The Governments of Europe Part 9

*114. The Enactment of the Parliament Bill, 1911.*--The appeal to the country, in December, yielded results all but exactly identical with those of the elections of the previous January. The Government secured a majority of 127, and in the new parliament, which met February 6, the Parliament Bill was reintroduced without alteration. On the ground that the measure had been submitted specifically to the people and had been approved by them, the ministry demanded its early enactment by the two houses. May 15 the bill pa.s.sed its third reading in the Commons by a vote of 362 to 241. During the committee stage upwards of one thousand amendments were suggested. But the Government stood firm for the instrument as originally drawn and, while it accepted a few incidental changes, in the end it got essentially its own way.

Meanwhile, early in May, Lord Lansdowne introduced in the upper chamber a comprehensive bill which put in form for legislation the programme of reconstruction to which the more moderate elements in that chamber were ready, under the circ.u.mstances, to subscribe. The Lansdowne Reconstruction Bill proposed, at the outset, a reduction of the membership of the chamber to 350. Princes of the blood and the two archbishops should retain membership, but the number of bishops ent.i.tled to sit should be reduced to five, these to be chosen triennially by the whole body of higher prelates upon the principle of proportional representation. The remainder of the membership should comprise lords of parliament, as follows: (1) 100 elected from the peers possessing carefully stipulated qualifications, for a term of twelve years, on the principle of proportional representation, by the whole body of hereditary peers (including the Scotch and Irish), one-fourth of the number retiring triennially; (2) 120 members chosen by electoral colleges composed of members of the House of Commons divided for the purpose into local groups, each returning from three to twelve, under conditions of tenure similar to those prevailing in the first cla.s.s; and (3) 100 appointed, from the peerage or outside, by the crown on nomination by the premier, with regard to the strength of parties in the House (p. 111) of Commons, and under the before-mentioned conditions of tenure. It was stipulated, further, that peers not sitting in the House of Lords should be eligible for election to the House of Commons, and that, except in event of the "indispensable" elevation of a cabinet minister or ex-minister to the peerage, it should be unlawful for the crown to confer the dignity of an hereditary peerage upon more than five persons during the course of any single year.

This body of proposals, it will be observed, related exclusively to the _composition_ of the upper chamber. The Liberal leaders preferred to approach the problem from the other side and to a.s.sure the preponderance of the Commons by the imposition of positive restrictions upon the _powers_ which the Lords, under given conditions, might exercise. Lord Lansdowne's bill--sadly characterized by its author as the "deathblow to the House of Lords, as many of us have known it for so long"--came too late, and the chamber, after allowing it to be read a second time without division, was constrained to drop it for the Government's measure. July 20 the Parliament Bill, amended in such a manner as to exclude from its operation legislation affecting the const.i.tution and other matters of "great gravity," was adopted without division. The proposed amendments were highly objectionable to the Liberals and, relying upon an understanding entered into with the king during the previous November relative to the creation of peers favorable to the Government's programme, the ministry let it be understood that no compromise upon essentials could be considered.[158] Confronted with the prospect of a wholesale "swamping,"[159] the Opposition fell back upon the policy of abstention and, although a considerable number of "last-ditchers" held out to the end, a group of Unionists adequate to carry the measure joined the supporters of the Government, August 10, in a vote not to insist upon the Lords' amendments, which meant, in effect, to approve the bill as adopted in the lower house.[160] The royal a.s.sent was extended August 18.

[Footnote 158: When, July 24, Premier Asquith rose in the Commons to reply to the Lords' amendments there resulted such confusion that for the first time in generations, save upon one occasion in 1905, the Speaker was obliged to adjourn a sitting on account of the disorderly conduct of members.]

[Footnote 159: Had the Unionists maintained to the end their att.i.tude of opposition the number of peers which would have had to be created to ensure the enactment of the bill would have been some 400.]

[Footnote 160: The final vote in the Lords was 131 to 114. The Unionist peers who voted with the Government numbered 37.]

