. . ...' i
m
i I
THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
BY THE SAME AUTHOB.
PHYSICS AND POLITICS: or. Thousrhfs on the
Application of the Principles of " Natural Selection "
and " Inlieritance " to Politu-a! Society. Ninth Edition.
Crown Svo. Cloth, price 5*
LOMBARD STREET. A Description of the Money
Market Tenth Edition. Crown vo. Cloth, price
Is. 6d.
ESSAYS ON PARLIAMENTARY REFORM.
Crown Svo. Cloth, price 5.
SOME ARTICLES ON THE DEPRECIATION
OP SILVER, and Topics connected with it. Deiny
Svo. Price 5s.
LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TKUBNEK a (_o.| LrJJ
THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
BY
WALTER BAGEHOT.
SEVENTH EDJIIOS.
LONDON:
KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., Li?
1894
{The rights of translation and of reproduction are reserved-^
CONTENTS.
tat
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION ..... vii
No. L
TUB CABINET . . 1
No. II.
THE MONAECHY 83
No. III.
THE MONABCHY (continued') 67
No. IV.
THE HOUSE OF LORDS ........ 89
No. V.
THE HOUSE OP COMMONS ........ 130
No. VI.
ON CHANGES OF MINISTRY .** 176
VI CONTENTS.
No. VII.
ITS SUPPOSED CHECKS AND BALANCES . . . 21l
No. VIII.
THE PRE-REQUISITES OF CABINET GOVERNMENT, AND THE
PECULIAR FORM WHICH THEY HAVE ASSUMED IN ENGLAND 254
No. IX.
ITS HISTORY, AND THE EFFECTS OF THAT HISTORY. CON-
CLUSION * 272
INTRODUCTION-
EDITION.
THERE is a great difficulty in the way of a vriter who
attempts to sketch a living Constitution a Constitution
that is in actual work and power. The difficulty is that
the object is in constant change. An historical writer
does not feel this difficulty : he deals only with the past ;
he can say definitely, the Constitution worked in such and
such a manner in the year at which he begins, and in a
manner in such and such respects different in the year
at which he ends ; he begins with a definite point of time
and ends with one also. But a contemporary writer who
tries to paint what is before him is puzzled and perplexed;
what he sees is changing daily. He must paint it as it
stood at some one time, or else he will be putting side by
side in his representations things which never were con-
temporaneous in reality. The difficulty is the greater
because a writer who deals with a living government
Vlll INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
naturally compares it with the most important other
living governments, and these are changing too ; what he
illustrates are altered in one way, and his sources of
illustration are altered probably in a different way. This
difficulty has been constantly in my way in preparing a
second edition of this book. It describes the English
Constitution as it stood in the years 1865 and 1866.
Roughly speaking, it describes its working as it was in
the time of Lord Palrnerston ; and since that time there
have been many changes, some of spirit and some of
detail In so short a period there have rarely been more
changes. If I had given a sketch of the Palmerston time
as a sketch of the present time, it would have been in
many points untrue; and if I had tried to change the
sketch of seven years since into a sketch of the present
time. I should probably have blurred the picture and
have given something equally unlike both.
The best plan in such a case is, I think, to keep the
original sketch in all essentials as it was at first written,
and to describe shortly such changes either in the Consti-
tution itself, or in the Constitutions compared with it, as
seem material. There are in this book various ex-
pressions which allude to persons who were living and to
events which were happening when it first appeared ;
and I have carefully preserved these. They will serve
to warn the reader what time he is reading about, and to
prevent his mistaking the date at which the likeness
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. ix
was attempted to be taken. I proceed to speak of the
changes which have taken place either in the Con-
stitution itself or in the competing institutions which
illustrate it.
It is too soon as yet to attempt to estimate the effect
of the Reform Act of 1867. The people enfranchised
under it do not yet know their own power; a single
election, so far from teaching us how they will use that
power, has not been even enough to explain to them that
they have such power. The Reform Act of 1832 did not
for many years disclose its real consequences; a writer
in 1836, whether he approved or disapproved of them,
whether he thought too little of or whether he exagge-
rated them, would have been sure to be mistaken in
them. A new Constitution does not produce its full
effect as long as all its subjects were reared under an old
Constitution, as long as its statesmen were trained by
that old Constitution. It is not really tested till it comes
to be worked by statesmen and among a people neither
of whom are guided by a different experience.
In one respect we are indeed particularly likely to be
mistaken as to the effect of the last Reform Bill. Un-
deniably there has lately been a great change in our.
politics. It is commonly said that " there is not a brick
of the Palmerston House standing." The change since
1865 is a change not in one point but in a thousand
points ; it is a change not of particular details but of per-
X INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
vading spirit. We are now quarrelling as to the minor
details of an Education Act ; in Lord Palmerston's time
no such Act could have passed. In Lord Palmerston's
time Sir George Grey said that the disestablishment of
the Irish Church would be an "act of Revolution;" it
has now been disestablished by great majorities, with Sir
George Grey himself assenting. A new world has arisen
which is not as the old world ; and we naturally ascribe
the change to the Reform Act. But this is a complete
mistake. If there had been no Reform Act at all there
would, nevertheless, have been a great change in English
politics. There has been a change of the sort which,
above all, generates other changes a change of genera-
tion. Generally one generation in politics succeeds
another almost silently; at every moment men of all
ages between thirty and seventy have considerable in-
fluence; each year removes many old men, makes all
others older, brings in many new. The transition is so
gradual that we hardly perceive it. The board of
directors of the political company has a few slight
changes every year, and therefore the shareholders are
conscious of no abrupt change. But sometimes there
is an abrupt change. It occasionally happens that
several ruling directors who are about the same age
live on for many years, manage the company all
through those years, and then go off the scene almost
together. In that case the affairs of the company are
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
apt to alter much, for good or for evil; sometimes
it becomes more successful, sometimes it is ruined, but
it hardly ever stays as it was. Something like this
happened before 1865. AIL through the period between
1832 and 1865, the pre-'32 statesmen if I may so call
them Lord Derby, Lord Russell, Lord Palmerston, re-
tained great power. Lord Palmerston to the last retained
great prohibitive power. Though in some ways always
young, he had not a particle of sympathy with the
younger generation ; he brought forward no young men ;
he obstructed all that young men wished. In con-
sequence, at his death a new generation all at once
started into life ; the pre-'32 all at once died out. Most
of the new politicians were men who might well have
been Lord Palme rston's grandchildren. He came into
Parliament in 1806, they entered it after 1856. Such
an enormous change in the age of the workers necessarily
caused a great change in the kind of work attempted
and the way in which it was done. What we call the
" spirit " of politics is more surely changed by a change
of generation in the men than by any other change
whatever. Even if there had been no Reform Act, this
single cause would have effected grave alterations.
The mere settlement of the Reform question made a
great change too. If it could have been settled by any
other change, or even without any change, the instant
effect of the settlement would still have been immense.
b
xii INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
New questions would have appeared at once. A political
country is like an American forest : you have only to cut
down the old trees, and immediately new trees come up
to replace them ; the seeds were waiting in the ground,
and they began to grow as soon as the withdrawal of the
old ones brought in light and air. These new questions
of themselves would have made a new atmosphere, new
parties, new debates.
Of course I am not arguing that so important an in-
novation as the Reform Act of 1867 will not have very
great effects. It must, in all likelihood, have many great
ones. I am only saying that as yet we do not know what
those effects are; that the great evident change since
1865 is certainly not strictly due to it ; probably is not
even in a principal measure due to it ; that we have still to
conjecture what it will cause and what it will not cause.
The principal question arises most naturally from a
main doctrine of these essays. I have said that cabinet
government is possible in England because England was
a deferential country. I meant that the nominal consti-
tuency was not the real constituency ; that the mass of
the " ten-pound " householders did not really form their
own opinions, and did not exact of their representatives
an obedience to those opinions ; that they were in fact
guided in their judgment by the better educated classes ;
that they preferred representatives from those classes, and
gave those representatives much license. If a hundred
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Xlii
small shopkeepers had by miracle been added to any of
the '32 Parliaments, they would have felt outcasts there.
Nothing could be more unlike those Parliaments than
the average mass of the constituency from which they
were chosen.
I do not of course mean that the ten-pound house-
holders were great admirers of intellect or good judges of
refinement. We all know that, for the most part, they
were not so at all : very few Englishmen are. They were
not influenced by ideas, but by facts; not by things
palpable, but by things impalpable. Not to put too fine
a point upon it, they were influenced by rank and
wealth. No doubt the better sort of them believed that
those who were superior to them in these indisputable
respects were superior also in the more intangible quali-
ties of sense and knowledge. But the mass of the old
electors did not analyse very much : they liked to have
one of their " betters " to represent them ; if he was rich,
they respected him much; and if he was a lord, they
liked him the better. The issue put before these electors
was which of two rich people will you choose ? And
each of those rich people was put forward by great
parties whose notions were the notions of the rich whose
plans were their plans. The electors only selected one or
two wealthy men to carry out the schemes of one or two
wealthy associations.
So fully was this so, that the class to whom the great
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
body of the ten-pound householders belonged the lower"
middle class was above all classes the one most hardly
treated in the imposition of the taxes, A small shop-
keeper, or a clerk who just, and only just, was rich
enough to pay income tax, was perhaps the only severely-
taxed man in the country. He paid the rates, the tea,
sugar, tobacco, malt, and spirit taxes, as well as the in-
come tax, but his means were exceedingly small. Curiously
enough the class which in theory was omnipotent, was the
only class financially ill-treated. Throughout the history
of our former Parliaments the constituency could no
more have originated the policy which those Parliaments
selected than they could have made the solar system.
As I have endeavoured to show in this volume, the
deference of the old electors to their betters was the only
way in which our old system could be maintained. No
doubt countries can be imagined in which the mass of
the electors would be thoroughly competent to form good
opinions; approximations to that state happily exist. But
such was not the state of the minor English shopkeepers.
They were just competent to make a selection between
two sets of superior ideas ; or rather for the conceptions
of such people are more personal than abstract between
two opposing parties, each professing a creed of such
ideas. But they could do no more. Their own notions,
if they had been cross-examined upon them, would have
been, found always most confused and often most foolish.
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XV
They were competent to decide an issue selected by the
higher classes, but they were incompetent to do more.
The grave question now is, How far will this peculiar
old system continue and how far will it be altered ? I
am afraid I must put aside at once the idea that it will
be altered entirely and altered for the better. I cannot
expect that the new class of voters will be at all more
able to form sound opinions on complex questions than
the old voters. There was indeed an idea a very
prevalent idea when the first edition of this book was
published that there then was an unrepresented class
of skilled artizans who could form superior opinions on
national matters, and ought to have the means of ex-
pressing them. We used to frame elaborate schemes to
give them such means. But the Keform Act of 1867 did
not stop at skilled labour; it enfranchised unskilled
labour too. And no one will contend that the ordinary
working man who has no special skill, and who is only
rated because he has a house, can judge much of intel-
lectual matters. The messenger in an office is not more
intelligent than the clerks, not better educated, but,
worse ; and yet the messenger is probably a very superior
specimen of the newly enfranchised classes. The average
can only earn very scanty wages by coarse labour. They
have no time to improve themselves, for they are labour-
ing the whole day through; and their early education
was so small that in most cases it is dubious whether
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
even if they had much time, they could use it to good
purpose. We have not enfranchised a class less needing
to be guided by their betters than the old class ; on the
contrary, the new class need it more than the old. The
real question is, Will they submit to it, will they defer
in the same way to wealth and rank, and to the higher
qualities of which these are the rough symbols and the
common accompaniments ?
There is a peculiar difficulty in answering this ques-
tion. Generally, the debates upon the passing of an Act
contain much valuable instruction as to what may be ex-
pected of it. But the debates on the Reform Act of 1867
hardly tell anything. They are taken up with techni-
calities as to the ratepayers and the compound house-
holder. Nobody in the country knew what was being
done. I happened at the time to visit a purely agricul-
tural and conservative county, and I asked the local
Tories, " Do you understand this Reform Bill ? Do you
know that your Conservative Government has brought
in a Bill far more Radical than any former Bill, and that
it is very likely to be passed ? " The answer I got
was, " What stuff you talk ! How can it be a Radical
Reform Bill ? Why, Bright opposes it 1 " There was no
answering that in a way which a " common jury " could
understand. The Bill was supported by the Times and
opposed by Mr. Bright; and therefore the mass of the
Conservatives and of common moderate people, without
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XVU
distinction of party, had no conception of the effect.
They said it was "London nonsense" if you tried to
explain it to them. The nation indeed generally looks
to the discussions in Parliament to enlighten it as to the
effect of Bills. But in this case neither party, as a party,
could speak out. Many, perhaps most of the intelligent
Conservatives, were fearful of the consequences of the
proposal ; but as it was made by the heads of their own
party, they did not like to oppose it, and the discipline
of party carried them with it. On the other side, many,
probably most of the intelligent Liberals, were in conster-
nation at the Bill ; they had been in the habit for years
of proposing Reform Bills ; they knew the points of
difference between each Bill, and perceived that this was
by far the most sweeping which had ever been proposed
by any Ministry. But they were almost all unwilling to
say so. They would have offended a large section in
their constituencies if they had resisted a Tory Bill
because it was too democratic ; the extreme partizans of
democracy would have said, " The enemies of the people
have confidence enough in the people to entrust them
with this power, but you, a 'Liberal,' and a professed
friend of the people, have not that confidence ; if that is
so, we will never vote for you again." Many Radical
members who had been asking for years for household
suffrage were much more surprised than pleased at the
near chance of obtaining it; they had asked for it as
XV111 INTKODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
bargainers ask for the highest possible price, but they
never expected to get it. Altogether the Liberals, or at
least the extreme Liberals, were much like a man who
has been pushing hard against an opposing door, till, on
a sudden, the door opens, the resistance ceases, and he is
thrown violently forward. Persons in such an un-
pleasant predicament can scarcely criticise effectually,
and certainly the Liberals did not so criticise. We have
had no such previous discussions as should guide our
expectations from the Reform Bill, nor such as under
ordinary circumstances we should have had.
Nor does the experience of the last election much help
us. The circumstances were too exceptional In the first
place, Mr. Gladstone's personal popularity was such as
has not been seen since the time of Mr. Pitt, and such as
may never be seen again. Certainly it will very rarely
be seen. A bad speaker is said to have been asked how
he got on as a candidate. " Oh," he answered, " when I
do not know what to say, I say 'Gladstone/ and then
they are sure to cheer, and I have time to think." In
fact, that popularity acted as a guide both to consti-
tuencies and to members. The candidates only said they
would vote with Mr. Gladstone, and the constituencies
only chose those who said so. Even the minority could
only be described as anti-Gladstone, just as the majority
could only be described as pro-Gladstone. The remains,
too, of the old electoral organisation were exceedingly
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. xix
powerful ; the old voters voted as they had been told, and
the new voters mostly voted with them. In extremely
few cases was there any new and contrary organisation.
At the last election, the trial of the new system hardly
began, and, as far as it did begin, it was favoured by a
peculiar guidance.
In the mean time our statesmen have the greatest
opportunities they have had for many years, and likewise
the greatest duty. They have to guide the new voters in
the exercise of the franchise ; to guide them quietly, and
without saying what they are doing, but still to guide
them. The leading statesmen in a free country have
great momentary power. They settle the conversation of
mankind. It is they who, by a great speech or two,
determine what shall be said and what shall be written
for long after. They, in conjunction with their coun-
sellors, settle the programme of their party the "plat-
form," as the Americans call it, on which they and those
associated with them are to take their stand for the
political campaign. It is by that programme, by a com-
parison of the programmes of different statesmen, that
the world forms its judgment. The common ordinary
mind is quite unfit to fix for itself what political ques-
tion it shall attend to ; it is as much as it can do to
judge decently of the questions which drift down to it,
and are brought before it; it almost never settles its
topics ; it can only decide upon the issues of those topics.
XX INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
And in settling what these questions shall be, statesmen
have now especially a great responsibility if they raise
questions which will excite the lower orders of mankind ,
if they raise questions on which those orders are likely to
be wrong ; if they raise questions on which the interest
of those orders is not identical with, or is antagonistic to,
the whole interest of the State, they will have done the
greatest harm they can do. The future of this country
depends on the happy working of a delicate experiment,
and they will have done all they could to vitiate that
experiment. Just when it is desirable that ignorant
men, new to politics, should have good issues, and only
good issues, put before them, these statesmen will have
suggested bad issues. They will have suggested topics
which will bind the poor as a class together; topics
which will excite them against the rich ; topics the dis-
cussion of which in the only form in which that discus-
sion reaches their ear will be to make them think that
some new law can make them comfortable that it is
the present law which makes them uncomfortable that
Government has at its disposal an inexhaustible fund out
of which it can give to those who now want without also
creating elsewhere other and greater wants. If the first
work of the poor voters is to try to create a " poor man's
paradise," as poor men are apt to fancy that Paradise,
and as they are apt to think they can create it, the great
political trial now beginning will simply fail. The wide
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
gift of the elective franchise will be a great calamity to
the whole nation, and to those who gain it as great a
calamity as to any.
I do not of course mean that statesmen can choose
with absolute freedom what topics they will deal with
and what they will not. I am of course aware that they
choose under stringent conditions. In excited states of
the public mind they have scarcely a discretion at all;
the tendency of the public perturbation determines what
shall and what shall not be dealt with. But, upon the
other hand, in quiet times statesmen have great power ;
when there is no fire lighted, they can settle what fire
shall be lit. And as the new suffrage is happily to be
tried in a quiet time, the responsibility of our statesmen
is great because their power is great too.
And the mode in which the questions dealt with are
discussed is almost as important as the selection of these
questions. It is for our principal statesmen to lead the
public, and not to let the public lead them. No doubt
when statesmen live by public favour, as ours do, this is
a hard saying, and it requires to be carefully limited. I
do not mean that our statesmen should assume a pedantic
and doctrinaire tone with the English people ; if there is
anything which English people thoroughly detest, it is
that tone exactly. And they are right in detesting it ;
if a man cannot give guidance and communicate instruc-
tion formally without telling his audience " I am better
XX11 INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
than you ; I have studied this as you have not," then he
is not fit for a guide or an instructor. A statesman who
should show that gauchei^ie would exhibit a defect of
imagination, and expose an incapacity for dealing with
men which would be a great hindrance to him in his
calling. But much argument is not required to guide
the public, still less a formal exposition of that argument.
What is mostly needed is the manly utterance of clear
conclusions ; if a statesman gives these in a felicitous way
(and if with a few light and humorous illustrations, so
much the better), he has done his part. He will have
given the text, the scribes in the newspapers will write
the sermon. A statesman ought to show his own nature,
and talk in a palpable way what is to him important
truth. And so he will both guide and benefit the nation.
