THE BUSINESS OF THE SESSION.
Tun construction of acts of Parliament, and the management of their discussion, are not the only or the most important functions of Government in England. Parliamentary proceedings have, however, assumed such magnitude among us, and attract so much more the attention and interest of the public than all the other functions of our ruling bodies, that the reputation of a Ministry will always be estimated by its Parliamentary and legislative suc- cesses. To improve old laws, and add new enactments to the statute-book called for by. altered circumstances and the fresh necessities they develop, Ls therefore a duty from which no Eng- lish Ministry can be exempt ; and no Ministry of late years has been called to office from which more may be reasonably expected in this way than from the band of statesmen who have undertaken to initiate a novel combination in political parties, and who must feel themselves under a peculiar responsibility to justify by their success the bold step they have taken, and to satisfy the height- ened expectations raised through the nation by so unwonted an array of talent, knowledge, high character, and Parliamentary skill. The strength of the new Ministry is in one respect its weakness. Nothing short of striking success will escape being, considered a failure. Expectation has, undoubtedly, been raised very high ; and though its objects are not as yet clearly defined, yet the public mind has a sufficiently keen sense of inconveniences, and has been offered so many and such apparently attractive re- medies, that it is likely to be extremely sensitive to any hesitation or reluctance on the part of a Government whose very construc- tion pledges it to do more than any single party has hitherto been
able to accomplish. •
The first requisite, without which Ministers must disappoint public expectation, is a clear conception, both on their own part and on that of the public, of the work that needs to be done at once, and of that which can be allowed to wait—of that which can be done at once, and of that which demands a previous discus- sion of principles and accumulation of facts. The session extends over about twenty working weeks, and it is plain that after the meeting of Parliament Cabinet Ministers have very little time for the preparation of measures, while in the present case they have not had a summer and autumn recess to make such preparations. This consideration would materially affect our demands upon any Ministry called to office only a few weeks before the spring meet- ing of Parliament. But it applies with far greater force to a Min- istry called suddenly to act together without previous habits of political intercourse. In this case, not only is time needed for the due preparation of measures embodying the well understood prin- ciples of a single strongly marked political party, but time and what time brings with it are still more needed for the thorough establishment of mutual understanding, for the growth of that mutual respect' and cordiality which may be anticipated from the intercourse of intelligent and patriotic men bent upon serving their country together, for the subsidence under such influences of old reminiscences of passages at arms, for the harmonizing of prin- ciples of action and particular opinions hitherto maintained in a position of mutual conflict. The raw material has been brought together,—or rather, we should say, the separate parts of a ma- chine : time and friction are required before it can be expected to do its destined work with perfect smoothness and effect.
We are not begging favours for the Ministers—not, certainly, wishing to provide them with excuses for delay. We are simply claiming that forbearance on the part of their supporters abso- lutely necessary to enable the Government even to approach their work with any hope of success. Last session was in great measure a provisional session, and we see no reason to regret it. Work would have been botched if attempted under the cir- cumstances, and of botched legislative work we have had quite enough. If another session be spent in transacting well the busi- ness that demands immediate attention, and in making prepara- tions for the satisfactory solution of the great questions which every one can foresee, time will be saved in the long run, and the Members of the new Parliament will be trained far more effectively for the work required of them hereafter, than they would be by the immediate introduction and discussion of measures submitted without due consideration, without requisite knowledge of facts, without a cordial unanimity of opinion and feeling among Minis- ters themselves. The coming session ought, certainly, to be one mainly employed in the education of the new Members, in the care- ful transaction of the ordinary and absolutely necessary business, and in the preparation for the Reform Bill that is promised, for the final solution of the Income-tax difficulty, and the reconstitu- tion of the Indian Charter.
