The Governments of Europe Part 6

[Footnote 99: In a statute fixing the order of precedence of public dignitaries. The premier's position, however, was defined by a royal warrant of December, 1905.]

[Footnote 100: The resignation of the premier terminates _ipso facto_ the life of the ministry.

An excellent ill.u.s.tration of the accustomed subordination of individual differences of opinion to the interests of cabinet solidarity is afforded by some remarks made by Mr. Asquith, December 4, 1911, to a deputation of the National League for Opposing Woman Suffrage. The deputation had called to protest against the Government's announced purpose to attach a suffrage amendment (if carried in the House of Commons) to a forthcoming measure of franchise reform. The Premier explained that he was, and always had been, of the opinion that "the grant of the parliamentary franchise to women in this country would be a political mistake of a very grievous kind." "So far," he continued, "we are in complete harmony with one another. On the other hand, I am, as you know, for the time being the head of the Government, in which a majority of my colleagues, a _considerable_ majority of my colleagues--I may say that without violating the obligation of cabinet secrecy...--are of a different opinion; and the Government in those circ.u.mstances has announced a policy which is the result of their combined deliberations, and by which it is the duty of all their members, and myself not least, to abide loyally. That is the position, so far as I am personally concerned."]

[Footnote 101: Low, The Governance of England, Chap. 9; M. Sibert, etude sur le premier ministre en Angleterre depuis ses origines jusqu'a l'epoque contemporaine (Paris, 1909).]

*78. The Cabinet's Central Position.*--In the English governmental system the cabinet is in every sense the keystone of the arch. Its functions are both executive and legislative, and indeed, to employ the figure of Bagehot, it comprises the hyphen that joins, the buckle that fastens, the executive and the legislative departments together.[102] As has been pointed out, the uses of the crown are by no means wholly ornamental. None the less, the actual executive of the nation is the cabinet. It is within the cabinet circle that administrative policies are decided upon, and it is by the cabinet ministers and their subordinates in the several departments that these policies, and the laws of the land generally, are carried into effect.

On the other side, the cabinet members not only occupy seats in one or the other of the houses of Parliament; collectively they direct the processes of legislation. They--primarily the prime minister--prepare the Speech from the Throne, in which at the opening of a parliamentary session the state of the country is reviewed and a programme of legislation is outlined. They formulate, introduce, explain, and advocate needful legislative measures upon all manner of subjects; and although bills may be submitted in either house by private members it is a recognized principle that all measures of large importance shall emanate directly or indirectly from the cabinet. Statistics demonstrate that measures introduced by private members have but an infinitesimal chance of enactment.

[Footnote 102: The English Const.i.tution (new ed.), 79.]

In effect, the cabinet comprises a parliamentary committee chosen, as Bagehot bluntly puts it, to rule the nation. If a cabinet group does not represent the ideas and purposes of Parliament as a whole, it at least represents those of the majority of the preponderating chamber; and that is ample to give it, during the s.p.a.ce of its tenure of office, a thoroughgoing command of the situation. The basal fact of the political system is the control of party, and within the party the power that governs is the cabinet. "The machinery," says Lowell, "is one of wheels within wheels; the outside ring consisting of the (p. 075) party that has a majority in the House of Commons; the next ring being the ministry, which contains the men who are most active within that party; and the smallest of all being the cabinet, containing the real leaders or chiefs. By this means is secured that unity of party action which depends upon placing the directing power in the hands of a body small enough to agree, and influential enough to control."[103]

[Footnote 103: Government of England, I., 56. The best discussion of the organization, functions, and relationships of the cabinet is contained in Lowell, _op. cit._, I., Chaps. 2-3, 17-18, 22-23.