But if, especially at a time when great ignorance has an
unusual power in public affairs, he chooses to accept and
reiterate the decisions of that ignorance, he is only the
hireling of the nation, and does little save hurt it.
I shall be told that this is very obvious, and that
everybody knows that 2 and 2 make 4, and that there
is no use in inculcating it. But I answer that the lesson
is not observed in fact; people do not do their political
sums so. Of all our political dangers, the greatest I
conceive is that they will neglect the lesson. In plain
English, what I fear is that both our political parties
will bid for the support of the working man ; that both
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XX111
of them -will promise to do as lie likes if he will only tell
them what it is ; that, as he now holds the casting vote
in our affairs, both parties will beg and pray him to give
that vote to them. I can conceive of nothing more
corrupting or worse for a set of poor ignorant people
than that two combinations of well-taught and rich men
should constantly offer to defer to their decision, and
compete for the office of executing it Vox populi will
be Vox didboli if it is worked in that manner.
And, on the other hand, my imagination conjures up
a contrary danger. I can conceive that questions being
raised which, if continually agitated, would combine the
working men as a class together, the higher orders might
have to consider whether they would concede the measure
that would settle such questions, or whether they would
risk the effect of the working men's combination.
No doubt the question cannot be easily discussed in
the abstract; much must depend on the nature of the
measures in each particular case ; on the evil they would
cause if conceded ; on the attractiveness of their idea to
the working classes if refused. But in all cases it must
be remembered that a political combination of the lower
classes, as such and for their own objects, is an evil of
the first magnitude; that a permanent combination of
them would make them (now that so many of them have
the suffrage) supreme in the country; and that their
supremacy, in the state they now are means the su^re-
Xxiv INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
macy of ignorance over instruction and of numbers over
knowledge. So long as they are not taught to act
together, there is a chance of this being averted, and
it can only be averted by the greatest wisdom and the
greatest foresight in the higher classes. They must
avoid, not only every evil, but every appearance of evil ;
while they have still the power they must remove, not
only every actual grievance, but, where it is possible,
every seeming grievance too ; they must willingly concede
every claim which they can safely concede, in order that
they may not have to concede unwillingly some claim
which would impair the safety of the country.
This advice, too, will be said to be obvious; but I
have the greatest fear that, when the time comes, it will
be cast aside as timid and cowardly. So strong are the
combative propensities of man that he would rather fight
a losing battle than not fight at all It is most difficult
to persuade people that by fighting they may strengthen
the enemy, yet that would be so here; since a losing
battle especially a long and well-fought one would
have thoroughly taught the lower orders to combine, and
would have left the higher orders face to face with an
irritated, organized, and superior voting power. The
courage which strengthens an enemy and which so loses,
not only the present battle, but many after battles, is a
heavy curse to men and nations.
In one minor respect, indeed, I think we may see
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXV
with distinctness the effect of the Reform Bill of 1867.
I think it has completed one change which the Act of
1832 began; it has completed the change which that
Act made in the relation of the House of Lords to the
House of Commons. As I have endeavoured in this book
to explain, the literary theory of the English Constitu-
tion is on this point quite wrong as usual According to
that theory, the two Houses are two branches of the
Legislature, perfectly equal and perfectly distinct. But
before the Act of 1832 they were not so distinct; there
was a very large and a very strong common element.
By their commanding influence in many boroughs and
counties the Lords nominated a considerable part of the
Commons ; the majority of the other part were the richer
gentry men in most respects like the Lords, and sympa-
thising with the Lords. Under the Constitution as it
then was the two Houses were not in their essence
distinct ; they were in their essence similar ; they were,
in the main, not Houses of contrasted origin, but Houses
of like origin. The predominant part of both was taken
from the same class from the English gentry, titled and
tintitled. By the Act of 1832 this was much altered.
The aristocracy and the gentry lost their predominance
in the House of Commons ; that predominance passed to
the middle class. The two Houses then became distinct,
but then they ceased to be co-equal. The Duke of
Wellington, in a most remarkable paper, has explained
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
what pains he took to induce the Lords to submit to
their new position, and to submit, time after time, their
will to the will of the Commons.
The Reform Act of 1867 has, I think, unmistakably
completed the effect which the Act of 1832 began, but
left unfinished. The middle class element has gained
greatly by the second change, and the aristocratic element
has lost greatly. If you examine carefully the lists of
members, especially of the most prominent members, of
either side of the House, you will not find that they are
in general aristocratic names. Considering the power
and position of the titled aristocracy, you will perhaps
be astonished at the small degree in which it contributes
to the active part of our governing assembly. The spirit
of our present House of Commons is plutocratic, not
aristocratic ; its most prominent statesmen are not men
of ancient descent or of great hereditary estate; they
are men mostly of substantial means, but they are mostly,
too, connected more or less closely with the new trading
wealth. The spirit of the two Assemblies has become far
more contrasted than it ever was.
The full effect of the Reform Act of 1832 was indeed
postponed by the cause which I mentioned just now.
The statesmen who worked the system which was put up
had themselves been educated under the system which
was pulled down. Strangely enough, their predominant
guidance lasted as long as the system which they created.
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXvii
Lord Palmerston, Lord Russell, Lord Derby, died or else
lost their influence within a year or two of 1867. The
complete consequences of the Act of 1832 upon the
House of Lords could not be seen while the Commons
were subject to such aristocratic guidance. Much of the
change which might have been expected from the Act of
1832 was held in suspense, and did not begin till that
measure had been followed by another of similar and
greater power.
The work which the Duke of Wellington in part
performed has now, therefore, to be completed also.
He met the half difficulty; we have to surmount the
whole one. We have to frame such tacit rules, to
establish such ruling but unenacted customs, as will
make the House of Lords yield to the Commons when
and as often as our new Constitution requires that it
should yield. I shall be asked, How often is that, and
what is the test by which you know it ?
I answer that the House of Lords must yield when-
ever the opinion of the Commons is also the opinion of
the nation, and when it is clear that the nation has made
up its mind. Whether or not the nation has made up its
mind is a question to be decided by all the circumstances
of the case, and in the common way in which all practical
questions are decided. There are some people who lay
down a sort of mechanical test : they say the House of
Lords should be at liberty to reject a measure passed by
XXV111 INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
the Commons once or more, and then if the Commons
send it up again and again, infer that the nation is
determined. But no important practical question in real
life can be uniformly settled by a fixed and formal rule
in this way. This rule would prove that the Lords
might have rejected the Reform Act of 1832. Whenever
the nation was both excited and determined, such a rule
would be an acute and dangerous political poison. It
would teach the House of Lords that it might shut its
eyes to all the facts of real life and decide simply by an
abstract formula. If in 1832 the Lords had so acted,
there would have been a revolution. Undoubtedly there
is a general truth in the rule. Whether a Bill has come
up once only, or whether it has coxie up several times, is
one important fact in judging whether the nation is
determined to have that measure enacted; it is an
indication, but it is only one of the indications. There
are others equally decisive. The unanimous voice of the
people may be so strong, and may be conveyed through
so many organs, that it may be assumed to be lasting.
Englishmen are so very miscellaneous, that that which
has really convinced a great and varied majority of them
for the present may fairly be assumed to be likely to
continue permanently to convince them. One sort might
easily fall into a temporary and erroneous fanaticism, but
all sorts simultaneously are very unlikely to do so.
T should venture so far as to lay down, for an approxi-
INTKODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXIX
mate rule, that the House of Lords ought, on a first-class
subject, to be slow very slow in rejecting a Bill passed
even once by a large majority of the House of Commons.
I would not of course lay this down as an unvarying
rule; as I have said, I have for practical purposes no
belief in unvarying rules. Majorities may be either
genuine or fictitious, and if they are not genuine, if they
do not embody the opinion of the representative as well
as the opinion of the constituency, no one would wish to
have any attention paid to them. But if the opinion of
the nation be strong and be universal, if it be really
believed by members of Parliament, as well as by those
who send them to Parliament, in my judgment the Lords
should yield at once, and should not resist it.
My main reason is one which has not been much
urged. As a theoretical writer I can venture to say,
what no elected member of Parliament, Conservative or
Liberal, can venture to say, that I am exceedingly afraid
of the ignorant multitude of the new constituencies. I
wish to have as great and as compact a power as possible
to resist it. But a dissension between the Lords and
Commons divides that resisting power; as I have ex-
plained, the House of Commons still mainly represents
the plutocracy, the Lords represent the aristocracy. The
main interest of both these classes is now identical,
which is to prevent or to mitigate the rule of une Jucatea
members. But to prevent it effectually, they must not
XXX INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION".
quarrel among themselves; they must not bid one
against the other for the aid of their common opponent.
And this is precisely the effect of a division between
Lords and Commons. The two great bodies of the
educated rich go to the constituencies to decide between
them, and the majority of the constituencies now consist
of the uneducated poor. This cannot be for the advan-
tage of any one.
In doing so besides the aristocracy forfeit their
natural position that by which they would gain most
power, and in which they would do most good. They
ought to be the heads of the plutocracy. In all countries
new wealth is ready to worship old wealth, if old wealth
will only let it, and I need not say that in England new
wealth is eager in its worship. Satirist after satirist
has told us how quick, how willing, how anxious are the
newly-made rich to associate with the ancient rich.
Rank probably in no country whatever has so much
"market" value as it has in England just now. Of
course there have been many countries in which certain
old families, whether rich or poor, were worshipped by
whole populations with a more intense and poetic
homage; but I doubt if there has ever been any in
which all old families and all titled families received
more ready observance from those who were their equals,
perhaps their superiors, in wealth, their equals in culture,
and their inferiors only in descent and rank. The
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXxi
possessors of the " material " distinctions of life, as a poli-
tical economist would class them, rush to worship those
who possess the immaterial distinctions. Nothing can be
more politically useful than such homage, if it be skil-
fully used ; no folly can be idler than to repel and reject it.
The worship is the more politically important because
it is the worship of the political superior for the political
inferior. At an election the non-titled are much more
powerful than the titled. Certain individual peers have,
from their great possessions, great electioneering in
fluence, but, as a whole, the House of Peers is not a
principal electioneering force. It has so many poor men
inside it, and so many rich men outside it, that its
electioneering value is impaired. Besides, it is in the
nature of the curious influence of rank to work much
more on men singly than on men collectively; it is an
influence which most men at least most Englishmen
feel very much, but of which most Englishmen are
somewhat ashamed. Accordingly, when any number
of men are collected together, each of whom worships
rank in his heart, the whole body will patiently hear
in many cases will cheer and approve some rather
strong speeches against rank. Each man is a little afraid
that his " sneaking kindness for a lord," as Mr. Gladstone
put it, be found out ; he is not sure how far that weakness
is shared by those around him. And thus Englishmen
easily find themselves committed to anti-aristocratic
XXX11 INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
sentiments which are the direct opposite of their real
feeling, and their collective action may be bitterly
hostile to rank while the secret sentiment of each
separately is especially favourable to rank. In 1 832 the
close boroughs, which were largely held by peers, and
were still more largely supposed to be held by them,
were swept away with a tumult of delight; and in
another similar time of great excitement, the Lords
themselves, if they deserve it, might pass away. The
democratic passions gain by fomenting a diffused excite-
ment, and by massing men in concourses ; the aristocratic
sentiments gain by calm and quiet, and act most on men
by themselves, in their families, and when female in-
fluence is not absent. The overt electioneering power
of the Lords does not at all equal its real social power.
The English plutocracy, as is often said of something yet
coarser, must be "humoured, not drove;" they may
easily be impelled against the aristocracy, though they
respect it very much; and as they are much stronger
than the aristocracy, they might, if angered, even destroy
it; though in order to destroy it, they must help to
arouse a wild excitement among the ignorant poor,
which, if once roused, may not be easily calmed, and
which may be fatal to far more than its beginners intend.
This is the explanation of the anomaly which puzzles
many clever lords. They think, if they do not say,
" Why are we pinned up here ? Wnv are we not in the
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXX111
Commons where we could have so much more power ?
Why is this nominal rank given us, at the price of
substantial influence? If we prefer real weight to
unreal prestige, why may we not have it ? " The reply
is, that the whole body of the Lords have an incalculably
greater influence over society while there is still a House
of Lords, than they would have if the House of Lords were
abolished ; and that though one or two clever young peers
might do better in the Commons, the old order of peers,
young and old, clever and not clever, is much better
where it is. The selfish instinct of the mass of peers
on this point is a keener and more exact judge of the real
world than the fine intelligence of one or two of them.
If the House of Peers ever goes, it will go in a storm,
and the storm will not leave all else as it is. It will not
destroy the House of Peers and leave the rich young
peers, with their wealth and their titles, to sit in the
Commons. It would probably sweep all titles before it
at least all legal titles and somehow or other it would
break up the curious system by which the estates of
great families all go to the eldest son. That system is a
very artificial one; you may make a fine argument for
it, but you cannot make a loud argument, an argument
which would reach and rule the multitude. The thing
looks like injustice, and in a time of popular passion it
would not stand. Much short of the compulsory equal
division of the Code Napoleon, stringent clauses might
XXXIV INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
be provided to obstruct and prevent these great aggrega-
tions of property. Few things certainly are less likely
than a violent tempest like this to destroy large and
hereditary estates. But then, too, few things are less
likely than an outbreak to destroy the House of Lords'
my point is, that a catastrophe which levels one will not
spare the other.
I conceive, therefore, that the great power of the
House of Lords should be exercised very timidly and
very cautiously. For the sake of keeping the headship
of the plutocracy, and through that of the nation, they
should not offend the plutocracy ; the points upon which
they have to yield are mostly very minor ones, and they
should yield many great points rather than risk the
bottom of their power. They should give large donations
out of income, if by so doing they keep, as they would
keep, their capital intact. The Duke of Wellington
guided the House of Lords in this manner for years, and
nothing could prosper better for them or for the country,
and the Lords have only to go back to the good path in
which he directed them.
The events of 1870 caused much discussion upon life
peerages, and we have gained this great step, that
whereas the former leader of the Tory party in the
Lords Lord Lyndhurst defeated the last proposal to
make life peers, Lord Derby, when leader of that party,
desired to create them. As I have given in this book
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXXV
what seemed to me good reasons for making them, I
need not repeat those reasons here ; I need only say how
the notion stands in my judgment now.
I cannot look on life peerages in the way in which
some of their strongest advocates regard them ; I cannot
think of them as a mode in which a permanent opposi-
tion or a contrast between the Houses of Lords and
Commons is to be remedied. To be effectual in that way,
life peerages must be very numerous. Now the House of
Lords will never consent to a very numerous life peerage
without a storm ; they must be in terror to do it, or they
will not do it. And if the storm blows strongly enough
to do so much, in all likelihood it will blow strongly
enough to do much more. If the revolution is powerful
enough and eager enough to make an immense number
of life peers, probably it will sweep away the hereditary
principle in the Upper Chamber entirely. Of course one
may fancy it to be otherwise; we may conceive of a
political storm just going to a life peerage limit, and then
stopping suddenly. But in politics we must not trouble
ourselves with exceedingly exceptional accidents; it is
quite difficult enough to count on and provide for the
regular and plain probabilities. To speak mathemati-
cally, we may easily miss the permanent course of the
political curve if we engross our minds with its cusps
and conjugate points.
Nor, on the other hand, can I sympathise with the
XXXVI 1NTKODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
objection to life peerages which some of the Radical party
take and feeL They think it will strengthen the Lords,
and so make them better able to oppose the Commons ;
they think, if they do not say, " The House of Lords is
our enemy and that of all Liberals ; happily the mass of
it is not intellectual; a few clever men are born there
which we cannot help, but we will not ' vaccinate ' it with
genius ; we will not put in a set of clever men for their
lives who may as likely as not turn against us." This
objection assumes that clever peers are just as likely to
oppose the Commons as stupid peers. But this I deny.
Most clever men who are in such a good place as the
House of Lords plainly is, will be very unwilling to lose
it if they can help it ; at the clear call of a great duty
they might lose it, but only at such a call. And it does
not take a clever man to see that systematic opposition
of the Commons is the only thing which can endanger
the Lords, or which will make an individual peer cease
to be a peer. The greater you make the sense of the
Lords, the more they will see that their plain interest is
to make friends of the plutocracy, and to be the chiefs of
it, and not to wish to oppose the Commons where that
plutocracy rules.
It is true that a completely new House of Lords,
mainly composed of men of ability, selected because they
were able, might very likely attempt to make ability the
predominant power in the State, and to rival, if not con-
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXXV11
quer, the House of Commons, where the standard of
intelligence is not much above the common English
average. But in the present English world such a House
of Lords would soon lose all influence. People would
say, " it was too clever by half," and in an Englishman's
mouth that means a very severe censure. The English
people would think it grossly anomalous if their elected
assembly of rich men were thwarted by a nominated
assembly of talkers and writers. Sensible men of sub-
stantial means are what we wish to be ruled by, and a
peerage of genius would not compare with it in power.
It is true, too, that at present some of the cleverest
peers are not so ready as some others to agree with the
Commons. But it is not unnatural that persons of high
rank and of great ability should be unwilling to bend
to persons of lower rank, and of certainly not greater
ability. A few of such peers (for they are very few)
might say, " We had rather not have our peerage if we
are to buy it at the price of yielding." But a life peer
who had fought his way up to the peers, would never
think so. Young men who are born to rank may risk it,
not middle-aged or old men who have earned their rank.
A moderate number of life peers would almost always
counsel moderation to the Lords, and would almost
always be right in counselling it.
Recent discussions have also brought into curious
prominence another part of the Constitution. I said in
XXXviii INTKODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
this book that it would very much surprise people if
they were only told how many things the Queen could
do without consulting Parliament, and it certainly has so
proved, for when the Queen abolished Purchase in the
Army by an act of prerogative (after the Lords had
rejected the bill for doing so), there was a great and
general astonishment.
But this is nothing to what the Queen can by law do
without consulting Parliament. Not to mention other
things, she could disband the army (by law she cannot
engage more than a certain number of men, but she is
not obliged to engage any men); she could dismiss all
the officers, from the General Comrnanding-in-Chief
downwards; she could dismiss all the sailors too; she
could sell off all our ships of war and all our naval
stores ; she could make a peace by the sacrifice of Corn-
wall, and begin a war for the conquest of Brittany. She
could make every citizen in the United Kingdom, male
or female, a peer; she could make every parish in the
United Kingdom a " university ; " she could dismiss most
of the civil servants ; she could pardon all offenders. In
a word, the Queen could by prerogative upset all the
action of civil government within the government, could
disgrace the nation by a bad war or peace, and could,
by disbanding our forces, whether land or sea, leave us
defenceless against foreign nations. Why do we not
fear that she would do this, or any approach to it ?
