THE PARALYSIS OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.
TF there is an atom of evidence for the Gla,dstonians' con- tention that the country is with them, it is to be found in the dull quiescence with which the constituencies watch the action of the minority in the House of Commons. That action is a direct insult to themselves, an assertion that they are too ignorant, or too corrupt, or too much misled, to bear rule, and that, consequently, the rights allowed to them by the Constitution shall not become executive. They have elected a House of Commons, but it is not allowed to work. They have appointed a Government, but it is not permitted to transact even the most ordinary business of the State. A minority of the minority organises, and the whole minority tolerates or approves, a plan of misusing the forms of the House of Commons, under which no business can be got through, representatives are too deeply disgusted to attend, and Ministers are worn out with work about as useful as polishing shot or picking oakum. -Under cover of exposing grievances during the debates on Supply, a band of Members con- sume the whole time of the House, and of the responsible servants of the country, in discussions which, were it not an object to paralyse the Executive, would never be raised, or would be concluded in as many minutes as they now occupy hours. On Monday, for example, the House sat for eight hours, passed two votes without alteration, and, under the pretext of a proposal to reduce Mr. Matthews' salary, talked for the hundredth time about the conduct of the Government in relation to the Parnell Commis- sion—a judicial inquiry still in progress—about a letter from Mr. Anderson, of the Home Office, refuting a state- ment by Sir W. Harcourt ; about the expediency of appointing female officers to the Metropolitan police- stations ; and about the duty of pardoning two men accused of shooting with intent to murder, whose case has been reconsidered by three successive Home Secre- taries. On Tuesday more actual work was done, though done out of season, for the House of Commons ordered a reform—without, however, specifying the reform— of the liquor-taxing system of India ; but hours were expended over a wrangle as to the conduct of public business, Mr. Goschen asking for more time for Govern- ment work—a demand rendered necessary only by the waste of twelve days over thirty votes in Supply, none of which were altered—and private Members contending that they wanted all their days for themselves, though when they get them, they usually fail to attend in sufficient numbers to make a House. The extra days were voted, but they will be wasted like the rest. It is the deliberate and announced intention of a section of the Opposition, tolerated by the remainder, to prevent any of the business of the country being done, and they carry it out in this way,—a way selected, it would seem, because of all ways of annoyance, it does the most injury to the health and happiness of the Ministers whom the constituencies appointed, and to the immediate interests of the electors. Bills anxiously desired by the Irish farmers, Bills about which the middle classes of Scotland are all eager, Bills like the Tithe Bill, which would directly relieve all English and Welsh farm tenants, besides saving the clergy from chronic contests with their flocks, are all stopped in order that part of the Opposition may torture the Government by a dreary dripping of words upon their heads, words avowedly devoted to subjects upon which no decently managed vestry meeting would expend ten minutes. This defiance of decency and the constituencies is not due, be it observed, to the Irish Members, and would not be ended by relegating them to their own island. The Irishmen are, of course, delighted with it, because it impedes the business of the State, and makes Great Britain contemptible ; but they do not openly work the machine, which is guided by English- men who, whenever—if ever—Ireland is out of the road, will apply the same method to ruin any Government which resists their wildest demands. It is no longer an assault by Ireland upon Great Britain, but a declaration of war by a faction on the principle of government by majorities. If the majority is not Radical, the majority is to be reduced in its own representative House to powerless imprisonment. It is hard to understand why the constituencies, who must perceive in some dim way what is going on, tolerate it for a day. If, indeed, they are at heart Gladstonian, and detest and despise the present Government as some leaders of that party say they do, we can understand that possibly they may be pleased to see their own agents tortured and affronted and bound in withes ; but if they are not—and they are not--why do they endure these outrages upon their own authority ? It is they who are attacked through the majority in the House which they returned. That majority is entitled by every constitutional rule to make its will prevail, and its will is deliberately prevented from prevailing. The electors may naturally ask why, if the Government is s6 harassed, it does not propose still further changes in the Standing Orders ; but the truth is, the Government cannot, without the support of the constituencies, go much further.
It can ask for the absolute Closure ; it can propose, as perhaps Mr. Goschen intended to hint on Monday, to suppress the right now enjoyed by Members in Com- mittee, of speaking as often as they please ; and it can introduce the Continental system of making debates in Supply purely financial debates. The third proposal, however, would be a change in the Constitution itself as hitherto understood, requiring the distinct approval of the people ; and if it or any other modifications in debate were carried, the evil might not be cured, or even much amended. If everything is to be discussed, subjects of dis- cussion can never be wanting ; and given a subject, any fifty Members without scruples, with long tongues, and with mischievous intentions, can always arrest the progress of affairs. They could do it if the subject were defence against a threatened invasion, but that if they did, they would be expelled until the danger was past. The evil requires a more radical change, it may even be the delegation of great powers not to Committees, but to the governing Committee, the Cabinet, or the introduction of silent sittings for the transaction of business instead of chatter ; but the necessary changes, whatever they may be, cannot be drastic enough unless the constituencies will move. It is they, not their agents, who are defied, and they should address the House and their Members from every electoral district in the Kingdom, form a league for the protection of the House of Commons and the defeat of obstnictives, and besiege the House with petitions for "such alteration of the Rules as will restore to the House its power of realising the wishes of its constituents." A really popular movement of that kind, with large public meetings and addresses from the Members who are now reduced to despair, would not only modify the tone of the obstructing faction, but would give the Ministry strength to make the necessary innovations sufficiently sweeping. No other method of action can inspire them with the needful Parliamentary nerve, or compel them to undertake a labour which must for the moment add severely to the already severe burden of their daily toil. It is not for them, but the constituencies, to protect representative government ; and it is representative government which is in danger of becoming as much hated here as it is in the States of the Union, where the electors, in their loathing of it, refuse their Members permission to sit more than once in two years. If the people do not desire to see that disastrous change in England, they should act, and not wait until Mr. Labouchere has solidified his position as a personage above the constituencies, and invested not merely with a sus- pensive veto, but with a power of declaring all their decisions, even the decision which appoints a Government, null and void.
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