IV. THE PARLIAMENT ACT OF 1911 AND AFTER (p. 112)

*115. Provisions Relating to Money Bills.*--In its preamble the Parliament Act promises further legislation which will define both the composition and the powers of a second chamber "const.i.tuted on a popular instead of an hereditary basis"; but the act itself relates exclusively to the powers of the chamber as it is at present const.i.tuted. The general purport of the measure is to define the conditions under which, while the normal methods of legislation remain unchanged, financial bills and proposals of general legislation may nevertheless be enacted into law without the concurrence of the upper house. The first signal provision is that a public bill pa.s.sed by the House of Commons and certified by the Speaker to be, within the terms of the act, a "money bill" shall, unless the Commons direct to the contrary, become an act of Parliament on the royal a.s.sent being signified, notwithstanding that the House of Lords may not have consented to the bill, within one month after it shall have been sent up to that house. A money bill is defined as "a public bill which, in the judgment of the Speaker, contains only provisions dealing with all or any of the following subjects: the imposition, repeal, remission, alteration, or regulation of taxation; the imposition for the payment of debt or other financial purposes of charges on the Consolidated Fund, or on money provided by Parliament, or the variation or repeal of any such charges; supply; the appropriation, receipt, custody, issue or audit of accounts of public money; the raising or guarantee of any loan or the payment thereof; or subordinate matters incidental to those subjects or any of them." A certificate of the Speaker given under this act is made conclusive for all purposes. It may not be questioned in any court of law.[161]

[Footnote 161: An incidental effect of the act is to exalt the power and importance of the Speaker, although it should be observed that the Speaker has long been accustomed to state at the introduction of a public bill whether in his judgment the rights or privileges claimed by the House of Commons in respect to finance had been infringed. If he were of the opinion that there had been infringement, it remained for the House to determine whether it would insist upon or waive its privilege Ilbert, Parliament, 207.]

*116. Provisions Relating to Other Public Bills.*--The second fundamental stipulation is that any other public bill (except one to confirm a provisional order or one to extend the maximum duration of Parliament beyond five years) which is pa.s.sed by the House of Commons in three successive sessions, whether or not of the same parliament, and which, having been sent up to the House of Lords at least one (p. 113) month, in each case, before the end of the session, is rejected by that chamber in each of those sessions, shall, unless the House of Commons direct to the contrary, become an act of Parliament on the royal a.s.sent being signified thereto, notwithstanding the fact that the House of Lords has not consented to the bill. It is required that at least two years shall have elapsed between the date of the second reading of such a bill (i.e., the first real opportunity for its discussion) in the first of these sessions of the House of Commons and the final pa.s.sage of the bill in the third of the sessions. To come within the provisions of this act the measure must be, at its initial and its final appearances, the "same bill;" that is, it must exhibit no alterations save such as are rendered necessary by the lapse of time. And a bill is to be construed to be "rejected" by the Lords if it is not pa.s.sed, or if amendments are introduced to which the House of Commons does not agree, or which the House of Commons does not suggest to the House of Lords at the second or third pa.s.sage of the bill.

*117. Effects of the Act.*--By the provisions which have been enumerated the co-ordinate and independent position which, in law if not in fact, the British upper chamber, as a legislative body, has occupied through the centuries has been effectually subverted. Within the domain of legislation, it is true, the Lords may yet exercise influence of no inconsiderable moment. To the chamber must be submitted every project of finance and of legislation which it is proposed to enact into law, and there is still nothing save a certain measure of custom to prevent the introduction of even the most important of non-financial measures first of all in that house. But a single presentation of any money bill fulfills the legal requirement and ensures that the measure will become law. For such a bill will not be presented until it has been pa.s.sed by the Commons, and, emanating from the cabinet, it will not be introduced in that chamber until the a.s.sent of the executive is a.s.sured. The upper house is allowed one month in which to approve or to reject, but, so far as the enactment of the bill is concerned, the result is the same in any case. Upon ordinary legislation the House of Lords possesses still a veto--a veto, however, which is no longer absolute but only suspensive. The conditions which are required for the enactment of non-fiscal legislation without the concurrence of the Lords are not easy to bring about, but their realization is not at all an impossibility. By the repeated rejection of proposed measures the Lords may influence public sentiment or bring about otherwise a change of circ.u.mstances and thus compa.s.s the defeat of the original intent of the Commons, and this is the more possible since a minimum period of two years is required to elapse before a non-fiscal measure can be (p. 114) carried over the Lords' veto. But the continuity of political alignments and of legislative policy is normally such in Great Britain that the remarkable legislative precedence which has been accorded the Commons must mean in effect little less than absolute law-making authority.

