Parliamentary reform

“ It is not for the constituencies, for the eager masses, to measure with a nice balance the value of some particular observance which constitutes in reality merely an isolated example of the spirit in which our ancestors sought to safeguard the liberty of debate. But whenever the people of these realms begin to understand that their readiness to dispense with obsolete formalities is being used as a means to substitute for the will of a free Parliament the dictation of an arbitrary Minister, farewell, at least for another generation, to all projects of reform of Parliamentary procedure. ”

“ Well then, the whole problem of people who want reform is, to bring enough political pressure to bear upon the government to lead them to initiate, to draft a bill, and introduce it in the first instance, into the House of Commons, force it through the House of Commons, press it through the House of Lords, and finally land it safely, having passed through the shoals and rapids of the parliamentary river, safely on the statute book as an Act of Parliament. ”

“ When the great measure of Reform in Parliament was introduced in 1831, apart from all question of party struggles there was the still greater question considered by many reflecting people, whether the new Parliamentary and electoral system would be found compatible with the old practice of government by means of party and steady Parliamentary majorities. ”

“ The Liberal, Conservative, and Labour parties are all agreed that a large measure of electoral reform is long overdue, but hitherto the various parties have contended only for such reforms as would strengthen their own parliamentary position. ”

“ The operatives of Manchester wanted cheaper bread; those of Birmingham wanted an extension of the franchise: and as Lord John Russell had opposed the re-opening of the reform question, the radicals were both disappointed and infuriated. The original leaders of parliamentary reform had no sympathy with such a rabble as now clamored for extended reform. They demanded universal suffrage, annual Parliaments, vote by ballot, abolition of property qualifications, payment of members of Parliament, and the division of the country into equal electoral districts. ”

“ Lord Hartington has been good enough to inform us that the object which the Liberal majority in the House of Commons ought to have in view is not general but particular. The aim of the reform of Parliamentary procedure about to be attempted is not the relief of the House of Commons from disorder, from disgrace, and from impotence, but merely the enactment of certain political proposals enumerated by his lordship. ”

“ So many Parliamentary reforms have been accomplished since the time they commenced in 1832, the time seems not far distant when there will be little more for Liberals to urge, or for Conservatives and the {196} House of Lords to obstruct. ”

“ It is only in the legislature that direct and immediate influence can be exercised over the principles and policy of the government. Until it can find expression there, no cause and no party can be said to be within the range of practical politics. Any change forced upon the nation by powers extraneous to Parliament would, if possible at all, be revolution, and not reform. ”

“ The method by which the party in opposition contrives to secure a parliamentary majority for itself is by disparaging the measures of the party in power, and promising greater reforms and better measures than those of their rivals. ”

“ If there be one subject more than another that deserves the consideration and demands the responsibility of the government, it certainly is the reconstruction of our parliamentary system; and it is the government or the political party candidates for power, who recommend a policy, and who will not shrink from the responsibility of carrying that policy into effect if the opportunity be afforded to them, who alone are qualified to deal with a question of this importance. ”

“ It is obvious that the only thing the reformers could do, whether in or out of Parliament, was to agitate, to discuss, to hold public meetings, to write political tracts, to change public opinion, to bring such a pressure to bear on political aspirants as to insure an election of members to the House of Commons who were favorable to reform. ”

“ Were our government a parliamentary system, such as exists among the free peoples of the Old World, we should have a legislature promptly responsive to movements of the popular will, a ministry sitting in one or the other house of Congress, and dependent for continuance in power upon the support of a majority in the Lower House, and an executive disarmed in whole or in part of the power to negative legislative enactments. ”

“ In a previous paper I have discussed the electoral reforms whereby Parliament or Congress could be made really representative of the national mind, would cease to be an arena for a stupid and boring party conflict, and would become a smaller assembly, a working council, alive throughout, appointing and criticising the various Ministries. But a reform of representative methods is not in itself a sufficient solution to our problem. A graver and profounder weakness both of the American and British community at the present time is the incoherence and diffuseness of public opinion. ”

“ But proportional representation, in rendering more difficult the passing of legislation conceived in a partisan spirit, will save the time and energy of Parliament for legislation which is more in accordance with the nation's will. The history of the numerous Education and Licensing Bills which have been presented to Parliament during the two decades 1890-1910 furnish an excellent example of the way in which a rigid party system results in the waste of parliamentary time. ”

“ I fancy that he has gone to present himself as a candidate for the new Parliament. People are all in motion for this purpose; but it seems that Reform will triumph, and the anti-reformers will get more and more into the mire. God forbid that this Bill should not pass—there would certainly be a revolution. ”

“ Even the suggestions of individual supporters of the administration in power must be ignored, unless there is a cave which might turn out the ministry altogether. In detail, therefore, we are governed, not by Parliament, but by the permanent officials, so far as really important Government measures are concerned: and it is quite evident that bills introduced by private members will very soon not be considered at all. The private member is rapidly being reduced to nothingness by the force of parliamentary development. ”

“ Speaking at a political meeting two days after the dissolution, Lord John Russell said that the electors in the approaching struggle were called on not merely to select the best men to defend their rights and interests, but also to give a plain answer to the question, put to the constituencies by the King in dissolving Parliament, Do you approve, aye or no, of the principle of Reform in the representation? ”