Other good general accounts are Low, Governance of England, Chaps. 2-4, 8-9; Moran, English Government, Chaps. 4-9; Macy, English Const.i.tution, Chap. 6; Anson, Law and Custom of the Const.i.tution, II., Pt. 1, Chap. 2; and Maitland, Const.i.tutional History of England, 387-430. A detailed and still valuable survey is in Todd, Parliamentary Government, Parts 3-4. A brilliant study is Bagehot, English Const.i.tution, especially Chaps. 1, 6-9. The growth of the cabinet is well described in Blauvelt, The Development of Cabinet Government in England; and a monograph of value is P. le Va.s.seur, Le cabinet britannique sous la reine Victoria (Paris, 1902). For an extended bibliography see Select List of Books on the Cabinets of England and America (Washington, 1903), compiled in the Library of Congress under the direction of A. P. C.

Griffin.]

CHAPTER IV (p. 076)

PARLIAMENT: THE HOUSE OF COMMONS

*79. Antiquity and Importance.*--The British Parliament is at once the oldest, the most comprehensive in jurisdiction, and the most powerful among modern legislative a.s.semblages. In structure, and to some extent in function, it is a product, as has appeared, of the Middle Ages. The term "parliament," employed originally to denote a discussion or conference, was applied officially to the Great Council in 1275;[104]

and by the opening of the fourteenth century the inst.i.tution which the English know to-day by that name had come clearly into existence, being then, indeed, what technically it still is--the king and the three estates of the realm, i.e., the lords spiritual, the lords temporal, and the commons. During upwards of a hundred years the three estates sat and deliberated separately. By the close of the reign of Edward III. (1327-1377), however, the bicameral principle had become fixed, and throughout the whole of its subsequent history (save during the Cromwellian era of experimentation) Parliament has comprised uninterruptedly, aside from the king, the two branches which exist at the present time, the House of Lords and the House of Commons, or, strictly, the Lords of Parliament and the Representatives of the Commons.

[Footnote 104: In the First Statute of Westminster.]

The range of jurisdiction which, step by step, these chambers, both separately and conjointly, have acquired has been broadened until, so far as the dominions of the British crown extend, it covers all but the whole of the domain of human government. And within this enormous expanse of political control the competence of the chambers knows, in neither theory nor fact, any restriction. "The British Parliament, ..."

writes Mr. Bryce, "can make and unmake any and every law, change the form of government or the succession to the crown, interfere with the course of justice, extinguish the most sacred private rights of the citizen. Between it and the people at large there is no legal distinction, because the whole plenitude of the people's rights and powers resides in it, just as if the whole nation were present within the chamber where it sits. In point of legal theory it is the nation, being the historical successor of the Folk Moot of our Teutonic forefathers. Both practically and legally, it is to-day the only (p. 077) and the sufficient depository of the authority of the nation; and it is therefore, within the sphere of law, irresponsible and omnipotent."[105] Whether the business in hand be const.i.tuent or legislative, whether ecclesiastical or temporal, the right of Parliament--or, more accurately "the King in Parliament"--to discuss and to dispose is indisputable.

[Footnote 105: The American Commonwealth (3d ed.), I., 35-36.]

I. THE HOUSE OF COMMONS PRIOR TO 1832

*80. Present Ascendancy.*--Legally, as has been explained, Parliament consists of the king, the lords spiritual, the lords temporal, and the commons. For practical purposes, however, it is the House of Commons alone. "When," as Spencer Walpole wrote a quarter of a century ago, "a minister consults Parliament he consults the House of Commons; when the Queen dissolves Parliament she dissolves the House of Commons. A new Parliament is simply a new House of Commons."[106] The gathering of the "representatives of the commons" at Westminster is, and has long been, without question the most important agency of government in the kingdom. The House of Commons consists at the present day of 670 members, of whom 465 sit for English const.i.tuencies, 30 for Welsh, 72 for Scottish, and 103 for Irish. Nine of the members are chosen, under somewhat special conditions, by the universities, but the remaining 661 are elected in county or borough const.i.tuencies under franchise arrangements, which, while based upon residence and property qualifications, fall not far short of manhood suffrage. The chamber is at the same time the preponderating repository of power in the national government and the prime organ of the popular will. It is in consequence of its prolonged and arduous development that Great Britain has attained democracy in national government; and the influence of English democracy as actualized in the House of Commons upon the political ideas and the governmental agencies of the outlying world, both English-speaking and non-English-speaking, is simply incalculable.