*118. Possible Further Changes and the Difficulties Involved.*--What the future holds in store for the House of Lords cannot be discerned. The Parliament Act, as has been pointed out, promises further legislation which will define both the composition and the powers of a second chamber const.i.tuted on a popular instead of an hereditary basis; but no steps have as yet (1912) been taken publicly in this direction, nor has any authoritative announcement of purpose been made.[162] Many Englishmen to-day are of the opinion that, as John Bright declared, "a hereditary House of Lords is not and cannot be perpetual in a free country." None the less, it is recognized that the chamber as it is at present const.i.tuted contains a large number of conscientious, eminent, and able men, that upon numerous occasions the body has imposed a wholesome check upon the popular branch, and that sometimes it has interpreted the will of the nation more correctly than has the popular branch itself. The most reasonable programme of reform would seem to be, not a total reconst.i.tution of the chamber upon a non-hereditary basis, but (1) the adoption of the Rosebery principle that the possession of a peerage shall not of itself ent.i.tle the possessor to sit, (2) the admission to membership of a considerable number of persons representative of the whole body of peers, and (3) the introduction of a goodly quota of life peers, appointed by reason of legal attainments, governmental experience, and other qualities of fitness and eminence.[163]

[Footnote 162: The Parliament Act is the handiwork, of course, of the Liberal party, and only that party is likely to acknowledge the obligation to follow up the reform of the Lords which the measure imposes. But the Unionists may be regarded as committed by Lord Lansdowne's bill to some measure of popularization of the chamber.]

[Footnote 163: During the discussions of 1910 an interesting suggestion was offered (April 25) by Lord Wemyss to the effect that the representative character of the chamber should be given emphasis by the admission of three members designated by each of some twenty-one commercial, professional, and educational societies of the kingdom, such as the Royal Academy of Arts, the Society of Engineers, the Shipping Federation, and the Royal Inst.i.tute of British Architects.]

It is to be observed, however, that neither this programme nor any other that can be offered, unless it be that of popular election, affords much ground upon which to hope for harmonious relations between the upper chamber and a Liberal Government. The House of Lords--_any_ House of Lords in which members sit for life or in heredity--is inevitably conservative in its political tendencies (p. 115) and sympathies, which means, as conditions are to-day, that the chamber is certain to be dominated by adherents of the Unionist party.

History shows that even men who are appointed to the upper house as Liberals become adherents almost invariably, in time, of Unionism. The consequence is that, while a Unionist administration is certain to have the support of a working majority in both of the houses, a Liberal government cannot expect ever to find itself in the ascendancy in the Lords. Its measures will be easy to carry in the lower house but difficult or impossible to carry in the upper one. This was the central fact in the situation from which sprang the Parliament Act of 1911. By this piece of legislation the Liberals sought to provide for themselves a mode of escape from the _impa.s.se_ in which the opposition of the Lords so frequently has involved them. The extent, however, to which the arrangements effected will fulfill the purpose for which they were intended remains to be ascertained.[164] "An upper house in a true parliamentary system," says Lowell, "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."[165] Therein must be adjudged still to lie (p. 116) the essential dilemma of English politics.

[Footnote 164: The literature of the question of second chamber reform in England is voluminous and but a few of the more important t.i.tles can be mentioned here. The subject is discussed briefly in Lowell, Government of England, I., Chap. 22; Moran, English Government, Chap. 11; Low, Governance of England, Chap. 13; and H. W. V. Temperley, Senates and Upper Chambers (London, 1910), Chap. 5.

