministers as would make it a mere tool in their hands. In short, an upper House in a true parliamentary system cannot be brought into constant accord with the dominant party of the day without destroying its independence altogether; and to make the House of Lords a mere tool in the hands of every cabinet would be well-nigh impossible and politically absurd.

[Sidenote: Reform in the Composition of the House.]

What is true of the creation of peers is true also of any other method of changing the membership of the House. Suggestions for reforming its composition have been based mainly upon the desire to reduce the hereditary element, and supply its place by representative men selected in other ways. The House contains, of course, many drones, who have inherited the right, without the desire, for public work. Either they do not attend at all, or they come only to swell a foregone majority upon some measure that has attracted popular interest. They give no time or thought to the work of the House, and their votes, on the rare occasions when they are cast, are peculiarly exasperating to their opponents. As the regular attendants at the sittings are few, it has been suggested that the English, like the Scotch and Irish, n.o.bility should choose representatives of their own order, and that the rest should have no right to vote. Just as the Scotch and Irish representative peers are solidly Unionist, so a change of this kind would merely result in increasing the Conservative majority of the House, unless some principle of minority representation were adopted, in which case the majority, though numerically smaller, would be equally constant and more subject to party dictation.

On the other hand, it has been proposed to make the House more broadly representative of the nation by a more or less extended creation of life peers, nominated, in part, perhaps, by sundry public bodies in the United Kingdom. It may be doubted, however, whether life peers are needed to increase the eminence or, in one sense, the representative character of the House. The peerage has been opened freely to men distinguished in various fields; and while many men without wealth have doubtless been precluded from an honour that would burden their descendants, many others have come in. The number of hereditary members of the House has increased nearly, although not quite, in proportion to population; and only about one fourth of the present members sit by virtue of t.i.tles dating before 1800. A large share of the creations have been made for political service; but others have been conferred in consequence of wealth ama.s.sed in commercial and industrial pursuits; the most distinguished lawyers and soldiers have always been rewarded by a peerage; and so in more recent times have a few men of eminence in science and literature. A body that contains, or has recently contained, such men as Tennyson, Acton, Kelvin, Lister, Rayleigh, and many more, can bear comparison in personal distinction with any legislative chamber the world has ever known. Therefore one may fairly doubt whether the defect to be remedied by a creation of life peers is either a lack of brains in the House, or a failure of its members to represent the deeper currents of national life.

[Sidenote: Reform Unlikely to Add Much Strength.]

But the personal distinction of members, in fields outside of public affairs, has very little connection with the political power of a body; and the House of Lords itself furnishes one of the most striking proofs of that fact. The men whose names have been mentioned have taken no part in the work of the House, and such people rarely do. Moreover, if they take part they rarely do it well. Occasionally such a man may have a chance to say something on the subject of his own profession that carries weight. The speech of Lord Roberts in July, 1905, for example, about the inefficiency of the British Army, was considered a very impressive utterance, but, except for the rule of office that sealed his mouth in any other place, he might have delivered it with just as much effect elsewhere. Men who would be created life peers on account of their distinction in other lines would either take no interest in politics, or would take it so late in life that they would rarely carry weight with the public. Such influence and repute as the House of Lords now possesses is derived not from the personal fame of the members but from the social l.u.s.tre of the peerage, and no creation of life peers would be likely to add anything to that. The authority of a public body depends not upon the eminence but upon the political following of its members; and it is self-evident that no leading English statesman in the full tide of his vigour and popularity would willingly exchange a seat in the House of Commons for an appointment for life in any second chamber, so that a House of Lords constructed on these principles would become in large part an asylum for decrepit politicians.

Another suggestion of a similar kind is that the House should be remodelled upon the lines of the Privy Council, but the Privy Council to-day as a working body is nothing but the ministry, the other members attending only on ceremonial occasions. It is a mere instrument of government in the hands of the cabinet; nor, so far as English politics are concerned, can it very well be anything else. The proposal that colonial members should sit in the House of Lords is interesting from other points of view, but clearly it could not be applied in the case of domestic legislation. That the will of the House of Commons on English questions should be thwarted by representatives from other parts of the empire would be far more unfortunate than to have it thwarted by hereditary English n.o.bles.

[Sidenote: Other Probable Results.]