[Footnote 106: The Electorate and the Legislature (London, 1892), 48.]

*81. Undemocratic Character at the Opening of the Nineteenth Century.*--"The virtue, the spirit, the essence of the House of Commons," once declared Edmund Burke, "consists in its being the express image of the nation." In the eighteenth century, however, when this a.s.sertion was made, the House of Commons was, in point of fact, far from const.i.tuting such an "image." Until, indeed, the nineteenth century was well advanced the nominally popular parliamentary branch was in reality representative, not of the ma.s.s of the nation, but (p. 078) of the aristocratic and governing elements, at best of the well-to-do middle cla.s.ses; and a correct appreciation of the composition and character of the chamber as it to-day exists requires some allusion to the process by which its democratization was accomplished. In 1832--the year of the first great Reform Act--the House of Commons consisted of 658 members, of whom 186 represented the forty counties and 472 sat for two hundred three boroughs. The apportionment of both county and borough members was haphazard and grossly inequitable. In the Unites States, and in many European countries, it is required by const.i.tutional provision that following a decennial census there shall be a reapportionment of seats in the popular legislative chamber, the purpose being, of course, to preserve substantial equality among the electoral const.i.tuencies and, ultimately, an essential parity of political power among the voters. At no time, however, has there been in Great Britain either legislation or the semblance of a tradition in respect to this matter. Reapportionment has taken place only partially and at irregular intervals, and at but a few times in the history of the nation have const.i.tuencies represented at Westminster been even approximately equal. Save that, in 1707, forty-five members were added to represent Scotland and, in 1801, one hundred to sit for Ireland, the ident.i.ty of the const.i.tuencies represented in the Commons continued all but unchanged from the reign of Charles II. to the reform of 1832.

*82. Need of a Redistribution of Seats.*--The population changes, in respect to both growth and distribution, falling within this extended period were, however, enormous. In 1689 the population of England and Wales was not in excess of 5,500,000. The census of 1831 revealed in these countries a population of 14,000,000. In the seventeenth and earlier eighteenth centuries the great ma.s.s of the English people lived in the south and east. Liverpool was but an insignificant town, Manchester a village, and Birmingham a sand-hill. But the industrial revolution had the effect of bringing coal, iron, and water-power into enormous demand, and after 1775 the industrial center, and likewise the population center, of the country was shifted rapidly toward the north. In the hitherto almost uninhabited valleys of Lancashire and Yorkshire sprang up a mult.i.tude of factory towns and cities. In Parliament these fast-growing populations were either glaringly under-represented or not represented at all. In 1831 the ten southernmost counties of England contained a population of 3,260,000 and returned to Parliament 235 members.[107] At the same time the six northernmost counties contained a population of 3,594,000, but (p. 079) returned only 68 members. Cornwall, with 300,000 inhabitants, had 42 representatives; Lancashire, with 1,330,000, had 14. Among towns, Birmingham and Manchester, each with upwards of 100,000 people, and Leeds and Sheffield, each with 50,000, had no representation whatever.

On the other hand, boroughs were ent.i.tled to representation which contained ridiculously scant populations, or even no population at all. Gatto, in Surrey, was a park; Old Sarum, in Wiltshire, was a deserted hill; the remains of what once was Dunwich were under the waves of the North Sea. Bosseney, in Cornwall, was a hamlet of three cottages, eight of whose nine electors belonged to a single family.

But Bosseney sent two members to the House of Commons.

[Footnote 107: That is to say, the quota of members mentioned was returned by the counties and by the boroughs contained geographically within them.]