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXXIX,
Because there are two checks one ancient and coarse,
the other modern and delicate. The first is the check of
impeachment. Any Minister who advised the Queen so
to use her prerogative as to endanger the safety of the
realm, might be impeached for high treason, and would
be so. Such a minister would, in our technical law, be
said to have levied, or aided to levy, " war against the
Queen." This counsel to her so to use her prerogative
would by the Judge be declared to be an act of violence
against herself, and in that peculiar but effectual way
the offender could be condemned and executed. Against
all gross excesses of the prerogative this is a sufficient
protection. But it would be no protection against minor
mistakes ; any error of judgment committed bond fide,
and only entailing consequences which one person might
say were good, and another say were bad, could not be
so punished. It would be possible to impeach any
Minister who disbanded the Queen's army, and it would
be done for certain. But suppose a Minister were to
reduce the army or the navy much below the con-
templated strength suppose he were only to spend upon
them one-third of the amount which Parliament had per-
mitted him to spend suppose a Minister of Lord Palmer-
ston's principles were suddenly and while in office con-
verted to the principles of Mr. Bright and Mr. Cobden,
and were to act on those principles, he could not be im-
peached. The law of treason neither could nor ought to
xl INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
be enforced against an act which was an error of judg-
ment not of intention which was in good faith intended
not to impair the well-being of the State, but to promote
and augment it. Against such misuses of the prerogative
our remedy is a change of Ministry. And in general this
works very well. Every Minister looks long before he
incurs that penalty, and no one incurs it wantonly. But,
nevertheless, there are two defects in it. The first is that
it may not be a remedy at all ; it may be only a punish-
ment. A Minister may risk his dismissal; he may do
some act difficult to undo, and then all which may be left
will be to remove and censure him. And the second is
that it is only one House of Parliament which has much
to say to this remedy, such as it is; the House of
Commons only can remove a Minister by a vote of
censure. Most of the Ministries for thirty years have
never possessed the confidence of the Lords, and in such
cases a vote of censure by the Lords could therefore have
but little weight; it would be simply the particular
expression of a general political disapproval. It would
be like a vote of censure on a Liberal Government by
the Carlton, or on a Tory Government by the Keform
Club. Aoid in no case has an adverse vote by the Lords
the same decisive effect as a vote of the Commons ; the
Lower House is the ruling and the choosing House, and
if a Government really possesses that, it thoroughly pos-
sesses nine-tenths of what it requires. The support of
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. xli
the Lords is an aid and a luxury ; that of the Commons
is a strict and indispensable necessary.
These difficulties are particularly raised by questions
of foreign policy. On most domestic subjects, either
custom or legislation has limited the use of the pre-
rogative. The mode of governing the country, according
to the existing laws, is mostly worn into a rut, and most
Administrations move in it because it is easier to move
there than anywhere else. Most political crises the
decisive votes, which determine the fate of Government
are generally either on questions of foreign policy or
of new laws; and the questions of foreign policy come
out generally in this way, that the Government has
already done something, and that it is for the one part of
the Legislature alone for the House of Commons, and
not for the House of Lords to say whether they have or
have not forfeited their place by the treaty they have
made.
I think every one must admit that this is not an ar-
rangement which seems right on the face of it. Treaties
are quite as important as most laws, and to require the
elaborate assent of representative assemblies to every
word of the law, and not to consult them even as to the
essence of the treaty, is primd facie ludicrous. In the
older forms of the English Constitution, this may have
been quite right ; the power was then really lodged in
the Crown, and because Parliament met very seldom,
xlii INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
arid for other reasons, it was then necessary that, on a
multitude of points, the Crown should have much more
power than is amply sufficient for it at present. But
now the real power is not in the Sovereign, it is in the
Prime Minister and in the Cabinet that is, in the hands
of a committee appointed by Parliament, and of the
chairman of that committee. Now, beforehand, no one
would have ventured to suggest that a committee of
Parliament on Foreign relations should be able to commit
the country to the greatest international obligations
without consulting either Parliament or the country.
No other select committee has any comparable power;
and considering how carefully we have fettered and
limited the powers of all other subordinate authorities,
our allowing so much discretionary power on matters
peculiarly dangerous and peculiarly delicate to rest in
the sole charge of one secret committee is exceedingly
strange. No doubt it may be beneficial ; many seeming
anomalies are so, but at first sight it does not look right.
I confess that I should see no advantage in it if our
two Chambers were sufficiently homogeneous and suffi-
ciently harmonious. On the contrary, if those two
Chambers were as they ought to be, I should believe it
to be a great defect. If the Administration had in both
Houses a majority not a mechanical majority ready to
accept anything, but a fair and reasonable one, predis-
posed to think the Government right, but not ready to
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. xliii
find it to be so in the face of facts and in opposition
to whatever might occur; if a good Government were
thus placed, I should think it decidedly better that the
agreements of the Administration with foreign powers
should be submitted to Parliament. They would then
receive that which is best for all arrangements of
business, an understanding and sympathising criticism
but still a criticism. The majority of the Legislature
being well disposed to the Government, would not " find "
against it except it had really committed some big and
plain mistake. But if the Government had made such
a mistake, certainly the majority of the Legislature
would find against it. In a country fit for Parliamentary
institutions, the partizanship of members of the Legisla-
ture never comes in manifest opposition to the plain
interest of the nation ; if it did, the nation being (as are
all nations capable of Parliamentary institutions) con-
stantly attentive to public affairs, would inflict on them
the maximum Parliamentary penalty at the next election
and at many future elections. It would break their
career. No English majority dare vote for an exceedingly
bad treaty ; it would rather desert its own leader than
ensure its own ruin. And an English minority, in-
heriting a long experience of Parliamentary affairs, would
not be exceedingly ready to reject a treaty made with
a foreign Government. The leaders of an English
Opposition are very conversant with the school-boy
d
xliv INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION".
maxim, " Two can play at that fun." They know that
the next time they are in office the same sort of sharp
practice may be used against them, and therefore they
will not use it. So strong is this predisposition, that
not- long since a subordinate member of the Opposition
declared that the " front benches " of the two sides of the
House that is, the leaders of the Government and the
leaders of the Opposition were in constant tacit league
to suppress the objections of independent members.
And what he said is often quite true. There are often
seeming objections which are not real objections; at
least, which are, in the particular cases, outweighed by
counter-considerations; and these "independent mem-
bers," having no real responsibility, not being likely to be
hurt themselves if they make a mistake, are sure to blurt
out, and to want to act upon. But the responsible heads
of the party who may have to decide similar things, or
even the same things, themselves will not permit it.
They refuse, out of interest as well as out of patriotism,
to engage the country in a permanent foreign scrape, to
secure for themselves and their party a momentary home
advantage. Accordingly, a Government which negotiated
a treaty would feel that its treaty would be subject
certainly to a scrutiny, but still to a candid and lenient
scrutiny; that it would go before judges, of whom the
majority were favourable, and among whom the most
influential part of the minority were in this case much
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
opposed to excessive antagonism. And this seems to be
the best position in which negotiators can be placed,
namely, that they should be sure to have to account to
considerate and fair persons, but not to have to account
to inconsiderate and unfair ones.
At present the Government which negotiates a treaty
can hardly be said to be accountable to any one. It is
sure to be subjected to vague censure. Benjamin Franklin
said, " I have never known a peace made, even the most
advantageous, that was not censured as inadequate, and
the makers condemned as injudicious or corrupt. ' Blessed
are the peace-makers' is, I suppose, to be understood in
the other world, for in this they are frequently cursed."
And this is very often the view taken now in England of
treaties. There being nothing practical in the Opposition
nothing likely to hamper them hereafter the leaders
of Opposition are nearly sure to suggest every objection.
The thing is done and cannot be undone, and the most
natural wish of the Opposition leaders is to prove that if
they had been in office, and it therefore had been theirs
to do it, they could have done it much better. On the
other hand, it is quite possible that there may be no real
criticism on a treaty at all ; or the treaty has been made
by the Government, and as it cannot be unmade by any
one, the Opposition may not think it worth while to say
much about it. The Government, therefore, is never
certain of any criticism ; on the contrary, it has a good
Xlvi INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
chance of escaping criticism ; but if there be any criticism
the Government must expect it to be bitter, sharp, and
captious made as an irresponsible objector would make
it, and not as a responsible statesman, who may have
to deal with a difficulty if he make it, and therefore will
be cautious how he says anything which may make it.
This is what happens in common cases ; and in the
uncommon the ninety-ninth case in a hundred in
which the Opposition hoped to turn out the Government
because of the alleged badness of the treaty they have
made, the criticism is sure to be of the most undesirable
character, and to say what is most offensive to foreign
nations. All the practised acumen of anti-Government
writers and speakers is sure to be engaged in proving
that England has been imposed upon that, as was said
in one case, " The moral and the intellectual qualities
have been divided; that our negotiation had the moral,
and the negotiation on the other side the intellectual,"
and so on. The whole pitch of party malice is then
expended, because there is nothing to check the party
VQ opposition. The treaty has been made, and though
it may be censured, and the party which made it ousted
yet the difficulty it was meant to cure is cured, and the
opposing party, if it takes office, will not have that
difficulty to deal with.
In abstract theory these defects in our present practice
would seem exceedingly great, but in practice they are
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. xlvii
not so. English statesmen and English parties have
really a great patriotism ; they can rarely be persuaded
even by their passions or their interest to do anything
contrary to the real interest of England, or anything
Avhich would lower England in the eyes of foreign
nations. And they would , seriously hurt themselves if
they did. But still these are the real tendencies of our
present practice, and these are only prevented by qualities
in the nation and qualities in our statesmen, which will
just as much exist if we change our practice.
It certainly would be in many ways advantageous to
change it. If we require that in some form the assent of
Parliament shall be given to such treaties, we should
have a real discussion prior to the making of such
treaties. We should have the reasons for the treaty
plainly stated, and also the reasons against it. At
present, as we have seen, the discussion is unreal. The
thing is done and cannot be altered ; and what is said
often ought not to be said because it is captious, and
what is not said ought as often to be said because it is
material. We should have a manlier and plainer way
of dealing with foreign policy, if Ministers were obliged
to explain clearly their foreign contracts before they
were valid, just as they have to explain their domestic
proposals before they can become laws.
The objections to this are, as far as I know, three,
and three only.
xlviii INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
First. That it would not be always desirable for
Ministers to state clearly the motives which induced
them to agree to foreign compacts. " Treaties," it is
said, " are in one great respect different from laws, they
concern not only the Government which binds, the
nation so bound, but a third party too a foreign country
and the feelings of that country are to be considered
as well as our own. And that foreign country will,
probably, in the present state of the world be a despotic
one, where discussion is not practised, where it is not
understood, where the expressions of different speakers
are not accurately weighed, where undue offence may
easily be given." This objection might be easily avoided
by requiring that the discussion upon treaties in Parlia-
ment like that discussion in the American Senate should
be "in secret session," and that no report shoidd bo
published of it. But I should, for my own part, be
rather disposed to risk a public debate. Despotic nations
now cannot understand England; it is to them an
anomaly "chartered by Providence;" they have been
time out of mind puzzled by its institutions, vexed at
its statesmen, and angry at its newspapers. A little
more of such perplexity and such vexation does not seem
to me a great eviL And if it be meant, as it often is
meant, that the whole truth as to treaties cannot be
spoken out, I answer, that neither can the whole truth
as to laws. All important laws affect large "vested
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
interests ; " they touch great sources of political strength ;
and these great interests require to be treated as
delicately, and with as nice a manipulation of language,
as the feelings of any foreign country. A Parliamentary
Minister is a man trained by elaborate practice not to
blurt out crude things, and an English Parliament is an
assembly -which particularly dislikes anything gauche or
anything imprudent. They would still more dislike it if
it hurt themselves and the country as well as the speaker.
I am, too, disposed to deny entirely that there can be
any treaty for which adequate reasons cannot be given
to the English people, which the English people ought
to make. A great deal of the reticence of diplomacy had,
I think history shows, much better be spoken out. The
worst families are those in which the members never
really speak their minds to one another ; they maintain
an atmosphere of unreality, and every one always lives in
an atmosphere of suppressed ill-feeling. It is the same
with nations. The parties concerned would almost
always be better for hearing the substantial reasons
which induced the negotiators to make the treaty, and
the negotiators would do their work much better, for
half the ambiguities in treaties are caused by the nego-
tiators not liking the fact or not taking the pains to put
their own meaning distinctly before their own minds.
And they would be obliged to make it plain if they had
to defend it and argue on it before a great assembly.
I INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
Secondly, it may be objected to the change suggested
that Parliament is not always sitting, and that if treaties
required its assent, it might have to be sometimes sum-
moned out of season, or the treaties would have to be
delayed. And this is as far as it goes a just objection,
but I do not imagine that it goes far. The great bulk of
treaties could wait a little without harm, and in the very-
few cases when urgent haste is necessary, an Autumn
session of Parliament could well be justified, for the
occasion must be of grave and critical importance.
Thirdly, it may be said that if we required the con-
sent of both Houses of Parliament to foreign treaties
before they were valid we should much augment the
power of the House of Lords. And this is also, I think,
a just objection as far as it goes. The House of Lords,
as it cannot turn out the Ministry for making treaties,
has in no case a decisive weight in foreign policy, though
its debates on them are often excellent ; and there is a
real danger at present in giving it such weight. They
are not under the same guidance as the House of Com-
mons. In the House of Commons, of necessity, the
Ministry has a majority, and the majority will agree to
the treaties the leaders have made if they fairly can.
They will not be anxious to disagree with them. But
the majority of the House of Lords may always be, and
has lately been generally an opposition majority, and
therefore the treaty may be submitted to critics exactly
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. li
pledged to opposite views. It might be like submitting
the design of an architect known to hold " mediaeval prin-
ciples " to a committee wedded to " classical principles."
Still, upon the whole, I think the augmentation of
the power of the Peers might be risked without real fear
of serious harm. Our present practice, as has been ex-
plained, only works because of the good sense of those
by whom it is worked, and the new practice would have
to rely on a similar good sense and practicality too. The
House of Lords must deal with the assent to treaties as
they do with the assent to laws ; they must defer to the
voice of the country and the authority of the Commons
even in cases where their own judgment might guide
them otherwise. In very vital treaties probably, being
Englishmen, they would be of the same mind as the rest
of Englishmen. If in such cases they showed a reluct-
ance to act as the people wished, they would have the
same lesson taught them as on vital and exciting questions
of domestic legislation, and the case is not so likely to
happen, for on these internal and organic questions the
interest and the feeling of the Peers is often presumably
opposed to that of other classes they may be anxious
not to relinquish the very power which other classes are
anxious to acquire; but in foreign policy there is no
similar antagonism of interest a peer and a non-peer
have presumably in that matter the same interest and
the same wishes.
Ill INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
Probably, if it were considered to be desirable to give
to Parliament a more direct control over questions of
foreign policy than it possesses now, the better way
would be not to require a formal vote to the treaty
clause by clause. This would entail too much time, and
would lead to unnecessary changes in minor details. It
would be enough to let the treaty be laid upon the table
of both Houses, say for fourteen days, and to acquire
validity unless objected to by one House or other before
that interval had expired.
II.
This is all which I think I need say on the domestic
events which have changed, or suggested changes, in the
English Constitution since this book was written. But
there are also some foreign events which have illustrated
it, and of these I should like to say a few words.
Naturally, the most striking of these illustrative
changes comes from France. Since 1789 France has
always been trying political experiments, from which
others may profit much, though as yet she herself has
profited little. She is now trying one singularly illus-
trative of the English Constitution. When the first
edition of this book was published I had great difficulty
in persuading many people that it was possible for a
non-monarchical state, for the real chief of the practical
Executive the Premier as we should call him to be
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Hii
nominated and to be removable by the vote of the
National Assembly. The United States and its copies
were the only present and familial Repuolics, and in
the3e the system wao exactly opposite. The Executive
was there appointed by the people as the Legislative
was too. No conspicuous example of any other sort of
Republic then existed. But now France has given an
example M. Thiers is (with one exception) just the chef
du pouvoir executif that I endeavoured more than once
in this book to describe. He is appointed by and is
removable by the Assembly. He comes down and
speaks in it just as our Premier does ; he is responsible
for managing it just as our Premier is. No one can any
longer doubt the possibility of a republic in which the
Executive and the Legislative authorities were united
and fixed; no one can assert such union to be the
incommunicable attribute of a Constitutional Monarchy.
But, unfortunately, we can as yet only infer from this
experiment that such a constitution is possible ; we can-
not as yet say whether it will be bad or good. The
circumstances are very peculiar, and that in three ways.
First, the trial of a specially Parliamentary Republic, of
a Republic where Parliament appoints the Minister, is
made in a nation which has, to say the least of it, no
peculiar aptitude for Parliamentary Government; which
has possibly a peculiar inaptitude for it. In the last but
one of these essays I have tried to describe one of the
liv INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
mental conditions of Parliamentary Government, which
I call " rationality," by which I do not mean reasoning
power, but rather the power of hearing the reasons of
others, of comparing them quietly with one's own reasons,
and then being guided by the result. But a French
Assembly is not easy to reason with. Every assembly is
divided into parties and into sections of parties, and in
France each party, almost every section of a party,
begins not to clamour but to scream, and to scream as
only Frenchmen can, as soon as it hears anything which
it particularly dislikes. With an Assembly in this
temper, real discussion is impossible, and Parliamentary
Government is impossible too, because the Parliament
can neither choose men nor measures. The French
assemblies under the Restored Monarchy seem to have
been quieter, probably because being elected from a
limited constituency they did not contain so many sec-
tions of opinion; they had fewer irritants and fewer
species of irritability. But the assemblies of the '48
Republic were disorderly in the extreme. I saw the last
myself, and can certify that steady discussion upon a
critical point was not possible in it. There was not an
audience willing to hear. The Assembly now sitting at
Versailles is undoubtedly also, at times, most tumultuous,
and a Parliamentary Government in which it governs
must be under a peculiar difficulty, because as a sove-
reign it is unstable, capricious, and unruly.
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Iv
The difficulty is the greater because there is no check,
or little, from the French nation upon the Assembly.
The French, as a nation, do not care for or appreciate
Parliamentary Government. I have endeavoured to ex-
plain how difficult it is for inexperienced mankind to
take to such a government; how much more natural,
that is, how much more easy to uneducated men is
loyalty to a monarch. A nation which does not expect
good from a Parliament, cannot check or punish a Par-
liament. France expects, I fear, too little from her
Parliaments ever to get what she ought. Now that
the suffrage is universal, the average intellect and the
average culture of the constituent bodies are excessively
low; and even such mind and culture as there is has
long been enslaved to authority; the French peasant
cares more for standing well with his present prefet
than for anything else whatever ; he is far too ignorant
to check and watch his Parliament, and far too timid to
think of doing either if the executive authority nearest
to him did not like it. The experiment of a strictly
Parliamentary Republic of a Republic where the Par-
liament appoints the Executive is being tried in France
at an extreme disadvantage, because in France a Par-
liament is unusually likely to be bad, and unusually
likely also to be free enough to show its badness.