Important books include W. C. Macpherson, The Baronage and the Senate; or the House of Lords in the Past, the Present, and the Future (London, 1893); T. A. Spalding, The House of Lords: a Retrospect and a Forecast (London, 1894); J. W.

Wylie, The House of Lords (London, 1908); W. S.

McKechnie, The Reform of the House of Lords (Glasgow, 1909); W. L. Wilson, The Case for the House of Lords (London, 1910); and J. H. Morgan, The House of Lords and the Const.i.tution (London, 1910). Of these, the first const.i.tutes one of the most forceful defenses and the second one of the most incisive criticisms of the upper chamber that have been written. A brief review by an able French writer is A. Esmein, La Chambre des Lords et la democratie (Paris, 1910). Among articles in periodicals may be mentioned H. W. Horwill, The Problem of The House of Lords, in _Political Science Quarterly_, March, 1908; E. Porritt, The Collapse of the Movement against the Lords, in _North American Review_, June, 1908; ibid., Recent and Pending Const.i.tutional Changes in England, in _American Political Science Review_, May, 1910; J.

L. Garvin, The British Elections and their Meaning, in _Fortnightly Review_, Feb., 1910; J. A. R.

Marriott, The Const.i.tutional Crisis, in _Nineteenth Century_, Jan., 1910. A readable sketch is A. L. P.

Dennis, Impressions of British Party Politics, 1909-1911, in _American Political Science Review_, Nov., 1911; and the best accounts of the Parliament Act and of its history are: Dennis, The Parliament Act of 1911, ibid., May and Aug., 1912; May and Holland, Const.i.tutional History of England, III., 343-384; Lowell, Government of England (rev. ed., New York, 1912), Chap. 23a; _Annual Register_ for the years 1910 and 1911; M. Sibert, Le vote du Parliament Act, in _Revue du Droit Public_, Jan.-March, 1912; and La reforme de la Chambre des Lords, ibid., July-Sept., 1912. A book of some value is C. T. King, The Asquith Parliament, 1906-1909; a Popular Sketch of its Men and its Measures (London, 1910).]

[Footnote 165: Government of England, I., 418-419.]

CHAPTER VI (p. 117)

PARLIAMENT: ORGANIZATION, FUNCTIONS, PROCEDURE

I. THE a.s.sEMBLING OF THE CHAMBERS

*119. Sessions.*--Parliament is required by statute to meet at least once in three years;[166] but, by reason of the enormous pressure of business and, in particular, the custom which forbids the voting of supplies for a period longer than one year, meetings are, in point of fact, annual. A session begins ordinarily near the first of February and continues, with brief adjournments at holiday seasons, until August or September. It is required that the two houses shall invariably be summoned together. Either may adjourn without the other, and the crown can compel an adjournment of neither. A prorogation, which brings a session to a close, and a dissolution, which brings the existence of a parliament to an end, must be ordered for the two houses conjointly. Both take place technically at the command of the crown, actually upon the decision of the ministry. A prorogation is to a specified date, and it terminates all pending business; but the rea.s.sembling of the houses may be either postponed or hastened by royal proclamation.

[Footnote 166: Triennial Act of December 22, 1694.]

*120. The Opening of a Parliament.*--At the beginning of a session the members of the two houses gather first of all in their respective chambers. The commoners are summoned thereupon to the chamber of the Lords, where the letters patent authorizing the session are read and the Lord Chancellor makes known the desire of the crown that the Commons proceed with the choosing of a Speaker. The Commons withdraw to attend to this matter, and on the next day the newly elected official, accompanied by the members, presents himself at the bar of the House of Lords, announces his election, and, through the Lord Chancellor, receives the royal approbation. Having demanded and received guarantee of the "ancient and undoubted rights and privileges of the Commons," the Speaker and the members then retire to their own quarters, where the necessary oaths are administered. If, as is not unusual, the king meets Parliament in person, he goes in state, (p. 118) probably the next day, to the House of Lords and takes his seat upon the throne, and the Lord Chamberlain is instructed to desire the Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod to _command_ the attendance once more of the Commons. If the sovereign does not attend, the Lords Commissioners bid the Usher to _desire_ the Commons' presence. In any case, the commoners present themselves and the king (or, in his absence, the Lord Chancellor) reads the Speech from the Throne, in which is communicated succinctly the nature of the business to which attention is to be directed. Following the retirement of the sovereign, the Commons again withdraw, the Throne Speech is reread and an address in reply voted in each house, and the Government begins the introduction of fiscal and legislative proposals. In the event that a session is not the first one of a parliament, the election of a Speaker and the administration of oaths are omitted.[167]