*83. County and Borough Franchise in 1831.*--Not only was there, thus, the most glaring lack of adjustment of parliamentary representation to the distribution of population; where the right of representation existed, the franchise arrangements under which members were elected were hopelessly heterogeneous and illiberal. Originally, as has been pointed out,[108] the representatives of the counties were chosen in the county court by all persons who were ent.i.tled to attend and to take part in the proceedings of that body. In 1429, during the reign of Henry VI., an act was pa.s.sed ostensibly to prevent riotous and disorderly elections, wherein it was stipulated that county electors should thereafter comprise only such male residents of the county as possessed free land or tenement which would rent for as much as forty shillings a year above all charges.[109] Leaseholders, copyholders, small freeholders, and all non-landholders were denied the suffrage altogether. Even in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the number of forty-shilling freeholders was small. With the concentration of land in fewer hands, incident to the agrarian revolution of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, it bore an increasingly diminutive ratio to the aggregate county population, and by 1832 the county electors comprised, as a rule, only a handful of large landed proprietors. Within the boroughs the franchise arrangements existing at the date mentioned were complicated and diverse beyond the possibility of general characterization. Many of the boroughs had been accorded parliamentary representation by the most arbitrary and haphazard methods, and at no time prior to 1830 was there legislation which so much as attempted to regulate the conditions of voting within them. There were "scot and lot" boroughs, "potwalloper" boroughs, burgage boroughs, corporation or "close" boroughs, and "freemen"

boroughs, to mention only the more important of the types that (p. 080) can be distinguished.[110] In some of these the franchise was, at least in theory, fairly democratic; but in most of them it was restricted by custom or local regulation to petty groups of property-holders or taxpayers, to members of the munic.i.p.al corporations, or even to members of a favored guild. With few exceptions, the borough franchise was illogical, exclusive, and non-expansive.

[Footnote 108: See p. 23.]

[Footnote 109: Equivalent in present values to 30 or 40.]

[Footnote 110: See p. 23.]

*84. Political Corruption.*--A third fact respecting electoral conditions in the earlier nineteenth century is the astounding prevalence of illegitimate political influence and of sheer corruption. Borough members were very commonly not true representatives at all, but nominees of peers, of influential commoners, or of the government. It has been estimated that of the 472 borough members not more than 137 may be regarded as having been in any proper sense elected. The remainder sat for "rotten" boroughs, or for "pocket" boroughs whose populations were so meager or so docile that the borough might, as it were, be carried about in a magnate's pocket. In the whole of Cornwall there were only one thousand voters.

Of the forty-two seats possessed by that section of the country twenty were controlled by seven peers, twenty-one were similarly controlled by eleven commoners, and but one was filled by free election. In 1780 it was a.s.serted by the Duke of Richmond that a clear majority of the House of Commons was returned by six thousand persons. Bribery and other forms of corruption were so common that only the most shameless instances attracted public attention. Not merely votes, but seats, were bought and sold openly, and it was a matter of general understanding that 5,000 to 7,000 was the amount which a political aspirant might expect to be obliged to pay a borough-monger for bringing about his election. Seats were not infrequently advertised for sale in the public prints, and even for hire for a term of years.[111]

[Footnote 111: The monumental treatise on the House of Commons prior to 1832 is E. Porritt, The Unreformed House of Commons: Parliamentary Representation before 1832, 2 vols. (2d ed., Cambridge, 1909). On the prevalence of corruption see May and Holland, Const.i.tutional History of England, I., 224-238, 254-262.]

II. PARLIAMENTARY REFORM, 1832-1885

*85. Demand for Reform Prior to 1832.*--Active demand for a reformation of the conditions that have been described antedated the nineteenth century. As early as 1690, indeed, John Locke denounced the absurdities of the prevailing electoral system,[112] although at the time they were inconsiderable in comparison with what they became by 1832; and during the second half of the eighteenth century a (p. 081) number of interesting reform proposals--notably that of the elder Pitt in 1766, that of Wilkes in 1776, and that of the younger Pitt in 1785--were widely though fruitlessly discussed. In 1780 a group of public-spirited men established a Society for Const.i.tutional Information which during the ensuing decade carried on actively a propaganda in behalf of parliamentary regeneration, and at a meeting under the auspices of this organization and presided over by Charles James Fox a programme was drawn up insisting upon innovations no less sweeping than the establishment of manhood suffrage, the creation of equal electoral districts, the payment of members, the abolition of property qualifications for members, and adoption of the secret ballot.[113] The revolution in France and the prolonged contest with Napoleon stayed the reform movement, but after 1815 agitation was actively renewed. The economic and social ills of the nation in the decade following the restoration of peace were many, and the idea took hold widely that only through a reconst.i.tution of Parliament could adequate measures of amelioration be attained. The disposition of the Tory governments of the period was to resist the popular demand, or, at the most, to concede changes which would not affect the aristocratic character of the parliamentary chambers. But the reformers refused to be diverted from their fundamental object, and in the end the forces of tradition, conservatism, and vested interest were obliged to give way.[114]

