LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE HOUSE OF LORDS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
SIII,—I thank you for your courtesy in publishing and corn- menting on my letter, and I venture to trouble you with one or two further remarks, in reply to your article.
In your first article, you said that the House of Lords was "absolutely no gauge of public opinion at all ;" but this ex- pression is somewhat modified in your second, where you state -that the House of Commons is a "thousandfold as sensitive a weather-gauge as the House of Lords." You repeat; how- ever, that the Medical Council and the Benchers of Lincoln's Inn are as well qualified for the task as the House of Lords. Possibly this may be the case ; they are both bodies -of learned men, and if put in possession of the autho- rity and information of the Cabinet itself, they might be able to carry on the business of the country with as much 'credit as some Cabinets which have actually existed. But this gauging" is not exclusively a question of qualification, but rather of opportunity. Among the means possessed by the House of Commons for gauging public opinion you specify three, viz , by-elections, newspapers, and the division-list. Well and good. These are open to the House of Lords, the Medical Council, and the Benchers, as well as to the House of Commons ; but in the political clubs and agencies throughout the country the two Houses have invaluable information which is not accessible to the Medical Council, &c. But even granting that the House of Lords has information from these sources, you say that they are less qualified to gauge than the Medical Council, &c., "so far as their much stronger prejudice against the bias of the House of Commons is a positive disqualification for impartial judgment." You add, "Our correspondent does not deny—he glories in this personal and violent bias [? prejudice]." Now, apart from the fact that I never gloried in, or even alluded to, any violent personal bias, but merely stated that I was not sur- prised that the House of Lords had not changed their opinion of Mr. Gladstone's Administration between 1880 and 1884, I would point out that if the House of Lords is disqualified "by a violent prejudice for one particular conclusion" from form- ing a just estimate in matters with which it is their especial -duty to deal, much more is the House of Commons so disqualified, for in the Lower Chamber every man is, ex necessitate rei, a party man, while in the Upper House independence of position pre- sumably gives greater possibility of independence of judgment. In the one House a man may be a partisan. in the other he mast.
You accuse the Upper House of arrogating the "right of com- pelling an appeal to the people." I am not aware that anyone has actually claimed such a right ; but assuming it to be so, that right must either exist or not. If it does, cadit qucestio. If it does not—if in a crisis which, as a Cabinet Minister has admitted, involves the greatest alteration in the Constitution which has occurred since the Revolution of 1688, and in the face of a measure in conflict with the recorded opinions of several
leading Members of the Government—if, under these circum- stances, the Lords challenge an appeal to the constituencies, then the Government—supposing them to be sincere in their desire to pass a beneficial measure—by accepting that chal- lenge, greatly strengthen their own position. By meeting the Lords with their own weapons, they show confidence in their own case, and should the appeal result in their favour, opposi- tion would be at an end. if, on the other hand, the appeal should go ap,ainst them, they would doubtless be thankful at having been saved from putting themselves in opposition to the will of the " Sovereign people." I have beard various reasons, more or less magnanimous, assigned to the " people " in the present demonstrations, from "the desire to secure the vote for our fellow men," down to the " big loaf;" but I now learn for the first time, that all that the demonstrators so eagerly demand is that they may not be appealed to in the legitimate way.
In conclusion, you say,—" If a struggle were precipitated by the craven concession of the Government that a Dissolution should take place when the Lords choose to demand one ;" the writer of your article " would certainly not think it worth his while to record his vote for the Liberal candidates."
So then, after all, the granting of the Franchie e, and all the disinterested desire to "ameliorate the condition of the masses," is a secondary consideration, the leading question, disguise it in what high-sounding phrases you will, is one of party tactics, in short, of pique. It is for this that the Government have ruthlessly cast away the entire work of a session ; have "raised the fiery cross" throughout the country ; and above all, have dared to sanction the appeal to the mob,—a proceed:ng for which they may, indeed, quote the precedent of tte Jacobins ninety years ago, but which, I think, they will find unprece- dented in the annals of English Constitutional Government.— [What has pique to do with the matter ? The Franchise Bill is a most important and beneficial Bill, but to carry it by making the Lords masters of the country, as they would be if they could compel Dissolutions at will, would be treachery to Liberalism.—En. Spectator.]
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