[Footnote 167: On the ceremonies involved in the opening, adjournment, prorogation, and dissolution of a parliament see Anson, Law and Custom of the Const.i.tution, I., 61-77; J. Redlich, The Procedure of the House of Commons; a Study of its History and Present Form, trans. by A. E. Steinthal, 3 vols.

(London, 1908), II., 51-67; T. E. May, Treatise on the Law, Privileges, Proceedings, and Usage of Parliament (11th ed., London, 1906), Chap. 7; A.

Wright and P. Smith, Parliament, Past and Present, 2 vols. (London, 1902), II., Chap. 25; MacDonaugh, The Book of Parliament, 96-114, 132-147, 184-203; and H. Graham, The Mother of Parliaments (Boston, 1911), 135-157.]

*121. The Palace of Westminster.*--From the beginning of parliamentary history the meeting-place of the houses has been regularly Westminster, on the left bank of the Thames. The last parliament which sat at any other spot was the third Oxford Parliament of Charles II., in 1681. The Palace of Westminster, in mediaeval times outside, though near, the princ.i.p.al city of the kingdom, was long the most important of the royal residences, and it was natural that its great halls and chambers, together with the adjoining abbey, should be utilized habitually for parliamentary sittings. Of the enormous structure known as Westminster to-day (still, technically, a royal palace, though not a royal residence), practically all portions save old Westminster Hall were constructed after the fire of 1834. The Lords first occupied their present quarters in 1847 and the Commons theirs in 1850.[168]

[Footnote 168: MacDonaugh, The Book of Parliament, 79-95; Graham, The Mother of Parliaments, 60-80; Wright and Smith, Parliament, Past and Present, I., Chaps. 11-13. The cla.s.sic history of the old Palace of Westminster is E. W. Brayley and J. Britton, History of the Ancient Palace and Late Houses of Parliament at Westminster (London, 1836).]

*122. The Chambers of the Commons and the Lords.*--From opposite sides of a central lobby corridors lead to the halls in which the sittings of the two bodies are held, these halls facing each other in such (p. 119) a manner that the King's throne at the south end of the House of Lords is visible from the Speaker's chair at the north end of the House of Commons. The room occupied by the Commons is not large, being but seventy-five feet in length by forty-five in breadth. It is bisected by a broad aisle, at the upper end of which is a large table for the use of the clerk and his a.s.sistants and beyond this the raised and canopied chair of the Speaker. "Facing the aisle on each side long rows of high-backed benches, covered with dark green leather, slope upward tier above tier to the walls of the room; and through them, at right angles to the aisle, a narrow pa.s.sage known as the gangway, cuts across the House. There is also a gallery running all around the room, the part of it facing the Speaker being given up to visitors, while the front rows at the opposite end belong to the reporters, and behind them there stands, before a still higher gallery, a heavy screen, like those erected in Turkish mosques to conceal the presence of women, and used here for the same purpose."[169] The rows of benches on the gallery sides are reserved for members, but they do not afford a very desirable location and are rarely occupied, save upon occasions of special interest. In the body of the house there are fewer than 350 seats for 670 members. As a rule, not even all of these are occupied, for there are no desks and the member who wishes to read, write, or otherwise occupy himself seeks the library or other rooms adjoining. The front bench at the upper end of the aisle, at the right of the Speaker, is known as the Treasury Bench and is reserved for members of the Government. The corresponding bench at the Speaker's left is reserved similarly for the leaders of the Opposition. In so far as is possible in the lack of a definite a.s.signment of seats, members of avowed party allegiance range themselves behind their leaders, while members of more independent att.i.tude seek places below the gangway. "The accident that the House of Commons sits in a narrow room with benches facing each other, and not, like most continental legislatures, in a (p. 120) semi-circular s.p.a.ce, with seats arranged like those of a theatre, makes for the two-party system and against groups shading into each other."[170]