[Footnote 112: Treatises of Government, II., Chap.

13, -- 157.]

[Footnote 113: It is of interest to observe that every one of the demands enumerated found a place half a century later among the "six points" of the Chartists. See pp. 82-83. A bill embodying the proposed reforms was introduced by the Duke of Richmond in 1780, but met with small favor. A second society--The Friends of the People--was formed in 1792 to promote the cause.]

[Footnote 114: The reform movement prior to 1832 is admirably sketched in May and Holland, Const.i.tutional History of England, I., 264-280. See also G. L. d.i.c.kinson, The Development of Parliament during the Nineteenth Century (London, 1895), Chap.

1; J. H. Rose, The Rise and Growth of Democracy in Great Britain (London, 1897), Chap. 1; C. B. R.

Kent, The English Radicals (London, 1899), Chaps.

1-2; and W. P. Hall, British Radicalism, 1791-1797 (New York, 1912).]

*86. The Reform Act of 1832.*--The first notable triumph was the enactment of the Reform Bill of 1832. The changes wrought by this memorable piece of legislation were two-fold, the first relating to the distribution of seats in Parliament, the second to the extension of the franchise. The number of Scottish members was increased from 45 to 54; that of Irish, from 100 to 105; that of English and Welsh was reduced from 513 to 499. There was no general reapportionment of seats, no effort to bring the parliamentary const.i.tuencies into precise and uniform relation to the census returns. But the most glaringly inequitable of former conditions were remedied. Fifty-six (p. 082) boroughs, of populations under 2,000, were deprived entirely of representation,[115] thirty-one, of populations between 2,000 and 4,000, were reduced from two members to one, and one was reduced from four members to two. The 143 seats thus made available were redistributed, and the aggregate number (658) continued as before.

Twenty-two large boroughs. .h.i.therto unrepresented were given two members each; twenty-one others were given one additional member each; and a total of sixty-five seats were allotted to twenty-seven of the English counties, the remaining thirteen being given to Scotland and Ireland. The redistribution had the effect of increasing markedly the political power of the northern and north-central portions of the country. The alterations introduced in the franchise were numerous and important. In the counties the forty-shilling freehold franchise, with some limitations, was retained; but the voting privilege was extended to all leaseholders and copyholders of land renting for as much as 10 a year, and to tenants-at-will holding an estate worth 50 a year. In the boroughs the right to vote was conferred upon all "occupiers" of houses worth 10 a year. The total number of persons enfranchised was approximately 455,000. By basing the franchise exclusively upon the ownership or occupancy of property of considerable value the reform fell short of admitting to political power the great ma.s.s of factory employees and of agricultural laborers, and for this reason it was roundly opposed by the more advanced liberal elements. If, however, the voting privilege had not been extended to the ma.s.ses it had been brought appreciably nearer them; and--what was almost equally important--it had been made substantially uniform, for the first time, throughout the realm.[116]

[Footnote 115: Of the fifty-six all save one had returned two members.]

[Footnote 116: The more important parts of the text of the Reform Bill of 1832 are printed in Robertson, Statutes, Cases and Doc.u.ments, 197-212.]

