Worse still, a considerable number of Members in the House
of Commons are, it is said, about to interfere again as they did in the Lipski case, and to bring their thoroughly unconsti- tutional influence to bear on the Home Secretary. We hope that Mr. Matthews will firmly resist now, as he did then, this most mischievous innovation. He must, of course, carefully review the evidence, with the assistance of Mr. Justice Stephen, and either grant a reprieve or not, as he judges to be most in keeping with his duty. But for Members of the House of Commons to get up Parliamentary pressure of this kind for the purpose of influencing the decision of a Secretary of State who is responsible only to his own conscience and his Sovereign for the way in which he uses the prerogative of the Crown, is one of the most alarming steps towards elective judgeships of which we have had experience. The next step will be to ask for a plebiscite for or against the execution of capital punishment in every case of a death-sentence ; and the final step will be to make Judges and remove them by a popular vote, and so pervert justice till it squares with popular favour or disfavour. We would as soon refer the making of the criminal law to the County Council of each local district, and so create a number of lenient districts where crime could be committed with comparative impunity, as intimidate Judges and juries in this unconstitutional fashion. Talk of idolatry as promoted by the statuary in cathedrals ! The only idolatry of which there is any danger in England is idolatry of the popular will as divine.
