Harry Graham

“ And if La Rochefoucauld's maxim be true, that we readily pardon those who bore us, but never those whom we bore, the House of Commons has need of a most forgiving spirit to listen patiently to so much of what can only be described as vox et praeterea nihil.
The level of eloquence is, no doubt, higher in the House of Lords than elsewhere. Peers include a greater number of orators among their numbers; opportunities for a display of their talents are more rare; their powers are not dissipated in prolonged debates, as in the Commons, but are reserved for full-dress occasions. ”

“ The flowers of rhetoric bloom no longer in the cold business-like atmosphere of the parliamentary garden; only the more practical but unromantic [223] vegetables remain. The rich embroideries of trope and metaphor have been roughly torn from modern speech, leaving the bare skeleton of reason exposed to the public gaze. The grandiose orator of the past, with his ornate phraseology, his graceful periods, his quotations from the poets, has been ousted by the passionless debater, flinging, like the improvident O'Connell, his brood of robust thoughts into the world, without a rag to cover them. ”

“ Politicians have learnt to control their feelings, and the present publicity of parliamentary proceedings acts as a salutary deterrent to outbursts of the elemental passions. Neither House to-day would dream of expressing its emotion in the open fashion common to Parliaments of long ago. The sight of a Lower Chamber dissolved in tears is no longer possible. Yet, in 1626, when, by the King's command, no discussion was permitted on the question of Buckingham's impeachment, a lachrymose Speaker led the whole House of Commons in a chorus of weeping. ”

“ In the long list of those who have so ably guided and controlled the proceedings of the House of Commons during the last hundred years, many names stand forth conspicuously—Manners Sutton, Shaw Lefevre, Denison, Brand, Peel. No Speaker has ever fallen short of the trust reposed in him, or failed in his duty to the House, and it may confidently be asserted that so long as the standard of English political life maintains its present high level, no difficulty will ever be experienced in providing the Chair with an occupant who shall fill it, not only worthily, but with distinction. ”

“ Though the oratorical masterpieces of the past may, for the most part, be dull reading, to the student or historian they must always prove interesting and instructive, as revealing those peculiar qualities which appeal to a parliamentary audience. They explain to a certain extent what it is that a speech must possess in order to meet with the approval of either House.
Parliament—and more especially the House of Commons—is no very lenient critic; but it is a sound one. It pardons the faults of style or manner due to inexperience; it tolerates homeliness that is the outcome of sincerity. ”

“ The Speaker may well be called the autocrat of the House; his word there is law, his judgment is unquestioned, his very presence is evocative of a peculiar deference. He is at the same time the servant of the House, and, in the memorable words which Speaker Lenthall addressed to Charles I., has "neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak but as the House is pleased to direct." It is upon the good pleasure of the Commons that his power is based; by their authority alone he rules supreme. ”

“ The delivery of this royal message to the Commons is the signal for a stampede of members towards the Upper House; grave politicians vieing with one another in the endeavour to be first at the Bar of the Lords. O'Connell compared the rush of members on such occasions to that of a pack of boys released from school, scrimmaging together to get out of the class-room. In their haste to arrive at the goal, the Commons are apt to hurry the unhappy Speaker before them like the sacrificial ox, urged along reluctant to the horns of the altar. ”

“ The sight of a member of Parliament enjoying an al fresco meal under the eye of the Speaker would to-day arouse indignant shouts of "Order!" Even the simple sandwich is taboo in the Chamber of either House, and nothing more solid or more potent than a glass of pure well-water, or perhaps an egg-flip, can be partaken of during debate. ”

“ The House of Commons has long ago shaken off the shackles of the Crown, and will perhaps some day be almost as wholly emancipated from the influence of the aristocracy. Its power is increasing yearly, owing mainly to the fact that [43] it has gained the confidence of the country, and it is now generally felt that when any great question arises, the House will solve it, as Disraeli said some fifty years ago, "not merely by the present thought and intelligence of its members, but by the accumulated wisdom of the eminent men who have preceded them." ”

“ The comfortable days of lengthy dinners are past and gone, and the modern member has barely time to snatch a hasty meal in the Commons' dining-room ere he returns to the bustle and confusion of the House. Things have indeed changed since the leisurely days when Bellamy could adequately cater for the needs of Parliament. His small staff and humble kitchen would have but little chance of satisfying modern requirements in an age when over a hundred thousand meals are served to members and their friends in the course of a single session. ”

“ Politicians would appear to be among the most inquisitive individuals on the face of the globe; their thirst for general information is as insatiable as it is amazing. The time spent by various Government officials in pandering to this craving for knowledge on the part of legislators is very considerable: it has even been hinted that the clerks at the Irish Office are employed exclusively upon the task of answering conundrums set by members of the House of Commons. Nothing is too insignificant, no matter is too sacred, to be made the subject of a question in the House. ”

“ The Sovereign does not inherit sagacity any more than the Duke of Norfolk, as Lord John Russell justly observed, and it would be unwise as well as unsafe to hang the Crown on the peg of an exception. It is as well, however, to remember that the Sovereign is a constitutional monarch whose powers nowadays are much restricted, whereas the Lords have the right to exercise a legislative veto the use of which kings have long since resigned.
Talent is not hereditary. No man chooses a coachman, as the first Lord Halifax once remarked, because his father was a coachman before him. ”

“ There is no rule of procedure regulating the length of speeches in either House. A man may speak for as long as he likes, the only limit being set by his own powers of endurance or the patience of his audience; but his remarks must be relevant. "If any speak too long, and speak within the matter, he may not be cut off; but if he be long, and out of the matter, then may the Speaker gently admonish him of the shortness of the time, or the business of the House, and pray him to make as short he may." ”