“ Indeed, it is by the difficulty of administering anything at all by parliamentary methods—every year more evidently breaking down—rather than by the desire to undertake large schemes of legislation, that statesmen will in a very short time be forced to initiate the changes whose full development will have become time-honoured by the end of this century. The organisation of political opposition in parliaments has reached a point which makes it evident that before long the minority in parliaments will have become a nonentity. ”

“ Nominally, it is true, an unfavorable vote in the Deputies upon a Government measure or action involves the retirement of a minister, or of the entire cabinet, unless the crown is willing to dissolve the Chamber and appeal to the country; and no Government project of consequence can be carried through without parliamentary approval. Practical conditions within the kingdom, however, have never been favorable for the operation of parliamentarism in a normal manner. In the first place, the parliament itself is in no wise representative of the nation as a whole. ”

“ On these grounds, some persons, incapable of seeing more than one side of a question, have pronounced parliamentary government a positive evil, and have maintained that the administration would be greatly improved if the power, now exercised by a large assembly, were transferred to a single person. ”

“ Should strong majorities favor the change, it generally is completed without much violence. In most states, where representation is not unequal, or the right of suffrage is not greatly restricted, the popular will can be felt and triumph through the popular vote and the delegates of the people in the legislature, and will thus lead soon, and peacefully, to legislative measures ending in reform, pursuant to legislative countenance and without the necessity of any stronger collateral course. ”

“ Is it too early for a united effort, to think out, in readiness for peace, a scheme of parliamentary procedure which shall afford time for the serious and uninterrupted consideration of non-party measures, and the furtherance of needed reforms?
Party no longer exists, but they who think it has gone for good dwell in a fools’ paradise. ”

“ The debate which followed this amendment continued three nights; and it consisted chiefly of a repetition of the views, arguments, and anticipations which had been brought out at such great length in the former parliament. Ministers and their supporters, however, found new matter for triumph in the evidence with which the general election had furnished them, that the people were generally for reform. All doubt or hesitation was at an end: the voice of the people had decided, not merely that there must be reform, but that it must be that kind of reform contained in the ministerial bill. ”

“ In promoting this legislation, it was [Pg 230] argued that, if citizens were assured the right to be enrolled in the party to which they desired to belong and to vote at primaries and freely to exercise their choice for delegates to conventions, they would be stimulated to take part in the primaries, and that this would result in preventing party nominations for office from being controlled by those who made politics their business or used improper or corrupt methods. Hence the primary reform measures introduced by legislation in our state in the nineties. ”

“ One very clear cause of failure in the House of Lords to give satisfaction lies in the fact that, although government by Party is the very groundwork of the parliamentary constitution, as far as the Upper House is concerned such an idea might just as well not exist at all. ”

“ Every great reform, it may almost literally be said, is heralded in Parliament by the motions of independent members, who are sure to be defeated, but whose determined efforts have success enough to make the leader of the Government, or the leader of the Opposition, feel that the time is near at hand when the cause must be taken up by one or other of the great parties in the State. ”

“ A Prime Minister in the twentieth century may count on the automatic support of the serried ranks of a parliamentary majority pledged beforehand to the party programme. He is thus relieved from the wholesome restraint that leads to moderation. Government by the parliamentary machine has supplanted, or will soon supplant, government by free discussion. The effective majority of the Lower House has become the unreasoning tool of the Cabinet's will, instead of its critic and master. ”

“ It has always been the fixed constitutional rule in this country that when a new Reform Act has created a large class of new voters the old Parliament becomes obsolete. That was the rule pursued in 1831, 1868, and 1885, and there seemed the more and not the less reason why at this crisis the country’s fate it should be pursued in 1918. ”

“ The groups which emerge under existing processes are uncertain in shape, in size, and in their combinations, and governments resting upon them are infirm even when they appear to be strong. It is only when the groups in the legislature represent in faithful proportion bodies of convinced adherents returning them as their representatives that such groups become strong enough to restore parliamentary efficiency and to combine in the maintenance of a stable administration. ”

“ If such an extensive reform were effected, we might go on for two or three sessions in good and easy times, and such a reformed parliament might adapt itself to one mode of government on the ordinary concerns of the country; but if such an extensive change were effected in the constitution of parliament, sure I am that, whenever an occasion shall arise of great popular excitement or re-action, the consequence will be a total subversion of our constitution, followed by anarchy and confusion, and terminating either in the tyranny of a fierce democracy, or a military despotism ”

“ Moreover, whatever foundation of fact underlie the charges, it should be borne in mind that parliamentary government has only existed for ten years, and it would not be reasonable to expect in a decade those virtues which were of very slow growth in our own Mother of Parliaments. ”

“ It will be particularly interesting to watch the ingenuities of the politicians in the new Parliament in producing schemes that will look like electoral reform and yet leave the profession still active for mischief. They will fight desperately against large constituencies with numerous members. The one-member [Pg 122] or two-member constituency is absolutely necessary to their party system. In such constituencies even proportional representation can be reduced to a farce. And also they will offer cheap but attractive substitutes like the second ballot and the alternative vote. ”