Secondly, the present polity of France is not a copy
of the whole effective part of the British Constitution,
Ivi INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
but only a part of it By our Constitution nominally
the Queen, but really the Prime Minister, has the power
of dissolving the Assembly. But M. Thiers has no such
power; and therefore, under ordinary circumstances, I
believe, the policy would soon become unmanageable.
The result would be, as I have tried to explain, that the
Assembly would be always changing its Ministry, that
having no reason to fear the penalty which that change so
often brings in England, they would be ready to make it
once a month. Caprice is the characteristic vice of
miscellaneous assemblies, and without some check their
selection would be unceasingly mutable. This peculiar
danger of the present Constitution of France has how-
ever been prevented by its peculiar circumstances. The
Assembly have not been inclined to remove M. Thiers,
because in their lamentable present position they could
not replace M. Thiers. He has a monopoly of the
necessary reputation. It is the Empire the Empire
which he always opposed that has done him this kind-
ness. For twenty years no great political reputation
could arise in France. The Emperor governed and no
one member could show a capacity for government. M.
Rouher, though of vast real ability, was in the popular
jdea only the Emperor's agent; and even had it been
otherwise, M. Rouher, the one great man of Imperialism,
could not have been selected as a head of the Govern-
ment, at a moment of the greatest reaction against the
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Ivii
Empire. Of the chiefs before the twenty years' silence,
of the eminent men known to be able to handle Parlia-
ments and to govern Parliaments, M Thiers was the only
one still physically able to begin again to do so. The
miracle is, that at seventy-four even he should still be
able. As no other great chief of the Parliament regime
existed, M. Thiers is not only the best choice, but the
only choice. If he were taken away, it would be most
difficult to make any other choice, and that difficulty
keeps him where he is. At every crisis the Assembly
feels that after M. Thiers "the deluge," and he lives upon
that feeling. A change of the President, though legally
simple, is in practice all but impossible; because all know
that such a change might be a change, not only of the
President, but of much more too : that very probably it
might be a change of the polity that it might bring in
a Monarchy or an Empire.
Lastly, by a natural consequence of the position, M.
Thiers does not govern as a Parliamentary Premier
governs. He is not, he boasts that he is not, the head of
a party. On the contrary, being the one person essential
to all parties, he selects Ministers from all parties, he
constructs a cabinet in which no one Minister agrees with
any other in anything, and with all the members of which
he himself frequently disagrees. The selection is quite
in his hand. Ordinarily a Parliamentary Premier cannot
choose ; he is brought in by a party ; he is maintained in
Iviii INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
office by a party ; and that party requires that as they
aid him, he shall aid them ; that as they give him the
very best thing in the State, he shall give them the
next best things. But M. Thiers is under no such
restriction. He can choose as he likes, and does choose.
Neither in the selection of his Cabinet nor in the
management of the Chamber, is M. Thiers guided as a
similar person in common circumstances would have to
be guided. He is the exception of a moment ; he is not
the example of a lasting condition.
For these reasons, though we may use the present
Constitution of France as a useful aid to our imaginations,
in conceiving of a purely Parliamentary republic, of a
monarchy 'minus the monarch, we must not think of it
as much more. It is too singular in its nature and too
peculiar in its accidents to be a guide to anything except
itself.
In this essay I have made many remarks on the
American Constitution, in comparison with the English ;
and as to the American Constitution we have had a whole
world of experience since I first wrote. My great object
was to contrast the office of President as an executive
officer and to compare it with that of a Prime Minister ;
and I devoted much space to showing that in one prin-
cipal respect the English system is by far the best. The
English Premier being appointed by the selection, and
being removable at the pleasure, of the preponderant
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. lix
Legislative Assembly, is sure to be able to rely on that
assembly. If he wants legislation to aid his policy he can
obtain that legislation; he can carry out that policy.
But the American President has no similar security. He
is elected in one way, at one time, and Congress (no
matter which House) is elected in another way, at another
time. The two have nothing to bind them together, and
in matter of fact, they continually disagree.
This was written in the time of Mr. Lincoln, when
Congress, the President, and all the North were united as
one man in the war against the South. There was then
no patent instance of mere disunion. But between the
time when the essays were first written in the " Fort-
nightly," and their subsequent junction into a book, Mr.
Lincoln was assassinated, and Mr. Johnson, the Vice-
President, became President, and so continued for nearly
four years. At such a time the characteristic evils of the
Presidential system were shown most conspicuously. The
President and the Assembly, so far from being (as it is
essential to good government that they should be) on
terms of close union, were not on terms of common
courtesy. So far from being capable of a continuous and
concerted co-operation they were all the while trying
to thwart one another. He had one plan for the paci-
fication of the South and they another ; they would have
nothing to say to his plans, and he vetoed their plans as
long as the Constitution permitted, and when they were,
e
IX INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
in spite of him, carried, he, as far as he could (and this
was very much), embarrassed them in action. The
quarrel in most countries would have gone beyond the
law, and come to blows ; even in America, the most law-
loving of countries, it went as far as possible within
the law. Mr. Johnson described the most popular branch
of the legislature the House of Representatives as a
body " hanging on the verge of government ; " and that
House impeached him criminally, in the hope that in
that way they might get rid of him civilly. Nothing
could be so conclusive against the American Constitution,
as a Constitution, as that incident. A hostile legislature
and a hostile executive were so tied together, that the
legislature tried, and tried in vain, to rid itself of the
executive by accusing it of illegal practices. The legis-
lature was so afraid of the President's legal power that
it unfairly accused him of acting beyond the law. And
the blame thus cast on the American Constitution is so
much praise to be given to the American political
character. Few nations, perhaps scarcely any nation,
could have borne such a trial so easily and so perfectly.
This was the most striking instance of disunion be-
tween the President and the Congress that has ever yet
occurred, and which probably will ever occur. Probably
for very many years the United States will have great
and painful reason to remember that at the moment of
all their history, when it was most important to them to
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Ixi
collect and concentrate all the strength and wisdom of
their policy on the pacification of the South, that policy-
was divided by a strife in the last degree unseemly and
degrading. But it will be for a competent historian
hereafter to trace out this accurately and in detail ; the
time is yet too recent, and I cannot pretend that I know
enough to do so. I cannot venture myself to draw the
full lessons from these events ; I can only predict that
when they are drawn, those lessons will be most import-
ant and most interesting.
There is, however, one series of events which have
happened in America since the beginning of the civil war,
and since the first publication of these essays, on which
I should wish to say something in detail I mean the
financial events. These lie within the scope of my pecu-
liar studies, and it is comparatively easy to judge of them,
since whatever may be the case with refined statistical
reasoning, the great results of money matters speak to
and interest all mankind. And every incident in this
part of American financial history exemplifies the con-
trast between a Parliamentary and a Presidential Govern-
ment.
The distinguishing quality of Parliamentary Govern-
ment is, that in each stage of a public transaction there is
a discussion; that the public assist at this discussion; that
it can, through Parliament, turn out an administration
which is not f)oing as it likes, and can put in an adminis-
Ixii INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
tration which will do as it likes. But the characteristic
of a Presidential Government is, in a multitude of cases,
that there is no such discussion ; that when there is a
discussion the fate of Government does not turn upon it,
and, therefore, the people do not attend to it ; that upon
the whole the administration itself is pretty much doing
as it likes, and neglecting as it likes, subject always to
the check that it must not too much offend the mass of
the nation. The nation commonly does not attend, but if
by gigantic blunders you make it attend, it will remember
it and turn you out when its time comes ; it will show
you that your power is short, and so on the instant
weaken that power; it will make your present life in
office unbearable and uncomfortable by the hundred
modes in which a free people can, without ceasing, act
upon the rulers which it elected yesterday, and will have
to reject or re-elect to-morrow.
In finance the most striking effect in America has, on
the first view of it, certainly been good. It has enabled
the Government to obtain and to keep a vast surplus of
revenue over expenditure. Even before the civil war it
did this from 1837 to 1857. Mr. Wells tells us that,
strange as it may seem, " There was not a single year in
which the unexpended balance in the National Treasury
derived from various sources at the end of the year,
was not in excess of the total expenditure of the pre-
ceding year; while in not a few years the unexpended
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Ixiii
balance was absolutely greater than the sum of the entire
expenditure of the twelve months preceding." But this
history before the war is nothing to what has happened
since. The following are the surpluses of revenue over
expenditure since the end of the civil war : -
Surplus.
Tear ending June 30.
1866 ...... 5,593,000
1867 21,586,000
1868 4,242,000
1869 7,418,000
1870 18,627,000
1871 16,712,000
No one who knows anything of the working of Par-
liamentary Government, will for a moment imagine that
any Parliament would have allowed any executive to
keep a surplus of this magnitude. In England, after the
French war, the Government of that day, which had
brought it to a happy end, which had the glory of
Waterloo, which was in consequence exceedingly strong,
which had besides elements of strength from close
boroughs and Treasury influence such as certainly no
Government has ever had since, and such perhaps as no
Government ever had before that Government proposed
to keep a moderate surplus and to apply it to the re-
duction of the debt, but even this the English Parliament
would not endure. The administration with all its power
derived both from good and evil had to yield; the income
tax was abolished, with it went the surplus, and with the
Ixiv INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
surplus all chance of any considerable reduction of the
debt for that time. In truth taxation is so painful that
in a sensitive community which has strong organs of ex-
pression and action, the maintenance of a great surplus is
excessively difficult. The opposition will always say that
it is unnecessary, is uncalled for, is injudicious ; the cry
will be echoed in every constituency ; there will be a
series of large meetings in the great cities ; even in the
smaller constituencies there will mostly be smaller meet-
ings ; every member of Parliament will be pressed upon
by those who elect him ; upon this point there will be no
distinction between town and country, the country gentle-
man and the farmer disliking high taxes as much as any
in the towns. To maintain a great surplus by heavy taxes
to pay off debt has never yet in this country been possible,
and to maintain a surplus of the American magnitude
would be plainly impossible.
Some part of the difference between England and
America arises undoubtedly not from political causes but
from economical. America is not a country sensitive to
taxes ; no great country has perhaps ever been so unseii-
sitive in this respect ; certainly she is far less sensitive
than England. In reality America is too rich, daily
industry there is too common, too skilful, and too pro-
ductive, for her to care much for fiscal burdens. She
is applying all the resources of science and skill and
trained labour, which have been in long ages painfully
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
acquired in old countries, to develop with great speed the
richest soil and the richest mines of new countries ; and
the result is untold wealth. Even under a Parliamentary
Government such a community could and would bear
taxation much more easily than Englishmen ever would.
But difference of physical character in this respect is
of little moment in comparison with difference of political
constitution. If America was under a Parliamentary
Government, she would soon be convinced that in main-
taining this great surplus and in paying this high tax-
ation she would be doing herself great harm. She is not
performing a great duty, but perpetrating a great in-
justice. She is injuring posterity by crippling and dis-
placing industry, far more than she is aiding it by re-
ducing the taxes it will have to pay. In the first place,
the maintenance of the present high taxation compels
the retention of many taxes which are contrary to the
maxims of free trade. Enormous customs duties are
necessary, and it would be all but impossible to impose
equal excise duties even if the Americans desired it. In
consequence, besides what the Americans pay to the
Government, they are paying a great deal to some of
their own citizens, and so are rearing a set of industries
which never ought to have existed, which are bad specu-
lations at present because other industries would have
paid better, and which may cause a great loss out of
pocket hereafter when the debt is paid off and the
Ixvi INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
fostering tax withdrawn. Then probably industry will
return to its natural channel, the artificial trade will be
first depressed, then discontinued, and the fixed capital
employed in the trade will all be depreciated and much
of it be worthless. Secondly, all taxes on trade and
manufacture are injurious in various ways to them. You
cannot put on a great series of such duties without
cramping trade in a hundred ways and without diminish-
ing their productiveness exceedingly. America is now
working in heavy fetters, and it would probably be better
for her to lighten those fetters even though a generation
or two should have to pay rather higher taxes. Those
generations would really benefit, because they would be
so much richer that the slightly increased cost of govern-
ment would never be perceived. At any rate, under a
Parliamentary Government this doctrine would have
been incessantly inculcated ; a whole party would have
made it their business to preach it, would have made
incessant small motions in Parliament about it, which is
the way to popularise their view. And in the end I do
not doubt that they would have prevailed. They would
have had to teach a lesson both pleasant and true, and
such lessons are soon learned. On the whole, therefore,
the result of the comparison is that a Presidential Govern-
ment makes it much easier than the Parliamentary to
maintain a great surplus of income over expenditure,
but that it does not give the same facility for examining
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Ixvii
whether it is good or not good to maintain a surplus, and,
therefore, that it works blindly, maintaining surpluses
when they do extreme harm just as much as when they
are very beneficial.
In this point the contrast of Presidential with Parlia-
mentary Government is mixed; one of the defects of
Parliamentary Government probably is the difficulty
under it of maintaining a surplus revenue to discharge
debt, and this defect Presidential Government escapes,
though at the cost of being likely to maintain that sur-
plus upon inexpedient occasions as well as upon expedient.
But in all other respects a Parliamentary Government
has in finance an unmixed advantage over the Presiden-
tial in the incessant discussion. Though in one single
case it produces evil as well as good, in most cases it
produces good only. And three of these cases are illus-
trated by recent American experience.
First, as Mr. Goldwin Smith no unfavourable judge
of anything American justly said some years since, the
capital error made by the United States Government
was the " Legal Tender Act," as it is called, by which it
made inconvertible paper notes issued by the Treasury
the sole circulating medium of the country. The tempta-
tion to do this was very great, because it gave at once a
great war fund when it was needed, and with no pain to
any one. If the notes of a Government supersede the
metallic currency medium of a country to the extent of
Ixviii INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
$80,000,000, this is equivalent to a recent loan of
$80,000,000 to the Government for all purposes within
the country. Whenever the precious metals are not
required, and for domestic purposes in such a case they
are not required, notes will buy what the Government
want, and it can buy to the extent of its issue. But,
like all easy expedients out of a great difficulty, it is
accompanied by the greatest evils; if it had not been
so, it would have been the regular device in such cases,
and the difficulty would have been no difficulty at all ;
there would have been a known easy way out of it. As
is well known, inconvertible paper issued by Government
is sure to be issued in great quantities, as the American
currency soon was ; it is sure to be depreciated as against
coin ; it is sure to disturb values and to derange markets ;
it is certain to defraud the lender ; it is certain to give
the borrower more than he 'ought to have. In the case
of America there was a further evil. Being a new
country, she ought in her times of financial want to
borrow of old countries ; but the old countries were
frightened by the probable issue of unlimited inconvertible
paper, and they would not lend a shilling. Much more
than the mercantile credit of America was thus lost.
The great commercial houses in England are the most
natural and most effectual conveyers of intelligence from
other countries to Europe. If they had been financially
interested in giving in a sound report as to the progress
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
of the war, a sound report we should have had. But as
the Northern States raised no loans in Lombard Street
(and could raise none because of their vicious paper
money), Lombard Street did not care about them, and
England was very imperfectly informed of the progress
of the civil struggle, and on the whole matter, which was
then new and very complex, England had to judge with-
out having her usual materials for judgment, and (since
the guidance of the " city " on political matter is very
quietly and' imperceptibly given) without knowing she
had not those materials.
Of course, this error might have been committed, and
perhaps would have been committed under a Parlia-
mentary Government. But if it had, its effects would
ere long have been thoroughly searched into and effect-
ually frustrated. The whole force of the greatest in-
quiring machine and the greatest discussing machine
which the world has ever known would have been
directed to this subject. In a year or two the American
public would have had it forced upon them in every
form till they must have comprehended it. But under
the Presidential form of Government, and owing to the
inferior power of generating discussion, the information
given to the American people has been imperfect in the
extreme. And in consequence, after nearly ten years of
painful experience, they do not now understand how much
they have suffered from their inconvertible currency.
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
But the mode in which the Presidential Government
of America managed its taxation during the Civil War, is
even a more striking example of its defects, Mr. Wells
tells us :
"In the outset all direct or internal taxation was
avoided, there having been apparently an apprehension
on the part of Congress, that inasmuch as the people had
never been accustomed to it, and as all machinery for
assessment and collection was wholly wanting, its adop-
tion would create discontent, and thereby interfere with
a vigorous prosecution of hostilities. Congress, therefore,
confined itself at first to the enactment of measures
looking to an increase of revenue from the increase of
indirect taxes upon imports ; and it was not until four
months after the actual outbreak of hostilities that a
direct tax of % 20,000,000 per annum was apportioned
among the States, and an income tax of 3 per cent, on
the excess of all incomes over $800 was provided for ;
the first being made to take effect practically eight, and
the second ten months after date of enactment. Such
laws of course took effect, and became immediately
operative in the loyal States only, and produced but
comparatively little revenue ; and although the range of
taxation was soon extended, the whole receipts from all
sources by the Government for the second year of the
war, from excise, income, stamp, and all other interna'
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Ixxi
taxes were less than 542,000,000; and that, too, at a
time when the expenditures were in excess $60,000,000
per month, or at the rate of over $700,000,000 per annum.
And as showing how novel was this whole subject of
direct and internal taxation to the people, and how com
pletely the government officials were lacking in all ex-
perience in respect to it, the following incident may be
noted. The Secretary of the Treasury, in his report for
1863, stated that, with a view of determining his re-
sources, he employed a very competent person, with the
aid of practical men, to estimate the probable amount of
revenue to be derived from each department of internal
taxation for the previous year. The estimate arrived at
was $85,000,000, but the actual receipts were only
$37,000,000."
Now, no doubt, this might have happened under a
Parliamentary Government. But, then, many members of
Parliament, the entire opposition in Parliament, would
have been active to unravel the matter. AH the principles
of finance would have been worked and propounded.
The light would have come from above, not from below
it would have come from Parliament to the nation instead
of from the nation to Parliament. But exactly the
reverse happened in America. Mr. Wells goes on to
eay :
" The people of the loyal States were, however, more
Ixxii INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
determined and in earnest in respect to this matter of
taxation than were their rulers; and before long the
popular discontent at the existing state of things was
openly manifest Everywhere the opinion was expressed
that taxation in all possible forms should immediately,
and to the largest extent, be made effective and impera-
tive ; and Congress spurred up, and rightfully relying on
public sentiment to sustain their action, at last took up
the matter resolutely and in earnest, and devised and
inaugurated a system of internal and direct taxation,
which for its universality and peculiarities has probably
no parallel in anything which has heretofore been recorded
in civil history, or is likely to be experienced hereafter.