[Footnote 169: Lowell, Government of England, I., 249. Visitors, technically "strangers," are present only on sufferance and may be excluded at any time; but the ladies' gallery is not supposed to be within the chamber, so that an order of exclusion does not reach the occupants of it. In the autumn of 1908, however, the disorderly conduct of persons in the ladies' and strangers' galleries caused the Speaker to close these galleries during the remainder of the session. In 1738 the House declared the publication of its proceedings "a high indignity and a notorious breach of privilege,"

and, technically, such publication is still illegal. In 1771, however, the reporters' gallery was fitted up, and through a century and a quarter the proceedings have been reported and printed as a matter of course. On the status of the public and the press in the chamber see Ilbert, Parliament, Chap. 8; Redlich, Procedure of the House of Commons; II., 28-38; MacDonaugh, The Book of Parliament, 310-329, 350-365; and H. Graham, The Mother of Parliaments, 259-287.]

[Footnote 170: Ilbert, Parliament, 124. The chamber is described fully in Wright and Smith, Parliament, Past and Present, Chap. 19.]

The hall occupied by the Lords is smaller and more elaborately decorated than that occupied by the Commons. It contains cross benches, but in the main the arrangements that have been described are duplicated in it. For social and ceremonial purposes there exists among the members a fixed order of precedence.[171] In the chamber, however, the seating is arranged without regard to this order, save that the bishops sit in a group. The Government peers occupy the benches on the right of the woolsack and the Opposition those on the left, while members who prefer to remain neutral take their places on the cross benches between the table and the bar.[172]

[Footnote 171: This order runs: Prince of Wales, other princes of the royal blood, Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Chancellor, Archbishop of York, Lord President of the Council, Lord Privy Seal, the dukes, the marquises, the earls, the viscounts, the bishops, and the barons.]

[Footnote 172: For full description, with ill.u.s.trations, see Wright and Smith, Parliament, Past and Present, Chap. 18.]

II. ORGANIZATION OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS

*123. Hours of Sittings.*--In the seventeenth century the sittings of the Commons began regularly at 8.30 or 9 o'clock in the morning and terminated with nightfall. In the eighteenth century, and far into the nineteenth, they were apt to begin as late as 3 or 4 o'clock in the afternoon and to be prolonged, at least not infrequently, until toward daybreak. In 1888, however, a standing order fixed midnight as the hour for the "interrupting" of ordinary business, and in 1906 the hour was made 11 o'clock. Nowadays the House meets regularly on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays at 2.45 and continues in session throughout the evening, the interval formerly allowed for dinner having been abolished in 1906. On Fridays, set apart, until late in the session, for the consideration of private members' bills, the hour of convening is 12 o'clock. At sittings on days other than Friday the first hour or more is consumed usually with small items of formal business and with the asking and answering of questions addressed to the ministers, so that the public business set for the day is reached at approximately 4 o'clock.[173]

[Footnote 173: Redlich, Procedure of the House of Commons, II., 68-77.]

