THE CONSTITUTIONAL DANGER.
[To ma EDITOR 07 UDR •.EPROTATOR.'1 Ent,—Mr. Gladstone, in his speech to his American sympathisers, appears to exult in the possibility of the Unionists being put in a minority of 80,000 votes at the next Election, instead of their retaining the majority, amounting to the same number of votes, which gave them power at the last. To me the idea of a funda- mental constitutional change being dependent on such a majority (in fact, on the shifting of a bare majority from side to side) is nothing less than terrifying and shocking. Surely it is as clear as anything can be that with a nation so evenly divided, no funda- mental change ought to be made.
Hitherto we have maintained our stability in two ways,—by taking historical institutions for granted, and by keeping active political power in the hands of a class the fundamental assump- tions of whose members were identical, however important might be the practical differences among them.
Neither of these safeguards any longer exists. Nothing is taken for granted, and there is no governing class. The Liberal leaders have taught their adherents to look upon the House of Lords as a contemptible assembly, existing only to be bullied and squeezed. The result is that that much-despised thing, a paper Constitution, alterable only by something much bigger than a bare majority, would be a godsend. Is it any longer
possible? To me it seems, at all events, more possible than any device of minority voting. A year or two ago, Mr. Goldwin Smith warned us that our problem was "to organise our democracy" in this sense. The counsel has been greatly enforced by what has happened since.—I am, Sir, Ac., 0.
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