The one necessity of the situation was revenue, and to
obtain it speedily and in large amounts through taxation
the only principle recognized if it can be called a prin-
ciple was akin to that recommended to the traditionary
Irishman on his visit to Donnybrook Fair, ' Wherever
you see a head hit it/ Wherever you find an article, a
product, a trade, a profession, or a source of income, tax
it 1 And so an edict went forth to this effect, and the
people cheerfully submitted. Incomes under #5,000
were taxed 5 per cent., with an exemption of #600
and house rent actually paid; these exemptions being
allowed on this ground, that they represented an amount
sufficient at the time to enable a small family to procure
INTEODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. Ixxiii
the bare necessaries of life, and thus take out from the
operation of the law all those who were dependent upon
each day's earnings to supply each day's needs. Incomes
in excess of #5,000 and not in excess of $10,000 were
taxed 2| per cent, in addition ; and incomes over $10,000
5 per cent, additional, without any abeyance or exemp-
tions whatever."
Now this is all contrary to and worse than what would
have happened under a Parliamentary Government. The
delay to tax would not have occurred under it: the
movement by the country to get taxation would never
have been necessary under it. The excessive taxation
accordingly imposed would not have been permitted
under it. The last point I think I need not labour at
length. The evils of a bad tax are quite sure to be
pressed upon the ears of Parliament in season and out of
season; the few persons who have to pay it are thoroughly
certain to make themselves heard. The sort of taxation
tried in America, that of taxing everything, and seeing
what everything would yield, could not have been tried
under a Government delicately and quickly sensitive to
public opinion.
I do not apologise for dwelling at length upon these
points, for the subject is one of transcendent importance.
The practical choice of first-rate nations is between the
Presidential Government and the Parliamentary ; no State
INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION.
can be first-rate which has not a Government by dis-
cussion, and those are the only two existing species of
that Government. It is between them that a nation
which has to choose its Government must choose. And
nothing therefore can be more important than to compare
the two, and to decide upon the testimony of experience
and by facts, which of them is the better.
THE POPLABS, WIMBLEDON i
June 20, 1872.
THE
ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
No. I.
THE CABINET.
" ON all great subjects," says Mr. Mill, "much remains to
be said," and of none is this more true than of the English
Constitution. The literature which has accumulated
upon it is huge. But an observer who looks at the living
reality will wonder at the contrast to the paper descrip-
tion. He will see in the life much which is not in the
books ; and he will not find in the rough practice many
refinements of the literary theory.
It was natural perhaps inevitable that such an
undergrowth of irrelevant ideas should gather round the
British Constitution. Language is the tradition of
nations ; each generation describes what it sees, but it
uses words transmitted from the past. When a great
entity like the British Constitution has continued in
connected outward sameness, but hidden inner change,
for many ages, every generation inherits a series of inapt
words of maxims once true, but of which the truth is
B
2 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
ceasing or has ceased. As a man's family go on mutter-
ing in his maturity incorrect phrases derived from a just
observation of his early youth, so, in the full activity of
an historical constitution, its subjects repeat phrases true
in the time of their fathers, and iaculcated by those
fathers, but now true no longer. Or, if I may say so, an
ancient and ever-altering constitution is like an old man
who still wears with attached fondness clothes in the
fashion of his youth : what you see of him is the same ;
what you do not see is wholly altered.
There are two descriptions of the English Constitution
which have exercised immense influence, but which are
erroneous. First, it is laid down as a principle of the
English polity, that in it the legislative, the executive,
and the judicial powers are quite divided that each is
entrusted to a separate person or set of persons that no
one of these can at all interfere with the work of the
other. There has been much eloquence expended in ex-
plaining how the rough genius of the English people,
even in the middle ages, when it was especially rude,
carried into life and practice that elaborate division of
functions which philosophers had suggested on paper,
but which they had hardly hoped to see except on paper.
Secondly, it is insisted that the peculiar excellence of
the British Constitution lies in a balanced union of three
powers. It is said that the monarchical element, the
aristocratic element, and the democratic element, have
each a share in the supreme sovereignty, and that the
assent of all three is necessary to the action of that
sovereignty. Kings, lords, and commons, by this theory,
THE CABINET. 3
are alleged to be not only the outward form, but the
inner moving essence, the vitality of the constitution.
A great theory, called the theory of "Checks and
Balances," pervades an immense part of political litera-
ture, and much of it is collected from or supported by
English experience. Monarchy, it is said, has some
faults, some bad tendencies, aristocracy Bothers, democracy,
again, others ; but England has shown that a government
can be constructed in which these evil tendencies exactly
check, balance, and destroy one another in which a
good whole is constructed not simply in spite of, but by
means of, the counteracting defects of the constituent parts.
Accordingly, it is believed that the principal cha-
racteristics of the English Constitution are inapplicable
in countries where the materials for a monarchy or an
aristocracy do not exist. That constitution is conceived
to be the best imaginable use of the political elements
which the great majority of States in modern Europe
inherited from the mediaeval period. It is believed that
out of these materials nothing better can be made than
the English Constitution ; but it is also believed that the
essential parts of the English Constitution cannot be
made except from these materials. Now these elements
are the accidents of a period and a region ; they belong
only to one or two centuries in human history, and to a
few countries. The United States could not have become
monarchical, even if the Constitutional Convention had
decreed it, even if the component States had ratified it.
The mystic reverence, the religious allegiance, which are
essential to a true monarchy, are imaginative sentiments
4 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
that no legislature can manufacture in any people. These
semi-filial feelings in government are inherited just as
the true filial feelings in common life. You might as
well adopt a father as make a monarchy: the special
sentiment belonging to the one is as incapable of volun-
tary creation as the peculiar affection belonging to the
other. If the practical part of the English Constitution
could only be made out of a curious accumulation of
mediaeval materials, its interest would be half historical,
and its imitability very confined.
No one can approach to an understanding of the
English institutions, or of others, which, being the growth
of many centuries, exercise a wide sway over mixed
populations, unless he divide them into two classes. In
such constitutions there are two parts (not indeed separ-
able with microscopic accuracy, for the genius of great
affairs abhors nicety of division) : first, those which
excite and preserve the reverence of the population the
dignified parts, if I may so call them ; and next, the
efficient parts those by which it, in fact, works and
rules. There are two great obj ects which every consti-
tution must attain to be successful, which every old and
celebrated one must have wonderfully achieved : every
constitution must first gain authority, and then use
authority; it must first win the loyalty and confidence
of mankind, and then employ that homage in the work
of government.
There are indeed practical men who reject the dig-
nified parts of government. They say, we want only to
attain results, to do business : a constitution is a collection
THE CABINET. 6
of political means for political ends, and if you admit
that any part of a constitution does no business, or that
a simpler machine would do equally well what it does,
you admit that this part of the constitution, however
dignified or awful it may be, is nevertheless in truth use-
less. And other reasoners, who distrust this bare philo-
sophy, have propounded subtle arguments to prove that
these dignified parts of old governments are cardinal
opponents of the essential apparatus, great pivots of
substantial utility ; and so they manufactured fallacies
which the plainer school have well exposed. But both
schools are in error. The dignified parts of government
are those which bring it force which attract its motive
power. The efficient parts only employ that power.
The comely parts of a government have need, for they
are those upon which its vital strength depends. They
may not do anything definite that a simpler polity would
not do better ; but they are the preliminaries, the need-
ful pre-requisites of all work. They raise the army,
though they do not win the battle.
Doubtless, if all subjects of the same government only
thought of what was useful to them, and if they all thought
the same thing useful, and all thought that same thing
could be attained in the same way, the efficient members
of a constitution would suffice, and no impressive adjuncts
would be needed. But the world in which we live is
organised far otherwise.
The most strange fact, though the most certain in
nature, is the unequal development of the human race.
If we look back to the early ages of mankind, such as we
THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
seem in the faint distance to see them if we call up
the image of those dismal tribes in lake villages, or
on wretched beaches scarcely equal to the commonest
material needs, cutting down trees slowly and painfully
with stone tools, hardly resisting the attacks of huge,
fierce animals without culture, without leisure, without
poetry, almost without thought destitute of morality,
with only a sort of magic for religion; and if we compare
that imagined life with the actual life of Europe now, we
are overwhelmed at the wide contrast we can scarcely
conceive ourselves to be of the same race as those in the
far distance. There used to be a notion not so much
widely asserted as deeply implanted, rather pervadingly
latent than commonly apparent in political philosophy
that in a little while, perhaps ten years or so, all human
beings might, without extraordinary appliances, be brought
to the same level. But now, when we see by the painful
history of mankind at what point we began, by what slow
toil, what favourable circumstances, what accumulated
achievements, civilised man has become at all worthy in
any degree so to call himself when we realise the tedium
of history and the painfulness of results our perceptions
are sharpened as to the relative steps of our long and
gradual progress. We have in a great community like
England crowds of people scarcely more civilised than
the majority of two thousand years ago ; we have others,
even more numerous, such as the best people were a thou-
sand years since. The lower orders, the middle orders, are
still, when tried by what is the standard of the educated
" ten thousand," narrow-minded, unintelligent, incurious.
THE CABINET. 7
It is useless to pile up abstract words. Those who doubt
should go out into their kitchens. Let an accomplished
man try what seems to him most obvious, most certain,
most palpable in intellectual matters, upon the housemaid
and the footman, and he will find that what he says seems
unintelligible, confused, and erroneous that his audience
think him mad and wild when he is speaking what is in
his own sphere of thought the dullest platitude of cautious
soberness. Great communities are like great mountains
they have in them the primary, secondary, and tertiary
strata of human progress; the characteristics of the lower
regions resemble the life of old times rather than the
present life of the higher regions. And a philosophy which
does not ceaselessly remember, which does not continually
obtrude, the palpable differences of the various parts, will
be a theory radically false, because it has omitted a capital
reality will be a theory essentially misleading, because
it will lead men to expect what does not exist, and not to
anticipate that which they will find.
Every one knows these plain facts, but by no means
every one has traced their political importance. When a
state is constituted thus, it is not true that the lower
classes will be wholly absorbed in the useful ; on the con-
trary, they do not like anything so poor. No orator ever
made an impression by appealing to men as to their
plainest physical wants, except when he could allege that
those wants were caused by some one's tyranny. But
thousands have made the greatest impression by appealing
to some vague dream of glory, or empire, or nationality.
The ruder sort of men that is, men at one stage of
8 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
rudeness will sacrifice all they hope for, all they have,
themselves, for what is called an idea for some attraction
which seems to transcend reality, which aspires to elevate
men by an interest higher, deeper, wider than that of ordi-
nary life. But this order of men are uninterested in the
plain, palpable ends of government; they do not prize
them; they do not in the least comprehend how they
should be attained. It is very natural, therefore, that
the most useful parts of the structure of government
should by no means be those which excite the most
reverence. The elements which excite the most easy
reverence will be the theatrical elements those which
appeal to the senses, which claim to be embodiments of
the greatest human ideas, which boast in some cases of
far more than human origin. That which is mystic in
its claims ; that which is occult in its mode of action ;
that which is brilliant to the eye; that which is seen
vividly for a moment, and then is seen no more; that
which is hidden and unhidden ; that which is specious,
and yet interesting, palpable in its seeming, and yet
professing to be more than palpable in its results; this,
howsoever its form may change, or however we may
define it or describe it, is the sort of thing the only
sort which yet comes home to the mass of men. So far
from the dignified parts of a constitution being necessarily
the most useful, they are likely, according to outside pre-
sumption, to be the least so; for they are likely to be
adjusted to the lowest orders those likely to care least
and judge worst about what is useful.
There is another reason which, in an old constitution
THE CABINET. 9
like that of England, is hardly less important. The most
intellectual of men are moved quite as much by the cir-
cumstances which they are used to as by their own will.
The active voluntary part of a man is very small, and if it
were not economised by a sleepy kind of habit, its results
would be null. We could not do every day out of our
own heads all we have to do. We should accomplish
nothing, for all our energies would be frittered away in
minor attempts at petty improvement. One man, too,
would go off from the known track in one direction, and
one in another; so that when a crisis came requiring
massed combination, no two men would be near enough to
act together. It is the dull traditional habit of mankind
that guides most men's actions, and is the steady frame in
which each new artist must set the picture that he paints.
And all this traditional part of human nature is, ex vi
termwii, most easily impressed and acted on by that which
is handed down. Other things being equal, yesterday's
institutions are by far the best for to-day ; they are the
most ready, the most influential, the most easy to get
obeyed, the most likely to retain the reverence which
they alone inherit, and which every other must win.
The most imposing institutions of mankind are the oldest;
and yet so changing is the world, so fluctuating are its
needs, so apt to lose inward force, though retaining out-
ward strength, are its best instruments, that we must not
expect the oldest institutions to be now the most efficient.
We must expect what is venerable to acquire influence
because of its inherent dignity ; but we must not expect
it to use that influence so well as new creations apt for the
10 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
modern world, instinct with its spirit, and fitting closely
to its life.
The brief description of the characteristic merit of the
English Constitution is, that its dignified parts are very
complicated and somewhat imposing, very old and rather
venerable ; while its efficient part, at least when in great
and critical action, is decidedly simple and rather modern.
We have made, or rather stumbled on, a constitution
which though full of every species of incidental defect,
though of the worst workmanship in all out-of-the-way
matters of any constitution in the world yet has two
capital merits : it contains a simple efficient part which,
on occasion, and when wanted, can work more simply and
easily, and better, than any instrument of government
that has yet been tried ; and it contains likewise histori-
cal, complex, august, theatrical parts, which it has in-
herited from a long past which take the multitude
which guide by an insensible but an omnipotent influence
the associations of its subjects. Its essence is strong with
the strength of modern simplicity ; its exterior is august
with the Gothic grandeur of a more imposing age. Its
simple essence may, mutatis mutandis, be trans-
planted to many very various countries, but its august
outside what most men think it is is narrowly confined
to nations with an analogous history and similar political
materials.
The efficient secret of the English Constitution may be
described as the close union, the nearly complete fusion,
of the executive and legislative powers. No doubt by the
traditional theory, as it exists in all the books, the
THE CABINET. 11
goodness of our constitution consists in the entire sepa-
ration of the legislative and executive authorities, but in
truth its merit consists in their singular approximation.
The connecting link is the cabinet. By that new word
we mean a committee of the legislative body selected to
be the executive body. The legislature has many com-
mittees, but this is its greatest. It chooses for this, its
main committee, the men in whom it has most confidence.
It does not, it is true, choose them directly; but it is
nearly omnipotent in choosing them indirectly. A cen-
tury ago the Crown had a real choice of ministers, though
it had no longer a choice in policy. During the long
reign of Sir R. Walpole he was obliged not only to
manage parliament but to manage the palace. He was
obliged to take care that some court intrigue did not
expel him from his place. The nation then selected the
English policy, but the Crown chose the English ministers
They were not only in name, as now, but in fact, the
Queen's servants. Remnants, important remnants, of this
great prerogative still remain. The discriminating favour
of William IV. made Lord Melbourne head of the Whig
party when he was only one of several rivals. At the
death of Lord Palmerston it is very likely that the Queen
may have the opportunity of fairly choosing between two,
if not three statesmen. But, as a rule, the nominal prime
minister is chosen by the legislature, and the real prime
minister for most purposes the leader of the House of
Commons almost without exception is so. There is nearly
always some one man plainly selected by the voice of
the predominant party in the predominant house of the
12 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
legislature to head that party, and consequently to rule the
nation. We have in England an elective first magistrate
as truly as the Americans have an elective first magis-
trate. The Queen is only at the head of the dignified
part of the constitution. The prime minister is at the
head of the efficient part. The Crown is, according to
the saying, the " fountain of honour ; " but the Treasury
is the spring of business. Nevertheless, our first magis-
trate differs from the American. He is not elected
directly by the people ; he is elected by the represen-
tatives of the people. He is an example of " double
election." The legislature chosen, in name, to make
laws, in fact finds its principal business in making and
in keeping an executive.
The leading minister so selected has to choose his
associates, but he only chooses among a charmed circle.
The position of most men in parliament forbids their
being invited to the cabinet; the position of a few
men ensures their being invited. Between the com-
pulsory list whom he must take, and the impossible
list whom he cannot take, a prime minister's inde-
pendent choice in the formation of a cabinet is not
very large ; it extends rather to the division of the
cabinet offices than to the choice of cabinet ministers.
Parliament and the nation have pretty well settled
who shall have the first places; but they have not
discriminated with the same accuracy which man shall
have which place. The highest patronage of a prime
minister is, of course, a considerable power, though it
La exercised under close and imperative restrictions
THE CABINET. 13
though it is far less than it seems to be when stated
in theory, or looked at from a distance.
The cabinet, in a word, is a board of control chosen by
the legislature, out of persons whom it trusts and knows,
to rule the nation. The particular mode in which the
English ministers are selected ; the fiction that they are,
in any political sense, the Queen's servants ; the rule which
limits the choice of the cabinet to the members of the
legislature are accidents unessential to its definition
historical incidents separable from its nature. Its charac-
teristic is that it should be chosen by the legislature out
of persons agreeable to and trusted by the legislature.
Naturally these are principally its own members but
they need not be exclusively so. A cabinet which in-
cluded persons not members of the legislative assembly
might still perform all useful duties. Indeed the peers,
who constitute a large element in modern cabinets, are
members, now-a-days, only of a subordinate assembly.
The House of Lords still exercises several useful func-
tions ; but the ruling influence the deciding faculty
has passed to what, using the language of old times, we
still call the lower house to an assembly which, though
inferior as a dignified institution, is superior as an efficient
institution. A principal advantage of the House of Lords
in the present age indeed consists in its thus acting as a
reservoir of cabinet ministers. Unless the composition
of the House of Commons were improved, or unless the
rules requiring cabinet ministers to be members of the
legislature were relaxed, it would undoubtedly be difficult
to find, without the Lords, a sufficient supply of chief
14 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
ministers. But the detail of the composition of a cabinet,
and the precise method of its choice, are not to the pur-
pose now. The first and cardinal consideration is the
definition of a cabinet. We must not bewilder ourselves
with the inseparable accidents until we know the neces-
sary essence. A cabinet is a combining committee
a hyphen which joins, a buckle which fastens, the legis-
lative part of the state to the executive part of the state.
In its origin it belongs to the one, in its functions it
belongs to the other.
The most curious point about the cabinet is that so
very little is known about it. The meetings are not only
secret in theory, but secret in reality. By the present
practice, no official minute in all ordinary cases is kept of
them. Even a private note is discouraged and disliked.