*124. Officers.*--The princ.i.p.al officers of the House are the (p. 121) Speaker, the Clerk and his two a.s.sistants, the Sergeant-at-Arms and his deputies, the Chaplain, and the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means. The Clerk and the Sergeant-at-Arms, together with their a.s.sistants, are appointed for life by the crown, on nomination of the premier, but the Speaker and the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means are elected for a single parliament by the House.[174]

All save the Chairman and his deputy are, strictly, non-political officers. The Clerk signs all orders of the House, indorses bills sent or returned to the Lords, reads whatever is required to be read during the sittings, records the proceedings of the chamber, and, with the concurrence of the Speaker, supervises the preparation of the official Journal. The Sergeant-at-Arms attends the Speaker, enforces the House's orders, and presents at the bar of the House persons ordered or qualified to be so presented. The Chairman of Ways and Means (in his absence the Deputy Chairman) presides over the deliberations of the House when the body sits as a committee of the whole[175] and exercises supervision over private bill legislation. Although a political official, he preserves, in both capacities, a strictly non-partisan att.i.tude.

[Footnote 174: In point of fact, the Chairman and Deputy Chairman retire when the ministry by which they have been nominated goes out of office.]

[Footnote 175: On this account he is referred to ordinarily as the Chairman of Committees.]

*125. The Speakership.*--The speakership arose from the need of the House when it was merely a pet.i.tioning body for a recognized spokesman, and although the known succession of Speakers begins with Sir Thomas Hungerford, who held the office in the last parliament of Edward III. (1377), there is every reason to suppose that at even an earlier date there were men whose functions were substantially equivalent. The Speaker is elected at the beginning of a parliament by and from the members of the House, and his tenure of office, unless terminated by resignation or death, continues through the term of that parliament. The choice of the House is subject to the approval of the crown; but, whereas in earlier days the king's will was at this point very influential, the last occasion upon which a Speaker-elect was rejected by the crown was in 1679. Though nominally elected, the Speaker is in fact chosen by the ministry, and he is pretty certain to be taken, in the first instance, from the party in power. During the nineteenth century, however, it became customary to re-elect a Speaker as long as he should be willing to serve, regardless of party affiliation.

*126. The Speaker's Functions and Powers.*--The functions of the Speaker are regulated in part by custom, in part by rules of the House, and in part by general legislation. They are numerous and, in the (p. 122) aggregate, highly important. The Speaker is, first of all, the presiding officer of the House. In this capacity he is a strictly non-partisan moderator whose business it is to maintain decorum in deliberations, decide points of order, put questions, and announce the result of divisions. The non-partisan aspect of the English speakership sets the office off in sharp contrast with its American counterpart.

"It makes little difference to any English party in Parliament," says Mr. Bryce, "whether the occupant of the chair has come from their own or from hostile ranks.... A custom as strong as law forbids him to render help to his own side even by private advice. Whatever information as to parliamentary law he may feel free to give must be equally at the disposal of every member."[176] Except in the event of a tie, the Speaker does not vote, even when, the House being in committee, he is not occupying the chair. In the second place, the Speaker is the spokesman and representative of the House, whether in demanding privileges, communicating resolutions, or issuing warrants.

There was a time when he was hardly less the spokesman of the king than the spokesman of the Commons, but the growth of independence of the popular chamber enabled him long ago to cast off this dual and extremely difficult role. The Speaker, furthermore, declares and interprets, though he in no case makes, the law of the House. "Where,"

says Ilbert, "precedents, rulings, and the orders of the House are insufficient or uncertain guides, he has to consider what course would be most consistent with the usages, traditions, and dignity of the House, and the rights and interests of its members, and on these points his advice is usually followed, and his decisions are very rarely questioned.... For many generations the deference habitually paid to the occupant of the chair has been the theme of admiring comment by foreign observers."[177] Finally, the fact should be noted that by the Parliament Act of 1911 the Speaker is given sole power, when question arises, to determine whether a given measure is or is not to be considered a money bill.[178] Upon his decision may hinge the entire policy of the Government respecting a measure, and even the fate of the measure itself. The Speaker's symbol of authority is the mace, which is carried before him when he formally enters or leaves the House and lies on the table before him when he is in the chair. He has an official residence in Westminster, and he receives a salary of 5,000 a year which is paid from the Consolidated Fund, being on that account not subject to change when the annual appropriation bills (p. 123) are under consideration. At retirement from office a Speaker is likely to be pensioned and to be elevated to the peerage.[179]