“ Elevation brings with it many disadvantages. The searchlight of public opinion beats relentlessly upon a Prime Minister; even his private life is open to criticism. Enemies lay snares for him on every side; friends and political allies [95] have to be treated with tact and tenderness; his labours never cease, day or night. [140] It is his duty, as Gladstone said, "to stand like a wall of adamant between the people and the sovereign," and the burden of an Empire hangs heavy upon his shoulders. From the very moment of a Prime Minister's appointment his responsibilities commence. ”

“ The parliamentary concert is about to commence, and it is for the Premier as leader of the Government orchestra to keep his band together as best he may. This is no easy task. A single false note may mar the harmony of the whole performance; the failure of one solitary instrumentalist may cause the dismissal of the entire band. It is the conductor's duty to see that his orchestra plays in unison, or, if not in unison, at least in harmony. He must keep a watchful eye upon each individual, and quash the efforts of any one member to perform a solo upon his own peculiar trumpet. ”

“ In these democratic days a seat in either House of Parliament is no longer the monopoly of a single privileged class: it lies within the reach of all who can afford the luxury of representing either themselves or their fellows at Westminster. ”

“ The time of the House is placed, very early in each session, at the disposal of the Government, its business is arranged to suit their convenience, and the private member must be content to make the most of such fragmentary opportunities as are flung to him. He is controlled by his party and by his Whip; he may not leave the House without permission; he must vote at the word of command. At one moment he may be called upon to speak at length upon a subject of which he is sublimely ignorant, in order to allow his party a chance of gathering their forces to meet an unexpected division ”

“ Parliament has ever been most tenacious of its historic and traditionary rights and privileges. Of these, freedom of speech and freedom from arrest may be considered the most important. The right of personal access to the Crown is claimed by peers, any one of whom may demand a private audience with the sovereign, and, though the Commons are not granted a similar privilege, it is permissible for them to accompany their Speaker when he presents an address to the King, and to wear ordinary dress on such an occasion. ”

“ If age can confer dignity and distinction upon any assembly, then must the House of Lords be peculiarly distinguished, for it is certainly the most venerable as well as the most antiquated of our Parliamentary institutions. ”

“ A marked improvement in the conduct of modern debate is to be noticed in the comparatively inoffensive character of the epithets used by members with reference to their opponents. The decencies of debate are, as a rule, religiously observed. Recriminations are rare. Measures are attacked, not men. The secession of a statesman is considered a political but not a personal offence, and what Palmerston once called the "puerile vanity of consistency" is no longer worshipped fanatically. Gladstone rightly called the House of Commons a "school of temper," as well as a school of honour and of justice. ”

“ Such language, however, is mercifully rare, and no modern Prime Minister could say, as Lord North did to the alderman who presented a petition from the electors of Billingsgate, that the honourable gentleman spoke not only the sentiments, but even the very language of his constituents.
A member may not speak at all unless a question is before the House, or he intends to conclude with a motion or amendment; but an exception is made in favour of a personal explanation, or of a question of privilege suddenly arising, which commands precedence over all other business. ”

“ Speaker, for the law of nations!" he finally exclaimed, as he prepared to turn to other matters.
Parliament will, indeed, put up with a great deal from a Minister whose honesty is unquestioned, and who has sufficient common-sense not to blunder at a moment of crisis. Nowadays, however, no man who was utterly lacking in ordinary power of speaking would be given a place on the front bench. A talent for debate may not necessarily be a gauge of a man's capacity as a Minister, but only in debate can he show his powers. ”

“ But the patronage in the hands of a private member to-day is of too insignificant a nature to prove an irresistible temptation, and political power of an appreciable kind is reserved for the very few.
The life of the modern legislator is a strenuous and an expensive one; it cannot be successfully undertaken by a poor or an idle man. Before a candidate may stand for Parliament at all he must deposit a substantial sum with the Returning Officer, and the mere expenses of election vary from £350 to £900 in boroughs, and from £650 to as much as £1800 in counties. ”

“ Every Act of Parliament commences its existence in the shape of a Bill. As such, it may be introduced in either House, though the Commons have the undoubted monopoly of initiating financial measures, and Bills for the restitution of honours and blood must originate with the Lords. In the Upper House, any peer may introduce a Bill without notice, but in the Commons a member must give notice of his intention either to present a measure or move for leave to do so. ”

“ The well-known biographies of Lord Campbell, whose habit of writing the lives of the deceased as soon as the breath was out of their bodies added, as Brougham declared, a new terror to death, supply abundant evidence of the statesmanlike qualities that attach to the holders of the office. The most eminent men of their day have held the Chancellorship, proving the truth of Burke's well-known assertion that of all human studies the law is the most efficacious in forming great men, and that to be well versed in the laws of England is to be imbued in the sublimest principles of human wisdom. ”

“ In 1860, again, Lord Palmerston as Prime Minister was in favour of the House of Lords throwing out the Paper Duties Bill, which was the measure of his own Chancellor of the Exchequer.
It is not perhaps easy to imagine a modern Premier being placed in a situation similar to that of either Lord Melbourne or Lord Palmerston. He must necessarily, to a certain extent, have the whip hand of the Cabinet. For if several of his colleagues disagree with him on a question of principle, and resign, he can generally appoint others; whereas, if he resigns, the whole Ministry crumbles and falls to pieces. ”