The House of Commons, even in its most inquisitive and
turbulent moments, would scarcely permit a note of a
cabinet meeting to be read. No minister who respected
the fundamental usages of political practice would attempt
to read such a note. The committee which unites the
law-making power to the law-executing power which,
by virtue of that combination, is, while it lasts and holds
together, the most powerful body in the state is a
committee wholly secret. No description of it, at once
graphic and authentic, has ever been given. It is said
to be sometimes like a rather disorderly board of direc-
tors, where many speak and few listen though no one
knows.*
* It is said that at the end of the cabinet which agreed to propose a fixed
duty on corn, Lord Melbourne put his back to the door and said, " Now ia
THE CABINET. 15
But a cabinet, though it is a committee of the legis-
lative assembly, is a committee with a power which no
assembly would unless for historical accidents, and after
happy experience have been persuaded to entrust to any
committee. It is a committee which can dissolve the
assembly which appointed it ; it is a committee with a
suspensive veto a committee with a power of appeal.
Though appointed by one parliament, it can appeal if it
chooses to the next. Theoretically, indeed, the power to
dissolve parliament is entrusted to the sovereign only ;
and there are vestiges of doubt whether in all cases
a sovereign is bound to dissolve parliament when the
cabinet asks him to do so. But neglecting such small
and dubious exceptions, the cabinet which was chosen by
one House of Commons has an appeal to the next House
of Commons. The chief committee of the legislature
has the power of dissolving the predominant part of that
legislature that which at a crisis is the supreme legis-
lature. The English system, therefore, is not an absorp-
tion of the executive power by the legislative power ; it
is a fusion of the two. Either the cabinet legislates and
acts, or else it can dissolve. It is a creature, but it has
the power of destroying its creators. It is an executive
which can annihilate the legislature, as well as an execu-
tive which is the nominee of the legislature. It was
made, but it can unmake ; it was derivative in its origin,
but it is destructive in its action.
it to lower the price of corn or isn't it ? It is not much matter which we
say, but mind, we must all say the same." This is the most graphic story
of a cabinet I ever heard, but I cannot vouch for its truth. Lord Mel-
bourne's is a character about which men make stories.
1(6 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
This fusion of the legislative and executive functions
may, to those who have not much considered it, seem
but a dry and small matter to be the latent essence and
effectual secret of the English constitution ; but we can
only judge of its real importance by looking at a few of
its principal effects, and contrasting it very shortly with
its great competitor, which seems likely, unless care be
taken, to outstrip it in the progress of the world. That
competitor is the Presidential system. The characteristic
of it is that the President is elected from the people by
one process, and the House of Representatives by another.
The independence of the legislative and executive powers
is the specific quality of Presidential Government, just
as their fusion and combination is the precise principle of
Cabinet Government.
First, compare the two in quiet times. The essence
of a civilised age is, that administration requires the con-
tinued aid of legislation. One principal and necessary
kind of legislation is taxation. The expense of civilised
government is continually varying. It must vary if the
government does its duty. The miscellaneous estimates
of the English Government contain an inevitable medley
of changing items. Education, prison discipline, art,
science, civil contingencies of a hundred kinds, require
more money one year and less another. The expense of
defence the naval and military estimates vary still
more as the danger of attack seems more or less immi-
nent, as the means of retarding such danger become
more or less costly. If the persons who have to do the
work are net the same as those who have to make the
THE CABINET. 17
laws, there will be a controversy between the two sets of
persons. The tax-imposers are sure to quarrel with the
tax-requirers. The executive is crippled by not getting
the laws it needs, and the legislature is spoiled by having
to act without responsibility: the executive becomes
unfit for its name, since it cannot execute what it decides
on ; the legislature is demoralised by liberty, by taking
decisions of which others (and not itself) will suffer the
effects.
In America so much has this difficulty been felt that
a semi-connection has grown up between the legislature
and the executive. When the Secretary of the Treasury
of the Federal Government wants a tax he consults
upon it with the Chairman of the Financial Committee
of Congress. He cannot go down to Congress himself
and propose what he wants ; he can only write a letter
and send it. But he tries to get a chairman of the
Finance Committee who likes his tax; through that
chairman he tries to persuade the committee to recom-
mend such tax ; by that committee he tries to induce the
house to adopt that tax. But such a chain of communi-
cations is liable to continual interruptions ; it may suffice
for a single tax on a fortunate occasion, but will scarcely
pass a complicated budget we do not say in a war or a
rebellion we are now comparing the cabinet system and
the presidential system in quiet times but in times of
financial difficulty. Two clever men never exactly agreed
about a budget. We have by present practice an Indian
Chancellor of the Exchequer talking English finance at
Calcutta, and an English one talking Indian finance in
c
18 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
England. But the figures are never the same, and the
views of policy are rarely the same. One most angry
controversy has amused the world, and probably others
scarcely less interesting are hidden in the copious stores
of our Anglo-Indian correspondence.
But relations something like these must subsist be-
tween the head of a finance committee in the legislature,
and a finance minister in the executive.* They are sure
to quarrel, and the result is sure to satisfy neither. And
when the taxes do not yield as they were expected to
yield, who is responsible ? Very likely the secretary of
the treasury could not persuade the chairman very
likely the chairman could not persuade his committee
very likely the committee could not persuade the
assembly. Whom, then, can you punish whom can
you abolish when your taxes run short ? There is
nobody save the legislature, a vast miscellaneous body
difficult to punish, and the very persons to inflict the
punishment.
Nor is the financial part of administration the only
one which requires in a civilised age the constant support
and accompaniment of facilitating legislation. All ad-
ministration does so. In England, on a vital occasion,
the cabinet can compel legislation by the threat of
resignation, and the threat of dissolution ; but neither of
these can be used in a presidential state. There the
legislature cannot be dissolved by the executive govern-
* It is worth observing that even during the short existence of the Con-
federate Government these evils distinctly showed themselves. Almost the
last incident at the Richmond Congress was an angry financial correspon-
dence with Jefferson Davis.
THE CABINET. 19
ment ; and it does not heed a resignation, for it has not
to find the successor. Accordingly, when a difference of
opinion arises, the legislature is forced to fight the exe-
cutive, and the executive is forced to fight the legislative;
and so very likely they contend to the conclusion of
their respective terms.* There is, indeed, one condition
of things in which this description, though still approxi-
mately true, is, nevertheless, not exactly true ; and that
is, when there is nothing to fight about. Before the
rebellion in America, owing to the vast distance of other
states, and the favourable economical condition of the
country, there were very few considerable objects of
contention ; but if that government had been tried by
English legislation of the last thirty years, the discordant
action of the two powers, whose constant co-operation is
essential to the best government, would have shown
itself much more distinctly.
Nor is this the worst. Cabinet government educates
the nation; the presidential does not educate it, and
may corrupt it. It has been said that England invented
the phrase, "Her Majesty's Opposition; " that it was the
first government which made a criticism of administra-
tion as much a part of the polity as administration itself.
This critical opposition is the consequence of cabinet
government. The great scene of debate, the great engine
of popular instruction and political controversy, is the
legislative assembly. A speech there by an eminent
* I leave this passage to stand as it was written, just after the
assassination of Mr. Lincoln, and when every one said Mr. Johnson would
be very hostile to the South.
20 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
statesman, a party movement by a great political com-
bination, are the best means yet known for arousing,
enlivening, and teaching a people. The cabinet system
ensures such debates, for it makes them the means by
which statesmen advertise themselves for future and con-
firm themselves in present governments. It brings for-
ward men eager to speak, and gives them occasions to
speak. The deciding catastrophes of cabinet govern-
ments are critical divisions preceded by fine discussions.
Everything which is worth saying, everything which
ought to be said, most certainly will be said. Conscientious
men think they ought to persuade others ; selfish men
think they would like to obtrude themselves. The nation
is forced to hear two sides all the sides, perhaps, of
that which most concerns it. And it likes to hear it is
eager to know. Human nature despises long arguments
which come to nothing heavy speeches which precede no
motion abstract disquisitions which leave visible things
where they were. But all men heed great results, and
a change of government is a great result. It has a hun-
dred ramifications; it runs through society; it gives
hope to many, and it takes away hope from many. It
is one of those marked events which, by its magnitude
and its melodrama, impress men even too much. And
debates which have this catastrophe at the end of them
or may so have it are sure to be listened to, and sure
to sink deep into the national mind.
Travellers even in the Northern States of America,
the greatest and best of presidential countries, have
noticed that the nation was " not specially addicted to
THE CABINET. 21
politics ; " that they have not a public opinion finished
and chastened as that of the English has been finished
and chastened. A great many hasty writers have charged
this defect on the " Yankee race," on the Anglo-American
character ; but English people, if they had no motive to
attend to politics, certainly would not attend to politics.
At present there is business in their attention. They
assist at the determining crisis ; they assist or help it.
Whether the government will go out or remain is deter-
mined by the debate, and by the division in parliament.
And the opinion out of doors, the secret pervading
disposition of society, has a great influence on that
division. The nation feels that its judgment is im-
portant, and it strives to judge. It succeeds in deciding
because the debates and the discussions give it the facts
and the arguments. But under a presidential govern-
ment, a nation has, except at the electing moment, no
influence ; it has not the ballot-box before it ; its virtue
is gone, and it must wait till its instant of despotism
again returns. It is not incited to form an opinion like
a nation under a cabinet government; nor is it in-
structed like such a nation. There are doubtless debates
in the legislature, but they are prologues without a play.
There is nothing of a catastrophe about them ; you can-
not turn out the government. The prize of power is
not in the gift of the legislature, and no one cares for the
egislature. The executive, the great centre of power
and place, sticks irremovable ; you cannot change it in
any event. The teaching apparatus which has educated
our public mind, which prepares our resolutions, which
22 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
shapes our opinions, does not exist. No presidential
country needs to form daily, delicate opinions, or is
helped in forming them.
It might be thought that the discussions in the press
would supply the deficiencies in the constitution ; that by
a reading people especially, the conduct of their govern-
ment would be as carefully watched, that their opinions
about it would be as consistent, as accurate, as well con-
sidered, under a presidential as under a cabinet polity.
But the same difficulty oppresses the press which op-
presses the legislature. It can do nothing. It cannot
change the administration ; the executive was elected
for such and such years, and for such and such years it
must last. People wonder that so literary a people as
the Americans a people who read more than any
people who ever lived, who read so many newspapers
should have such bad newspapers. The papers are not
so good as the English, because they have not the same
motive to be good as the English papers. At a political
"crisis," as we say that is, when the fate of an ad-
ministration is unfixed, when it depends on a few votes
yet unsettled, upon a wavering and veering opinion
effective articles in great journals become of essential
moment. The Times has made many ministries. When,
as of late, there has been a long continuance of divided
parliaments, of governments which were without " brute
voting power," and which depended on intellectual
strength, the support of the most influential organ of
English opinion has been of critical moment. If a
Washington newspaper could have turned out Mr.
THE CABINET. 23
Lincoln, there would have been good writing and fine
argument in the Washington newspapers. But the
Washington newspapers can no more remove a president
during his term of place than the Times can remove a
lord mayor during his year of office. Nobody cares for
a debate in Congress which comes to nothing," and no
one reads long articles which have no influence on events.
The Americans glance at the heads of news, and through
the paper. They do not enter upon a discussion. They
do not think of entering upon a discussion which would
be useless.
After saying that the division of the legislature and
the executive in presidential governments weakens the
legislative power, it may seem a contradiction to say
that it also weakens the executive power. But it is not
a contradiction. The division weakens the whole aggre-
gate force of government the entire imperial power;
and therefore it weakens both its halves. The executive
is weakened in a very plain way. In England a strong
cabinet can obtain the concurrence of the legislature in
all acts which facilitate its administration ; it is itself, so
to say, the legislature. But a president may be hampered
by the parliament, and is likely to be hampered. The
natural tendency of the members of every legislature is
to make themselves conspicuous. They wish to gratify
an ambition laudable or blamable ; they wish to promote
the measures they think best for the public welfare ; they
wish to make their will felt in great affairs. All these
mixed motives urge them to oppose the executive. They
are embodying the purposes of others if they aid; they
24 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION".
are advancing their own opinions if they defeat : they are
first if they vanquish ; they are auxiliaries if they sup-
port. The weakness of the American executive used to
be the great theme of all critics before the Confederate
rebellion. Congress and committees of Congress of
course impeded the executive when there was no coercive
public sentiment to check and rule them.
But the presidential system not only gives the exe-
cutive power an antagonist in the legislative power, and
so makes it weaker ; it also enfeebles it by impairing its
intrinsic quality. "A cabinet is elected by a legislature ;
and when that legislature is composed of fit persons, that
mode of electing the executive is the very best. It is a
case of secondary election, under the only conditions in
which secondary election is preferable to primary. Gene-
rally speaking, in an electioneering country (I mean in a
country full of political life, and used to the manipulation
of popular institutions), the election of candidates to elect
candidates is a farce. The Electoral College of America
is so. It was intended that the deputies when assembled
should exercise a real discretion, and by independent
choice select the president. But the primary electors
take too much interest. They only elect a deputy to
vote for Mr. Lincoln or Mr. Breckenridge, and the deputy
only takes a ticket, and drops that ticket in an urn. He
never chooses or thinks of choosing. He is but a mes-
senger a transmitter; the real decision is in those who
choose him who chose him because they knew what he
would do.
It is true that the British House of Commons is sub-
THE CABINET. 25
ject to the same influences. Members are mostly, per-
haps, elected because they will vote for a particular
ministry, rather than for purely legislative reasons. But
and here is the capital distinction the functions of
the House of Commons are important and continuous.
It does not, like the Electoral College in the United
States, separate when it has elected its ruler ; it watches,
legislates, seats and unseats ministries, from day to day.
Accordingly it is a real electoral body. The parliament
of 1857, which, more than any other parliament of late
years, was a parliament elected to support a particular
premier which was chosen, as Americans might say,
upon the "Palmerston ticket" before it had been in
existence two years, dethroned Lord Palmerston. Though
selected in the interest of a particular ministry, it in
fact destroyed that ministry.
A good parliament, too, is a capital choosing body.
If it is fit to make laws for a country, its majority ought
to represent the general average intelligence of that
country; its various members ought to represent the
various special interests, special opinions, special pre-
judices, to be found in that community. There ought
to be an advocate for every particular sect, and a vast
neutral body of no sect homogeneous and judicial, like
the nation itself. Such a body, when possible, is the
best selecter of executives that can be imagined. It is
full of political activity; it is close to political life; it
feels the responsibility of affairs which are brought as
it were to its threshold ; it has as much intelligence as
the society in question chances to contain. It is, what
26 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Washington and Hamilton strove to create, an electoral
college of the picked men of the nation.
The best mode of appreciating its advantages is to
look at the alternative. The competing constituency is
the nation itself, and this is, according to theory and ex-
perience, in all but the rarest cases, a bad constituency.
Mr. Lincoln, at his second election, being elected when
all the Federal states had set their united hearts on one
single object, was voluntarily re-elected by an actually
choosing nation. He embodied the object in which
every one was absorbed. But this is almost the only
presidential election of which so much can be said. In
almost all cases the President is chosen by a machinery
of caucuses and combinations too complicated to be
perfectly known, and too familiar to require de-
scription. He is not the choice of the nation, he is the
choice of the wire-pullers. A very large constituency
in quiet times is the necessary, almost the legitimate,
subject of electioneering management: a man cannot
know that he does not throw his vote away except he
votes as part of some great organisation ; and if he votes
as a part, he abdicates his electoral function in favour of
the managers of that association. The nation, even if it
chose for itself, would, in some degree, be an unskilled
body ; but when it does not choose for itself, but only as
latent agitators wish, it is like a large, lazy man, with a
small vicious mind, it moves slowly and heavily, but
it moves at the bidding of a bad intention ; it " means
little, but it means that little ill."
And, as the nation is less able to choose than a par-
THE CABINET. 27
liament, so it has worse people to choose out of. The
American legislators of the last century have been much
blamed for not permitting the ministers of the President
to be members of the assembly ; but, with reference to
the specific end which they had in view, they saw clearly
and decided wisely. They wished to keep "the legis-
lative branch absolutely distinct from the executive
branch ; " they believed such a separation to be essential
to a good constitution ; they believed such a separation
to exist in the English, which the wisest of them thought
the best constitution. And, to the effectual maintenance
of such a separation, the exclusion of the President's
ministers from the legislature is essential. If they are
not excluded they become the executive, they eclipse the
President himself. A legislative chamber is greedy and
covetous; it acquires as much, it concedes as little as
possible. The passions of its members are its rulers ; the
law-making faculty, the most comprehensive of the im-
perial faculties, is its instrument ; it will take the admin-
istration if it can take it. Tried by their own aims, the
founders of the United States were wise in excluding the
ministers from Congress.
But though this exclusion is essential to the pre-
sidential system of government, it is not for that reason
a small eviL It causes the degradation of public life.
Unless a member of the legislature be sure of something
more than speech, unless he is incited by the hope of
action, and chastened by the chance of responsibility, a
first-rate man will not care to take the place, and will
not do much if he does take it. To belong to a debating
28 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
society adhering to an executive (and this is no inapt
description of a congress under a presidential constitu-
tion) is not an object to stir a noble ambition, and is a
position to encourage idleness. The members of a parlia-
ment excluded from office can never be comparable, much
less equal, to those of a parliament, not excluded from
office. The presidential government, by its nature,
divides political life into two halves, an executive half
and a legislative half; and, by so dividing it, makes
neither half worth a man's having worth his making it
a continuous career worthy to absorb, as cabinet govern-
ment absorbs, his whole soul. The statesmen from
whom a nation chooses under a presidential system are
much inferior to those from whom it chooses under a
cabinet system, while the selecting apparatus is also far
less discerning.
All these differences are more important at critical
periods, because government itself is more important. A
formed public opinion, a respectable, able, and disciplined
legislature, a well-chosen executive, a parliament and an
administration not thwarting each other, but co-operating
with each other, are of greater consequence when great
affairs are in progress than when small affairs are in pro-
gress when there is much to do than when there is little
to do. But in addition to this, a parliamentary or cabinet
constitution possesses an additional and special advantage
in very dangerous times. It has what we may call a re-
serve of power fit for and needed by extreme exigencies.
The principle of popular government is that the supreme
power, the determining efficacy in matters political, resides
THE CABINET. 29
in the people not necessarily or commonly in the whole
people, in the numerical majority, but in a chosen people,
a picked and selected people. It is so in England ; it is
so in all free countries. Under a cabinet constitution at
a sudden emergency this people can choose a ruler for the
occasion. It is quite possible and even likely that he
would not be ruler before the occasion. The great quali-
ties, the imperious will, the rapid energy, the eager nature
fit for a great crisis are not required are impediments
in common times. A Lord Liverpool is better in every-
day politics than a Chatham a Louis Philippe far better
than a Napoleon. By the structure of the world we often
want, at the sudden occurrence of a grave tempest, to
change the helmsman to replace the pilot of the calm
by the pilot of the storm. In England we have had so
few catastrophes since our constitution attained maturity,
that we hardly appreciate this latent excellence. We have
not needed a Cavour to rule a revolution a representative
man above all men fit for a great occasion, and by a
natural legal mode brought in to rule. But even in
England, at what was the nearest to a great sudden crisis
which we have had of late years at the Crimean difficulty
we used this inherent power. We abolished the
Aberdeen cabinet, the ablest we have had, perhaps, since
the Reform Act a cabinet not only adapted, but
eminently adapted, for every sort of difficulty save the
one it had to meet which abounded in pacific discretion,
and was wanting only in the " daemonic element ; " we
chose a statesman, who had the sort of merit then wanted,
who, when he feels the steady power of England behind
SO THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
him, will advance without reluctance, and will strike with-
out restraint. As was said at the time, " We turned out
the Quaker, and put in the pugilist."