*87. The Chartist Movement.*--The act of 1832 possessed none of the elements of finality. Its authors were in general content, but with the lapse of time it was made increasingly manifest that the nation was not. Political power was still confined to the magnates of the kingdom, the townsfolk who were able to pay a 10 annual rental, and the well-to-do copyholders and leaseholders of rural districts. Whigs and Tories of influence alike insisted that further innovation could not be contemplated, but the radicals and the laboring ma.s.ses insisted no less resolutely that the reformation which had been begun should be carried to its logical conclusion. The demands upon which emphasis was especially placed were gathered up in the "six points" of the People's Charter, promulgated in final form May 8, 1838. The six points were: (1) universal suffrage for males over twenty-one years of age, (p. 083) (2) equal electoral districts, (3) voting by secret ballot, (4) annual sessions of Parliament, (5) the abolition of property qualifications for members of the House of Commons, and (6) payment of members. The barest enumeration of these demands is sufficient to reveal the political backwardness of the England of three-quarters of a century ago. Not only was the suffrage still severely restricted and the basis of representation antiquated and unfair; voting was oral and public, and only men who were qualified by the possession of property were eligible for election.[117]

[Footnote 117: Rose, Rise and Growth of Democracy, Chaps. 6-8; Kent, The English Radicals, Chap. 3; and R. G. Gammage, History of the Chartist Movement, 1837-1854 (Newcastle-on-Tyne, 1894).]

*88. The Representation of the People Act of 1867.*--After a decade of spectacular propaganda Chartism collapsed, without having attained tangible results. None the less, the day was not long postponed when the forces of reform, sobered and led by practical statesmen, were enabled to realize one after another of their fundamental purposes. In 1858 the second Derby government acquiesced in the enactment of a measure by which all property qualifications. .h.i.therto required of English, Welsh, and Irish members were abolished,[118] and after 1860 projects for franchise extension were considered with increasing seriousness. In 1867 the third Derby government, whose guiding spirit was Disraeli, carried a bill providing for an electoral reform of a more thoroughgoing character than any persons save the most uncompromising of the radicals had ever asked or desired. This Representation of the People Act modified but slightly the distribution of parliamentary seats. The total number of seats remained unchanged, as did Ireland's quota of 105; Scotland's apportionment was increased from 54 to 60, while that of England and Wales was decreased from 499 to 493; and in the course of the re-allotment that was made eleven boroughs lost the right of representation and thirty-five others were reduced from two members to one. The fifty-two seats thus vacated were utilized to enfranchise twelve new borough and three university const.i.tuencies and to increase the representation of a number of the more populous towns and counties.

[Footnote 118: By law of 1710 it had been required that county members should possess landed property worth 600, and borough members worth 300, a year.

These qualifications were very commonly evaded, but they were not abolished until 1858.]

The most important provisions of the Act were, however, those relating to the franchise. In England and Wales the county franchise was guaranteed to men whose freehold was of the value of forty shillings a year, to copyholders and leaseholders of the annual value of 5, and to householders whose rent amounted to not less than 12 a year. (p. 084) The twelve pound occupation franchise was new,[119] and the qualification for copyholders and leaseholders was reduced from 10 to 5; otherwise the county franchise was unchanged. The borough franchise was modified profoundly. Heretofore persons were qualified to vote as householders only in the event that their house was worth as much as 10 a year. Now the right was conferred upon every man who occupied, as owner or as tenant, for twelve months, a dwelling-house, or any portion thereof utilized as a separate dwelling, without regard to its value. Another newly established franchise admitted to the voting privilege all lodgers occupying for as much as a year rooms of the clear value, unfurnished, of 10 a year. The effect of these provisions was to enfranchise the urban working population, even as the act of 1832 had enfranchised princ.i.p.ally the urban middle cla.s.s.

So broad, indeed, did the urban franchise at this point become that little room was left for its modification subsequently. As originally planned, Disraeli's measure would have enlarged the electorate by not more than 100,000; as amended and carried, it practically doubled the voting population, raising it from 1,370,793 immediately prior to 1867 to 2,526,423 in 1871.[120] By the act of 1832 the middle cla.s.ses had been enfranchised; by that of 1867 political power was thrown in no small degree into the hands of the ma.s.ses. Only two large groups of people remained now outside the pale of political influence, i.e., the agricultural laborers and the miners.

[Footnote 119: It may be regarded, however, as taking the place of the 50 rental franchise.]