In removing from the category of things that ought to be set- tled at once, and that can be settled at once, a new Reform Bill and the principle of the Income-tax, we are aware that we are in the one case opposing a course vehemently urged by the organs of the Suffrage-extension movement pure and simple, and that in the other we are running counter to a popular sentiment. In each case the motive is the same,—that we see no prospect of a satis- factory settlement of either question under the present circum- stances within the limits of the session ; and furthermore, that no estimable inconvenience results from the delay. It would be quite possible to draw up a Reform Bill that would satisfy the Suffrage- extension gentlemen • a map of England and a statistical diction- ary would be the only aids required. But such a bill would dis- satisfy every one else, and would inevitably fail to pass—nay, it would not even excite a sensation, so utterly would the nation re- fuse and disown it. So of the Income-tax, nothing could be more simple and on the level of a schoolboy's capacity than Mr. Dis- raeli's plan for settling the principle of graduation and its appli- cation • but when it came to be tested, it was found to have been adopted by tossing-up for a choice of schemes, and not to have been the result of a balance of conflicting opinions, an insight into the principles they involved, and a knowledge of the facts on which they were justified and which their application in practice would produce. This sort of settlement is the makeshift of a pre- tender, not the chef-d'ceuvre of a statesman ; and is not the settle- ment we either require for the nation or expect from such men as our present Ministers. Both these questions need to be solved, not merely compromised and then to remain as germs for future agitation and discontent. Our legislation need not look forward to eternity, but it ought to settle the questions with which it deals in accordance with the fullest knowledge attainable, and the best tested scientific principles of the generation at present ex- isting. Our wish for delay arises not from indifference towards the objects sought, but from anxious interest that the objects should be attained, and so attained as not to turn out curses rather than blessings.
The impracticability of extemporizing an adequate Reform Bill, and passing it within the next six months, is clear to us from se- veral causes. It is highly improbable that men brought together so suddenly, and from such various and opposite points of the po- litical compass, as the members of the present Government, could, with their other pressing avocations, devote sufficient time to its discussion to agree even upon its principles, supposing, what is no- toriously not the case, that facts well tested and clearly arranged were in the possession of any public men, to justify an immediate discussion of principles. We hve in an age when positive science is enlarging her domain, and when legislation demands a previous accumulation of carefully observed facts before she can plant her foot firmly and construct her works with precision and approxi- mate certainty of success. All men know that bribery is practised largely in borough elections, and that coercion, more or less marked according to the resistance of the voters, is instrumental in many of our counties. But who would undertake to state the relative amount of each, or the localities where they prevail, or the causes which influence the distribution and the efficacy of these noxious agents ? Yet an exact appreciation of these facts is necessary to the skilful application of the remedy ; a far more desirable result than the mere extension of the suffrage, and not to be attained by any amount of extension. Then again, it is an admitted blemish
that petty towns should neutralize by the votes of their represent- atives the political decisions of great districts containing hundreds
of times their inhabitants, and of absolutely incommensurable im- portance in the country. Yet who would apply the simple nu- merical principle, which would diminish the Members for Eng- land to between three and four hundred, and increase those for Ireland to between two and three hundred? The large towns complain that they are unfairly borne down, yet the borough population is enfranchised and represented at a higher numerical ratio than that of the counties. Any single principle followed out strictly to its consequences would lead to results that no Eng- lish statesman even of the most advanced school would for a
moment dare to recommend in public. The evils clearly seen, long complained of, and frequently discussed, are so bound up with
what is good and useful that even to remedy them would be a very difficult problem. But the real complexity of the question is only seen when the problem is attempted in its constructive form. How can the House of Commons be improved as a representation of the intelligence of the country and an engine for legislation, and at, the same time be more broadly based on popular representation ?