But under a presidential government you can do
nothing of the kind. The American government calls
itself a government of the supreme people; but at a
quick crisis, the time when a sovereign power is most
needed, you cannot find the supreme people. You have
got a Congress elected for one fixed period, going out
perhaps by fixed instalments, which cannot be accelerated
or retarded you have a President chosen for a fixed
period, and immovable during that period: all the ar-
rangements are for stated times. There is no elastic
element, everything is rigid, specified, dated. Come what
may, you can quicken nothing, and can retard nothing.
You have bespoken your government in advance, and
whether it suits you or not, whether it works well or
works ill, whether it is what you want or not, by law
you must keep it. In a country of complex foreign
relations it would mostly happen that the first and most
critical year of every war would be managed by a peace
premier, and the first and most critical years of peace by
a war premier. In each case the period of transition
would be irrevocably governed by a man selected not for
what he was to introduce, but what he was to change
for the policy he was to abandon, not for the policy he
was to administer.
The whole history of the American civil war a
history which has thrown an intense light on the work-
ing of a presidential government at the time when
THE CABINET. 31
government is most important is but a vast continuous
commentary on these reflections. It would, indeed, be
absurd to press against presidential government as such
the singular defect by which Vice-President Johnson has
become President by which a man elected to a sinecure
is fixed in what is for the moment the most important
administrative part in the political world. This defect,
though most characteristic of the expectations* of the
framers of the constitution and of its working, is but an
accident of this particular case of presidential govern-
ment, and no necessary ingredient in that government
itself. But the first election of Mr. Lincoln is liable to no
such objection. It was a characteristic instance of the
natural working of such a government upon a great
occasion. And what was that working? It may be
summed up it was government by an unknown
quantity. Hardly any one in America had any living
idea what Mr. Lincoln was like, or any definite notion
what he would do. The leading statesmen under the
system of cabinet government are not only household
words, but household ideas. A conception, not, perhaps,
in all respects a true but a most vivid conception of what
Mr. Gladstone is like, or what Lord Palmerston is like,
runs through society. We have simply no notion what
it would be to be left with the visible sovereignty in the
hands of an unknown man. The notion of employing a
man of unknown smallness at a crisis of unknown great-
* The framers of the constitution expected that the vice-president
would be elected by the Electoral College as the second wisest man in
the country. The vice-presidentship being a sinecure, a second-rate man
agreeable to the wire-pullers is always smuggled in. The chance of sue-
cession to the presidentship is too distant to be thought of.
32 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
ness is to our minds simply ludicrous. Mr. Lincoln, it is
true, happened to be a man, if not of eminent ability, yet of
eminent justness. There was an inner depth of Puritan
nature which came out under suffering, and was very attrac-
tive. But success in a lottery is no argument for lotteries.
What were the chances against a person of Lincoln's ante-
cedents, elected as he was, proving to be what he was ?
Such an incident is, however, natural to a presidential
government. The President is elected by processes which
forbid the election of known men, except at peculiar
conjunctures, and in moments when public opinion is
excited and despotic ; and consequently if a crisis comes
upon us soon after he is elected, inevitably we have
government by an unknown quantity the superin-
tendence of that crisis by what our great satirist would
have called " Statesman X." Even in quiet times,
government by a president is, for the several various
reasons which have been stated, inferior to government
by a cabinet ; but the difficulty of quiet times is nothing
as compared with the difficulty of unquiet times. The
comparative deficiencies of the regular, common operation
of a presidential government are far less than the com-
parative deficiencies in time of sudden trouble the want
of elasticity, the impossibility of a dictatorship, the
total absence of a revolutionary reserve.
This contrast explains why the characteristic quality
of cabinet governments the fusion of the executive
power with the legislative power is of such cardinal
importance. I shall proceed to show under what form
and with what adjuncts it exists in England.
33
No. IL
THE MONARCHY.
THE use of the Queen, in a dignified capacity, is incal-
culable. Without her in England, the present English
Government would fail and pass away. Most people
when they read that the Queen walked on the slopes at
Windsor that the Prince of Wales went to the Derby
have imagined that too much thought and prominence
were given to little things. But they have been in error ;
and it is nice to trace how the actions of a retired widow
and an unemployed youth become of such importance.
The best reason why Monarchy is a strong govern-
ment is, that it is an intelligible government. The mass
of mankind understand it, and they hardly anywhere in
the world understand any other. It is often said that
men are ruled by their imaginations; but it would be
truer to say they are governed by the weakness of their
imaginations. The nature of a constitution, the action
of an assembly, the play of parties, the unseen formation
of a guiding opinion, are complex facts, difficult to know
and easy to mistake. But the action of a single will,
the fiat of a single mind, are easy ideas : anybody can
make them out, and no one can ever forget them. When
D
34 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
you put before the mass of mankind the question, " "Will
you be governed by a king, or will you be governed by
a constitution ? " the inquiry comes out thus " Will you
be governed in a way you understand, or will you be
governed in a way you do not understand ? " The issue
was put to the French people ; they were asked, " Will
you be governed by Louis Napoleon, or will you be
governed by an assembly?" The French people said,
" We will be governed by the one man we can imagine,
and not by the many people we cannot imagine."
The best mode of comprehending the nature of the
two governments, is to look at a country in which the
two have within a comparatively short space of years
succeeded each other.
"The political condition," says Mr. Grote, "which
Grecian legend everywhere presents to us, is in its prin-
cipal features strikingly different from that which had
become universally prevalent among the Greeks in the
time of the Peloponnesian war. Historical oligarchy,
as well as democracy, agreed in requiring a certain
established system of government, comprising the three
elements of specialised functions, temporary functionaries,
and ultimate responsibility (under some forms or other)
to the mass of qualified citizens either a Senate or an
Ecclesia, or both. There were, of course, many and
capital distinctions between one government and another,
in respect to the qualification of the citizen, the attributes
and efficiency of the general assembly, the admissibility to
power, &c. ; and men might often be dissatisfied with the
way in which these questions were determined in their
THE MONAECHY. 35
own city. But in the mind of every man, some deter-
mining rule or system something like what in modern
times is called a constitution was indispensable to any
government entitled to be called legitimate, or capable of
creating in the mind of a Greek a feeling of moral obli-
gation to obey it. The functionaries who exercise autho-
rity under it might be more or less competent or popular ;
but his personal feelings towards them were commonly
lost in his attachment or aversion to the general system.
If any energetic man could by audacity or craft break
down the constitution, and render himself permanent
ruler according to his own will and pleasure, even though
he might govern well, he could never inspire the people
with any sentiment of duty towards him : his sceptre
was illegitimate from the beginning, and even the taking
of his life, far from being interdicted by that moral
feeling which condemned the shedding of blood in other,
cases, was considered meritorious : he could not even be
mentioned in the language except by a name (rvpawog
despot) which branded him as an object of mingled fear
and dislike.
" If we carry our eyes back from historical to legen-
dary Greece, we find a picture the reverse of what has
been here sketched. We discern a government in which
there is little or no scheme or system, still less any idea
of responsibility to the governed, but in which the main-
spring of obedience on the part of the people consists in
their personal feeling and reverence towards the chief.
We remark, first and foremost, the King ; next, a limited
number of subordinate kings or chiefs ; afterwards, the
36 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
mass of armed freemen, husbandmen, artisans, freebooters,
&c. ; lowest of all, the free labourers for hire and the
bought slaves. The King is not distinguished by any
broad, or impassable boundary from the other chiefs, to
each of whom the title Basileus is applicable as well as
to himself: his supremacy has been inherited from his
ancestors, and passes by inheritance, as a general rule, to
his eldest son, having been conferred upon the family as
a privilege by the favour of Zeus. In war, he is the
leader, foremost in personal prowess, and directing all
military movements ; in peace, he is the general protector
of the injured and oppressed ; he offers up moreover those
public prayers and sacrifices which are intended to obtain
for the whole people the favour of the gods. An ample
domain is assigned to him as an appurtenance of his lofty
position, and the produce of his fields and his cattle is
consecrated in part to an abundant, though rude hospi-
tality. Moreover he receives frequent presents, to avert
his enmity, to conciliate his favour, or to buy off his
exactions ; and when plunder is taken from the enemy,
a large previous share, comprising probably the most
alluring female captive, is reserved for him apart from
the general distribution.
" Such is the position of the King in the heroic times
of Greece the only person (if we except the herald,
and priests, each both special and subordinate) who is
then presented to us as clothed with any individual
authority the person by whom all the executive
functions, then few in number, which the society re-
quires, are either performed or directed. His personal
THE MONARCHY. 37
ascendancy derived from divine countenance bestowed
both upon himself individually and upon his race, and
probably from accredited divine descent is the salient
feature in the picture : the people hearken to his voice,
embrace his propositions, and obey his orders : not merely
resistance, but even criticism upon his acts, is generally
exhibited in an odious point of view, and is indeed never
heard of except from some one or more of the subordinate
princes."
The characteristic of the English Monarchy is that it
retains the feelings by which the heroic kings governed
their rude age, and has added the feelings by which the
constitutions of later Greece ruled in more refined ages
We are a more mixed people than the Athenians, or pro-
bably than any political Greeks. We have progressed
more unequally. The slaves in ancient times were a
separate order ; not ruled by the same laws, or thoughts,
as other men. It was not necessary to think of them in
making a constitution : it was not necessary to improve
them in order to make a constitution possible. The
Greek legislator had not to combine in his polity men
like the labourers of Somersetshire, and men like Mr.
Grote. He had not to deal with a community in which
primitive barbarism lay as a recognised basis to acquired
civilisation. We have. We have no slaves to keep
down by special terrors and independent legislation.
But we have whole classes unable to comprehend the
idea of a constitution unable to feel the least attachment
to impersonal laws. Most do indeed vaguely know that
there are some other institutions besides the Queen, and
38 THE ENGLISH CONSTITt/TION.
some rules by which she governs. But a vast number
like their minds to dwell more upon her than upon
anything else, and therefore she is inestimable. A re-
public has only difficult ideas in government ; a Consti-
tutional Monarchy has an easy idea too; it has a
comprehensible element for the vacant many, as well as
complex laws and notions for the inquiring few.
A family on the throne is an interesting idea also.
It brings down the pride of sovereignty to the level of
petty life. No feeling could seem more childish than the
enthusiasm of the English at the marriage of the Prince
of Wales. They treated as a great political event, what,
looked at as a matter of pure business, was very small
indeed. But no feeling could be more like common
human nature as it is, and as it is likely to be. The
women one half the human race at least care fifty
times more for a marriage than a ministry. All but a
few cynics like to see a pretty novel touching for a
moment the dry scenes of the grave world. A princely
marriage is the brilliant edition of a universal fact, and,
as such, it rivets mankind. We smile at the Court
Circular; but remember how many people read the
Court Circular ! Its use is not in what it says, but in
those to whom it speaks. They say that the Americans
were more pleased at the Queen's letter to Mrs. Lincoln,
than at any act of the English Government. It was a
spontaneous act of intelligible feeling in the midst of
confused and tiresome business. Just so a royal family
sweetens politics by the seasonable addition of nice and
pretty events. It introduces irrelevant facts into the
THE MONARCHY. 39
business of government, but they are facts which speak
to "men's bosoms" and employ their thoughts.
To state the matter shortly, Royalty is a government
in which the attention of the nation is concentrated on
one person doing interesting actions. A Republic is a
government in which that attention is divided between
many, who are all doing uninteresting actions. Ac-
cordingly, so long as the human heart is strong and the
human reason weak, royalty will be strong because it
appeals to diffused feeling, and Republics weak because
they appeal to the understanding.
Secondly. The English Monarchy strengthens our
government with the strength of religion. It is not easy
to say why it should be so. Every instructed theologian
would say that it was the duty of a person born under
a Republic as much to obey that Republic as it is the
duty of one born under a Monarchy to obey the monarch.
But the mass of the English people do not think so; they
agree with the oath of allegiance ; they say it is their
duty to obey the "Queen," and they have but hazy
notions as to obeying laws without a queen. In former
times, when our constitution was incomplete, this notion
of local holiness in one part was mischievous. All parts
were struggling, and it was necessary each should have
its full growth. But superstition said one should grow
where it would, and no other part should grow without
its leave. The whole cavalier party said it was their
duty to obey the King, whatever the king did. There
was to be " passive obedience " to him, and there was no
religious obedience due to any one else. He was the
40 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
" Lord's anointed," and no one else had been anointed at
all. The parliament, the laws, the press were human
institutions ; but the Monarchy was a divine institution.
An undue advantage was given to a part of the con-
stitution, and therefore the progress of the whole was
stayed.
After the Revolution this mischievous sentiment was
much weaker. The change of the line of sovereigns was
at first conclusive. If there was a mystic right in any
one, that right was plainly in James II. ; if it was an
English duty to obey any one whatever he did, he was
the person to be so obeyed: if there was an inherent
inherited claim in any king, it was in the Stuart king tc
whom the crown had come by descent, and not in the
Revolution king to whom it had come by vote of Parlia-
ment. All through the reign of William III. there was
(in common speech) one king whom man had made, and
another king whom God had made. The king who ruled
had no consecrated loyalty to build upon ; although he
ruled in fact, according to sacred theory there was a
king in France who ought to rule. But it was very hard
for the English people, with their plain sense and slow
imagination, to keep up a strong sentiment of veneration
for a foreign adventurer. He lived under the protection
of a French king ; what he did was commonly stupid,
and what he left undone was very often wise. As soon
as Queen Anne began to reign there was a change of
feeling ; the old sacred sentiment began to cohere about
her. There were indeed difficulties which would have
baffled most people ; but an Englishman whose heart is
THE MONARCHY. 41
in a matter is not easily baffled. Queen Anne had a
brother living and a father living, and by every rule of
descent, their right was better than hers. But many
people evaded both claims. They said James II. had
" run away," and so abdicated, though he only ran away
because he was in duresse and was frightened, and
though he claimed the allegiance of his subjects day by
day. The Pretender, it was said, was not legitimate,
though the birth was proved by evidence which any
Court of Justice would have accepted. The English
people were "out of" a sacred monarch, and so they
tried very hard to make a new one. Events, however,
were too strong for them. They were ready and eager
to take Queen Anne as the stock of a new dynasty ;
they were ready to ignore the claims of her father and
the claims of her brother, but they could not ignore the
fact that at the critical period she had no children. She
had once had thirteen, but they all died in her lifetime,
and it was necessary either to revert to the Stuarts or
to make a new king by Act of Parliament.
According to the Act of Settlement passed by the
Whigs, the crown was settled on the descendants of the
" Princess Sophia " of Hanover, a younger daughter of a
daughter of James I. There were before her James II.,
his son, the descendants of a daughter of Charles I., and
elder children of her own mother. But the Whigs passed
these over because they were Catholics, and selected the
Princess Sophia, who, if she was anything, was a Protes-
tant. Certainly this selection was statesmanlike, but it
could not be very popular. It was quite impossible to say
42 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
that it was the duty of the English people to obey the
House of Hanover upon any principles which do not
concede the right of the people to choose their rulers, and
which do not degrade monarchy from its solitary pinnacle
of majestic reverence, and make it one only among many
expedient institutions. If a king is a useful public func-
tionary who may be changed, and in whose place you may
make another, you cannot regard him with mystic awe and
wonder : and if you are bound to worship him, of course
you cannot change him. Accordingly, during the whole
reigns of George I. and George II. the sentiment of
religious loyalty altogether ceased to support the Crown.
The prerogative of the king had no strong party to
support it ; the Tories, who naturally would support it,
disliked the actual king; and the Whigs, according to
their creed, disliked the king's office. Until the accession
of George III. the most vigorous opponents of the Crown
were the country gentlemen, its natural friends, and the
representatives of quite rural districts, where loyalty is
mostly to be found, if anywhere. But after the accession
of George III. the common feeling came back to the same
point as in Queen Anne's time. The English were ready
to take the new young prince as the beginning of a sacred
line of sovereigns, just as they had been willing to take
an old lady, who was the second cousin of his great-great-
grandmother. So it is now. If you ask the immense
majority of the Queen's subjects by what right she rules,
they would never tell you that she rules by Parliamentary
right, by virtue of 6 Anne, c. 7. They will say she rules
by " God's Grace ; " they believe that they have a mystic
THE MONARCHY. 43
obligation to obey her. When her family came to the
Crown it was a sort of treason to maintain the inalien-
able right of lineal sovereignty, for it was equivalent
to saying that the claim of another family was better
than hers : but now, in the strange course of human
events, that very sentiment has become her surest and
best support.
But it would be a great mistake to believe that at the
accession of George III. the instinctive sentiment of
hereditary loyalty at once became as useful as now. It
began to be powerful, but it hardly began to be useful
There was so much harm done by it as well as so much
good, that it is quite capable of being argued whether on
the whole it was beneficial or hurtful. Throughout the
greater part of his life George III. was a kind of " conse-
crated obstruction." Whatever he did had a sanctity
different from what any one else did, and it perversely
happened that he was commonly wrong. He had as good
intentions as any one need have, and he attended to the
business of his country, as a clerk with his bread to get
attends to the business of his office. But his mind was
small, his education limited, and he lived in a changing
time. Accordingly he was always resisting what ought to
be, and prolonging what ought not to be. He was the
sinister but sacred assailant of half his ministries ; and
when the French revolution excited the horror of the
world, and proved democracy to be " impious," the piety
of England concentrated upon him, and gave him tenfold
strength. The monarchy by its religious sanction now
confirms all our political order; in George IIL's time it
44 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
confirmed little except itself. It gives now a vast strength
to the entire constitution, by enlisting on its behalf the
credulous obedience of enormous masses ; then it lived
aloof, absorbed all the holiness into itself, and turned over
all the rest of the polity to the coarse justification of bare
expediency.
A principal reason why the monarchy so well conse-
crates our whole state is to be sought in the peculiarity
many Americans and many utilitarians smile at. They
laugh at this " extra," as the Yankee called it, at the
solitary transcendent element. They quote Napoleon's
saying, " that he did not wish to be fatted in idleness,"
when he refused to be grand elector in Sieyes' constitu-
tion, which was an office copied, and M. Thiers says, well
copied, from constitutional monarchy. But such objec-
tions are wholly wrong. No doubt it was absurd enough
in the Abbe Sieyes to propose that a new institution,
inheriting no reverence, and made holy by no religion,
should be created to fill the sort of post occupied by a
constitutional king in nations of monarchical history.