But if a change in the composition of the House of Lords would be very unlikely to raise its political position as a whole, it might well reduce the personal influence of individual peers. If the House came to be regarded as mainly a collection of persons holding seats for life, the social position of its members might be very different from that of an hereditary n.o.bility. A radical reform in the composition of the House might also very well produce a change of another kind. Perhaps the most important function of the House of Lords at the present day, and probably the chief privilege of its members, comes from the fact that it is largely a reservoir of ministers of state. By the present traditions ministers must be all taken from one House or the other; and a large proportion of them are always taken from the peers. This gives a n.o.bleman, who is sincerely interested in public life, even if of somewhat slender ability, a fair prospect of obtaining a position of honour and usefulness. Now, if a number of life peers were to be created, it would clearly be possible to confer a t.i.tle upon a man for the purpose of making him a minister. If this were done commonly, it might affect not only the position of the existing peers, but also that of the House of Commons. For a man not born to a coronet would be able to achieve a high office of state without an apprenticeship in the popular chamber. Thus a channel might be opened for a direct connection between the cabinet and the political forces of the nation without the mediation of the House of Commons. The change might be a first step in lessening the authority of Parliament, because cabinets, as will be explained in the following chapter, being really made or destroyed by the popular voice uttered in general elections, much of the power of the House of Commons is based upon the fact that it is the sole recruiting ground for all ministers not hereditary peers.

Unsatisfactory, therefore, as the present position of the House of Lords is to many people in England, the difficulties that surround the question of reform are very great; and a half-unconscious perception of these explains in large part the fact that although proposals to reform the House have been made of late years by leading men of every shade of political opinion, none of them has borne fruit, or even taken the shape of a definite plan commanding any considerable amount of support. To reform the House of Lords, or to create some other satisfactory second chamber may not be an impossible task, but it is one that will require constructive statesmanship in a high degree; and to obtain the best chance of success it ought to be undertaken at the most unlikely time, a time when the question provokes no pa.s.sionate interest.

FOOTNOTES:

[406:1] "The Governance of England," 218.

[406:2] In 1830 the House of Lords contained 326 hereditary members.

From that time until the fall of Mr. Gladstone's cabinet, in 1885, the Liberals made 198 additions to these members; and during the same period the Conservatives made 70. Since 1885 the Conservatives have been in power by far the greater part of the time, and their creations of peers have been correspondingly more numerous.

[409:1] See the chapter on "The Strength of Party Ties," _infra_.

[412:1] When the Liberals are in power this is not much use for bills which the Lords are likely to amend seriously, because the amendments would have to be reversed in the Commons at a cost of much time.

[412:2] Rep. of Com. on Priv. Bill Legislation, Com. Papers, 1888, XVI., 1.

[414:1] "The Working Const.i.tution," 120.

[415:1] Probably the advocates of this policy would not want to apply it in the case of private bill legislation.

[417:1] The power to create peers enough to swamp the House has a potential value. It could be used once for all to abolish or transform the body, and this fact has, no doubt, its effect on the general att.i.tude of the members, but that does not affect the argument that as a means of maintaining harmony between the Houses the power is useless.

[418:1] "Recollections and Suggestions," 110-11.

CHAPTER XXIII

THE CABINET AND THE COUNTRY

[Sidenote: Transfer of Power from Parliament to the People.]

[Sidenote: Its Causes; (1) the Growth of Power of the Cabinet.]

If the predominance of the House of Commons has been lessened by a delegation of authority to the cabinet, it has been weakened also by the transfer of power directly to the electorate. The two tendencies are not, indeed, unconnected. The transfer of power to the electorate is due in part to the growing influence of the ministers, to the recognition that policy is mainly directed, not by Parliament, but by them. The cabinet now rules the nation by and with the advice and consent of Parliament; and for that very reason the nation wishes to decide what cabinet it shall be that rules. No doubt the ministry depends for its existence upon the good pleasure of the House of Commons; but it really gets its commission from the country as the result of a general election. Even if its life should be cut short by the Commons, the new cabinet would not now rest for support upon that Parliament; but would at once dissolve and seek a fresh majority from the electors. This was by no means true forty years ago. The Parliament elected in 1852, which sat a little more than four years, supported during the first half of that time a coalition ministry of Liberals and Peelites, and during the second half a ministry of Liberals alone. The following Parliament affords an even better ill.u.s.tration. It met in 1857 with a large majority for the Liberal cabinet of Lord Palmerston; but in less than a year he was defeated and resigned, to be succeeded by the Conservatives under Lord Derby, who carried on the government for another year before dissolving. The case of the next Conservative administration is more striking still. Coming into office in 1866, in face of a hostile majority, strongly Liberal, but hopelessly divided upon questions of reform, it remained in power more than two years, and brought to pa.s.s a drastic extension of the franchise before it dissolved Parliament.

Nothing of the kind has occurred since that time. Every subsequent change of ministry has either been the immediate consequence of a general election, or if not, the new cabinet has kept the old Parliament together only so long as was absolutely necessary to dispose of current business, and has then appealed to the people. Practically, therefore, a change of ministry to-day is either the result of, or is at once ratified by, a general election.

[Sidenote: (2) The Increase of the Electorate.]