cannot be too often repeated, that what is wanted is, not to put into the shape of laws the raw opinion of the majority of the nation on questions they are not competent to decide, and to most of which they have never given a thought. If it were, as has been observed, the tax-collector might gather the suffrages, and save the ho- nourable gentlemen the trouble and expense of canvassing con- stituencies and sitting at Westminster. Our representative system does indeed aim at harmonizins.6 the legislation of the country with the sense of the majority; but it has another important function, without which this might often be simply. prejudicial. It has to form by discussion, by comparison of opinions, by statement of facts, by appeals to experience, to interest, to moral sentiments, that very sense of the majority on which its decisions are ultimately to rest. We should not be disposed to give up this advantage for any simplicity of plan, any arithmetical or geometrical accuracy, any rapidity. of execution, any enthusiasm. The impenetrability of our Legislature to immediate popular suggestion is an in- valuable security against caprice and rashness, and a guarantee of that proper amount of discussion which is the nation's best means of political instruction ; while the legislation of the last twenty years proves that this impenetrability is not carried so far as to create a dangerous obstacle to the execution of the popular will when once seriously and deliberately pronounced. The 'English House of. Commons must continue to be a tribunal before which all the great interests of the nation can get their hearing. Whatever extension may be given to the franchise, the variety of classes and of opinions represented in the House of Com- mons must at least not be lessened. We must have no class able to say that its views and its interests are not allowed to be heard before the nation comes to its decisions. That cause is rife with revolution and reaction. On the other hand, to admit the working class to such a share of the franchise as would enable them to be heard as well as those who are richer, would be to complete rather than to endanger our representative system. We do not profess to be discussing a new Reform Bill, but simply to be illus- trating by a few of the most obvious commonplaces the complexity of the problem which those who undertake to amend our electoral constitution have to solve. The old Reform Bill comparatively failed —quite failed in its object of permanently satisfying—because it treated a complex problem as if it had been simple. The reason was probably in the passion evoked by long resistance, and in the enor- mous comparative magnitude of the one great evil to be over- thrown. But the moral ought not to be lost upon us now. Look ogain at Lord John's Bill of last year. Perhaps it fell dead partly because a sinking Ministry tied themselves to it; but had it been really a large, statesmanlike, well-conceived, well-based measure, it would have revived that falling Ministry. Now, if Lord John could not devise a measure to satisfy either the moderate Whigs, the Liberal Conservatives, or the Radicals, who else fancies that he can do so without careful study ? Or does it seem possible to carry a measure against the will of either of these sections ? It may be tried, and Reform may be stopped for an indefinite period. The country certainly cannot be excited to change its mixed system for any spick and span scheme born complete from the brain of the Manchester Jupiters.
The reasons for postponing a final decision on the Income-tax are of the same character as those which lead to the necessity of deferring a Reform Bill. We have none of us really made up our minds—no reasonable man can have made up his mind, while he knows that men of equal authority and science hold completely opposite opinions, and that no decided tendency to unanimity is yet manifest, simply because there has been no really pub- lic discussion till Mr. Disraeli's Budget was rejected. All that has been done as yet is to collect opinions. Let time be given for comparing them, for rediscusaing points of dif- ference, for systematizing and attempting to harmonize such truths as are undoubtedly contained in and lie at the root of every deliberately-expressed opinion of a competent judge, unbias- ed by selfish interest. This last qualification is important. But it applies with tenfold force to the popular opinion, which rests on nothing but instinct impelled by interest. The British public does not wish to be unfair, does not wish to perpetrate legalized injus- tice. Let it take time to weigh well what it is about in this mat- ter, and be persuaded that, in the long run, a tax that unfairly affects ,"property and capital will act injuriously upon profits and wages. What harm can be done by. paying a year's more Income- tax on the old principle for the sake even of the chance of a satis- factory solution ? and what more rational means than to reappoint the Committee which has already devoted so much time to the sub- ject, but has not yet been able to report, so complex are the diffi- culties in the way of a scientific and politic decision? A year is not much in the history of a country like England ; and were it more, a final issue were purchased cheaply by the delay.
We have enlarged upon what ought not rather than what ought to be the business of the session : but the first requisite to effective work is to know what not to attempt.*
• While this paper is passin,, from our hands to the press, a friend who was eminently useful in the passing for the Reform Bill of 1832, and who continues to be second to none in accurate knowledge of facts and principles, or in honest zeal for the cause, favours us with his opinion on the best mode of proceeding with the new Reform Bill, summed up in the following lines. "The plain course, I think, is for the Ministry to state distinctly that they will at the end of the session submit a bill for popular consideration—pro- ceeding with it next year; or, undertaking to bring in a measure next Fe- bruary, properly and maturely considered. Most would, I believe, prefer this course. A frank and distinct Ministerial declaration, however, is es- sential ; and that early on the reassembling of Parliament."
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