Such an institution, far from being so august as to spread
reverence around it, is too novel and artificial to get
reverence for itself; if, too, the absurdity could anyhow
be augmented, it was so by offering an office of inactive
uselessness and pretended sanctity to Napoleon, the most
active man in France, with the greatest genius for busi-
ness, only not sacred, and exclusively fit for action. But
the blunder of Sieyes brings the excellence of real
monarchy to the best light. When a monarch can bless,
it is best that he should not be touched. It should be
THE MONARCHY. 45
evident that he does no wrong. He should not be
brought too closely to real measurement. He should be
aloof and solitary. As the functions of English royalty
are for the most part latent, it fulfils this condition. It
seems to order, but it never seems to struggle. It is
commonly hidden like a mystery, and sometimes paraded
like a pageant, but in neither case is it contentious. The
nation is divided into parties, but the crown is of no
party. Its apparent separation from business is that
which removes it both from enmities and from desecra-
tion, which preserves its mystery, which enables it to
combine the affection of conflicting parties to be a
visible symbol of unity to those still so imperfectly
educated as to need a symbol
Thirdly. The Queen is the head of our society. If
she did not exist the Prime Minister would be the first
person in the country. He and his wife would have to
receive foreign ministers, and occasionally foreign princes,
to give the first parties in the country ; he and she would
be at the head of the pageant of life ; they would repre-
sent England in the eyes of foreign nations ; they would
represent the Government of England in the eyes of the
English.
It is very easy to imagine a world in which this
change would not be a great evil. In a country where
people did not care for the outward show of life, where
the genius of the people was untheatrical, and they exclu-
sively regarded the substance of things, this matter would
be trifling. Whether Lord and Lady Derby received the
foreign ministers, or Lord and Lady Palmerston, would
46 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
be a matter of indifference; whether they gave the
nicest parties would be important only to the persons at
those parties. A nation of unimpressible philosophers
would not care at all how the externals of life were
managed. Who is the showman is not material unless
you care about the show.
But of all nations in the world the English are per-
haps the least a nation of pure philosophers. It would
be a very serious matter to us to change every four or five
years the visible head of our world. We are not now
remarkable for the highest sort of ambition ; but we are
remarkable for having a great deal of the lower sort of
ambition and envy. The House of Commons is thronged
! with people who get there merely for " social purposes,"
as the phrase goes ; that is, that they and their families
may go to parties else impossible. Members of Parlia-
ment are envied by thousands merely for this frivolous
glory, as a thinker calls it. If the highest post in con-
spicuous life were thrown open to public competition,
this low sort of ambition and envy would be fearfully in-
creased. Politics would offer a prize too dazzling for
mankind ; clever base people would strive for it, and
stupid base people would envy it. Even now a dangerous
distinction is given by what is exclusively called public
life. The newspapers describe daily and incessantly a
certain conspicuous existence; they comment on its
characters, recount its details, investigate its motives,
anticipate its course. They give a precedent and a
dignity to that world which they do not give to any
other. The literary world, the scientific world, the philo-
THE MONARCHY. 47
sophic world, not only are not comparable in dignity to
the political world, but in comparison are hardly worlds
at all. The newspaper makes no mention of them, and
could not mention them. As are the papers, so are the
readers; they, by irresistible sequence and association,
believe that those people who constantly figure in the
papers are cleverer, abler, or at any rate, somehow higher,
than other people. " I wrote books," we heard of a man
saying, " for twenty years, and I was nobody ; I got into
Parliament, and before I had taken my seat I had become
somebody." English politicians are the men who fill the
thoughts of the English public : they are the actors on
the scene, and it is hard for the admiring spectators not
to believe that the admired actor is greater than them-
selves. In this present age and country it would be very
dangerous to give the slightest addition to a force already
perilously great. If the highest social rank was to be
scrambled for in the House of Commons, the number
of social adventurers there would be incalculably more
numerous, and indefinitely more eager.
A very peculiar combination of causes has made this
characteristic one of the most prominent in English
society. The middle ages left all Europe with a social
system headed by Courts. The government was made
the head of all society, all intercourse, and all life ; every-
thing paid allegiance to the sovereign, and everything
ranged itself round the sovereign what was next to be
greatest, and what was farthest least. The idea that the
head of the government is the head of society is so fixed
in the ideas of mankind that only a few philosophers
43 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
regard it as historical and accidental, though when the
matter is examined, that conclusion is certain and even
obvious.
In the first place, society as society does not naturally
need a head at all. Its constitution, if left to itself, is
not monarchical, but aristocratical. Society, in the sense
we are now talking of, is the union of people for amuse-
ment and conversation. The making of marriages goes
on in it, as it were, incidentally, but its common and
main concern is talking and pleasure. There is nothing
in this which needs a single supreme head ; it is a pursuit
in which a single person does not of necessity dominate.
By nature it creates an " upper ten thousand ; " a certain
number of persons and families possessed of equal cul-
ture, and equal faculties, and equal spirit, get to be on a
level and that level a high level. By boldness, by culti-
vation, by " social science " they raise themselves above
others ; they become the " first families," and all the rest
come to be below them. But they tend to be much about
a level among one another ; no one is recognised by all
or by many others as superior to them all. This is society
as it grew up in Greece or Italy, as it grows up now in
any American or colonial town. So far from the notion
of a " head of society " being a necessary notion, in many
ages it would scarcely have been an intelligible notion.
You could not have made Socrates understand it. He
would have said, "If you tell me that one of my
fellows is chief magistrate, and that I am bound to obey
him, I understand you, and you speak well; or that
another is a priest, and that he ought to offer sacrifices to
THE MONARCHY. 49
the gods which I or any one not a priest ought not to
offer, again I understand and agree with you. But if you
tell me that there is in some citizen a hidden charm by
which his words become better than my words, and his
house better than my house, I do not follow you, and
should be pleased if you will explain yourself."
And even if a head of society were a natural idea, it
certainly would not follow that the head of the civil
government should be that head. Society as such has no
more to do with civil polity than with ecclesiastical. The
organisation of men and women for the purpose of amuse-
ment is not necessarily identical with their organisation
f jr political purposes, any more than with their organisa-
tion for religious purposes ; it has of itself no more to do
with the State than it has with the Church. The facul-
ties which fit a man to be a great ruler are not those of
society ; some great rulers have been unintelligible like
Cromwell, or brusque like Napoleon, or coarse and bar-
barous like Sir Robert Walpole. The light nothings of
the drawing-room and the grave things of office are as
difierent from one another as two human occupations
can be. There is no naturalness in uniting the two ; the
end of it always is, that you put a man at the head of
society who very likely is remarkable for social defects,
and is not eminent for social merits.
The best possible commentary on these remarks is
the "History of English Royalty." It has not been
sufficiently remarked that a change has taken place in
the structure of our society exactly analogous to the
change in our polity. A Republic has insinuated itself
E
50 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
beneath the folds of a Monarchy. Charles II. was really
the head of society ; Whitehall, in his time, was the
centre of the best talk, the best fashion, and the most
curious love affairs of the age. He did not contribute
good morality to society, but he set an example of
infinite agreeableness. He concentrated around him all
the light part of the high world of London, and London
concentrated around it all the light part of the high
world of England. The Court was the focus where
everything fascinating gathered, and where everything
exciting centred. Whitehall was an unequalled club,
with female society of a very clever and sharp sort
superadded. All this, as we know, is now altered.
Buckingham Palace is as unlike a club as any place is
likely to be. The Court is a separate part, which stands
aloof from the rest of the London world, and which has
but slender relations 'with the more amusing part of it
The first two Georges were men ignorant of English,
and wholly unfit to guide and lead English society.
They both preferred one or two German ladies of bad
character to all else in London. George III. had no
social vices, but he had no social pleasures. He was a
family man, and a man of business, and sincerely preferred
a leg of mutton and turnips after a good day's work, to
the best fashion and the most exciting talk. In conse-
quence, society in London, though still in form under
the domination of a Court, assumed in fact its natural
und oligarchical structure. It, too, has become an "upper
ten thousand ; " it is no more monarchical in fact than
the society of New York. Great ladies give the tone to
THE MONARCHY. 51
it with little reference to the particular Court world.
The peculiarly masculine world of the clubs and their
neighbourhood has no more to do in daily life with
Buckingham Palace than with the Tuileries. Formal
O
ceremonies of presentation and attendance are retained.
The names of leve'e and drawing-room still sustain the
memory of the time when the king's bed-chamber and
the queen's " withdrawing room " were the centres of
London life, but they no longer make a part of social
enjoyment : they are a sort of ritual in which now-a-days
almost every decent person can if he likes take part.
Even Court balls, where pleasure is at least supposed to
be possible, are lost in a London July. Careful observers
have long perceived this, but it was made palpable to
every one by the death of the Prince Consort. Since
then the Court has been always in a state of suspended
animation, and for a time it was quite annihilated. But
everything went on as usual. A few people who had no
daughters and little money made it an excuse to give
fewer parties, and if very poor, stayed in the country,
but upon the whole the difference was not perceptible.
The queen bee was taken away, but the hive went on.
Refined and original observers have of late objected
to English royalty that it is not splendid enough. They
have compared it with the French Court, which is better
in show, which comes to the surface everywhere so that
you cannot help seeing it, which is infinitely and beyond
question the most splendid thing in France. They have
said, "that in old times the English Court took too
much of the nation's money, and spent it ill ; but now,
52 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
when it could be trusted to spend well, it does not take
enough of the nation's money. There are arguments for
not having a Court, and there are arguments for having
a splendid Court ; but there are no arguments for having
a mean Court. It is better to spend a million in dazzling
when you wish to dazzle, than three-quarters of a million
in trying to dazzle and yet not dazzling." There may be
something in this theory ; it may be that the Court of
England is not quite as gorgeous as we might wish to
see it. But no comparison must ever be made between
it and the French Court. The Emperor represents a
different idea from the Queen. He is not the head of
the State; he is the State. The theory of his govern-
ment is that every one in France is equal, and that the
Emperor embodies the principle of equality. The greater
you make him, the less, and therefore the more equal,
you make all othera He is magnified that others may
be dwarfed. The very contrary is the principle of
English royalty. As in politics it would lose its principal
use if it came forward into the public arena, so in society
if it advertised itself it would be pernicious. We have
voluntary show enough already in London; we do not
wish to have it encouraged and intensified, but quieted
and mitigated. Our Court is but the head of an un-
equal, competing, aristocratic society; its splendour would
not keep others down, but incite others to come on. It is
of use so long as it keeps others out of the first place, and
is guarded and retired in that place. But it would do
evil if it added a new example to our many examples of
showy wealth if it gave the sanction of its dignity to
the race of exoenditure.
THE MONARCHY. 53
Fourthly. We have come to regard the Crown as the
head of our morality. The virtues of Queen Victoria and
the virtues of George III. have sunk deep into the
popular heart. We have come to believe that it is
natural to have a virtuous sovereign, and that the do-
mestic virtues are as likely to be found on thrones as
they are eminent when there. But a little experience
and less thought show that royalty cannot take credit
for domestic excellence. Neither George I., nor George
IT., nor William IV. were patterns of family merit;
George IV. was a model of family demerit. The plain fact
is, that to the disposition of all others most likely to go
wrong, to an excitable disposition, the place of a consti-
tutional king has greater temptations than almost any
other, and fewer suitable occupations than almost any
other. All the world and all the glory of it, whatever
is most attractive, whatever is most seductive, has always
been offered to the Prince of Wales of the day, and
always will be. It is not rational to expect the best
virtue where temptation is applied in the most trying
form at the frailest time of human life. The occupations
of a constitutional monarch are grave, formal, important,
but never exciting ; they have nothing to stir eager
blood, awaken high imagination, work off wild thoughts.
On men like George III., with a predominant taste for
business occupations, the routine duties of constitutional
royalty have doubtless a calm and chastening effect.
The insanity with which he struggled, and in many
cases struggled very successfully, during many years,
would probably have burst out much oftener but for the
54 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
sedative effect of sedulous employment. But how few
princes have ever felt the anomalous impulse for real
work ; how uncommon is that impulse anywhere ; how
little are the circumstances of princes calculated to foster
it ; how little can it be relied on as an ordinary break-
water to their habitual temptations 1 Grave and careful
men may have domestic virtues on a constitutional
throne, but even these fail sometimes, and to imagine
that men of more eager temperaments will commonly
produce them, is to expect grapes from thorns and figs
from thistles.
Lastly, Constitutional royalty has the function which
I insisted on at length in my last essay, and which,
though it is by far the greatest, I need not now enlarge
upon again. It acts as a disguise. It enables our real
rulers to change without heedless people knowing it.
The masses of Englishmen are not fit for an elective
government ; if they knew how near they were to it,
they would be surprised, and almost tremble.
Of a like nature is the value of constitutional royalty
in times of transition. The greatest of all helps to the
substitution of a cabinet government for a preceding
absolute monarchy is the accession of a king favourable
to such a government, and pledged to it. Cabinet
government, when new, is weak in time of trouble.
The prime minister the chief on whom everything
depends, who must take responsibility if any one is to
take it, who must use force if any one is to use it is
not fixed in power. He holds his place, by the essence
of the government, with some uncertainty. Among a
THE MONARCHY. 55
people well-accustomed to such a government, such a
functionary may be bold: he may rely, if not on the
parliament, on the nation which understands and values
him. But when that government has only recently been
introduced, it is difficult for such a minister to be as bold
as he ought to be. His power rests too much on human
reason, and too little on human instinct. The traditional
strength of the hereditary monarch is at these times of
incalculable use. It would have been impossible for
England to get through the first years after 1688 but
for the singular ability of William III. It would have
been impossible for Italy to have attained and kept her
freedom without the help of Victor Emmanuel: neither
the work of Cavour nor the work of Garibaldi were
more necessary than his. But the failure of Louis
Philippe to use his reserve power as constitutional
monarch is the most instructive proof how great that
reserve power is. In February, 1848, Guizot was weak
because his tenure of office was insecure. Louis Philippe
should have made that tenure certain. Parliamentary
reform might afterwards have been conceded to instructed
opinion, but nothing ought to have been conceded to the
mob. The Parisian populace ought to have been put
down, as Guizot wished. If Louis Phil ; ppe had been a
fit king to introduce free government, he would have
strengthened his ministers when they were the instru-
ments of order, even if he afterwards discarded them
when order was safe, and policy could be discussed.
But he was one of the cautious men who are " noted " to
fail in old age : though of the largest experience and of
56 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
great ability, he failed and lost his crown for want of
petty and momentary energy, which at such a crisis a
plain man would have at once put forth.
Such are the principal modes in which the institution
of royalty by its august aspect influences mankind, and
in the English state of civilisation they are invaluable.
Of the actual business of the sovereign the real work
the Queen does I shall speak in my next paper.
No. III.
THE MONARCHY (continued).
THE House of Commons has inquired into most things,
but has never had a committee on " the Queen." There
is no authentic blue-book to say what she does. Such an
investigation cannot take place ; but if it could, it would
probably save her much vexatious routine, and many toil-
some and unnecessary hours.
The popular theory of the English Constitution involves
two errors as to the sovereign. First, in its oldest form at
least, it considers him as an "Estate of the Realm," a
separate co-ordinate authority with the House of Lords
and the House of Commons. This and much else the
sovereign once was, but this he is no longer. That
authority could only be exercised by a monarch with a
legislative veto. He should be able to reject bills, if not
as the House of Commons rejects them, at least as the
House of Peers rejects them. But the Queen has no such
veto. She must sign her own death-warrant if the two
Houses unanimously send it up to her. It is a fiction of
the past to ascribe to her legislative power. She has long
ceased to have any. Secondly, the ancient theory holds
that the Queen is the executive. The American Consti-
58 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
tution was made upon a most careful argument, and most
of that argument assumes the king to be the administratoi
of the English Constitution, and an unhereditary substi-
tute for him viz., a president to be peremptorily neces-
sary. Living across the Atlantic, and misled by accepted
doctrines, the acute framers of the Federal Constitution,
even after the keenest attention, did not perceive the Prime
Minister to be the principal executive of the British Con-
stitution, and the sovereign a cog in the mechanism.
There is, indeed, much excuse for the American legislators
in the history of that time. They took their idea of our
constitution from the time when they encountered it. But
in the so-called government of Lord North, George III.
was the government. Lord North was not only his
appointee, but his agent. The minister carried on a war
which he disapproved and hated, because it was a war
which his sovereign approved and liked. Inevitably,
therefore, the American Convention believed the king,
from whom they had suffered, to be the real executive,
and not the minister, from whom they had not suffered.
If we leave literary theory, and look to our actual old
law, it is wonderful how much the sovereign can do. A
few years ago the Queen very wisely attempted to make
life Peers, and the House of Lords very unwisely, and
contrary to its own best interests, refused to admit her
claim. They said her power had decayed into non-
existence; she once had it, they allowed, but it had ceased
by long disuse. If any one will run over the pages of
Comyn's " Digest," or any other such book, title " Preroga-
tive/' he will find the Queen has a hundred such powers
THE MONARCHY. 59
which waver between reality and desuetude, and which
would cause a protracted and very interesting legal argu-
ment if she tried to exercise them. Some good lawyer
ought to write a careful book to say which of these powers
are really usable, and which are obsolete. There is no
authentic explicit information as to what the Queen can
do, any more than of what she does.
In the bare superficial theory of free institutions this
is undoubtedly a defect. Every power in a popular govern-
ment ought to be known. The whole notion of such a
government is that the political people the governing
people rules as it thinks fit. All the acts of every
administration are to be canvassed by it ; it is to watch
if such acts seem good, and in some manner or other to
interpose if they seem not good. But it cannot judge if
it is to be kept in ignorance ; it cannot interpose if it does
not know. A secret prerogative is an anomaly perhaps
the greatest of anomalies. That secrecy is, however,
essential to the utility of English royalty as it now is.
Above all things our royalty is to be reverenced, and if you
begin to poke about it you cannot reverence it. When
there is a select committee on the Queen, the charm of
royalty will be gone. Its mystery is its life. We must
not let in daylight upon magic. We must not bring
the Queen into the combat of politics, or she will cease
to be reverenced by all combatants ; she will become one
combatant among many. The existence of this secret
power is, according to abstract theory, a defect in our
constitutional polity, but it is a defect incident to a
civilisation such as ours, where august and therefore
60 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
unknown powers are needed, as well as known and ser-
viceable powers.
If we attempt to estimate the working of this inner
power by the evidence of those, whether dead or living,
who have been brought in contact with it, we shall find a
singular difference. Both the courtiers of George III.
and the courtiers of Queen Victoria are agreed as to the
magnitude of the royal influence. It is with both an
accepted secret doctrine that the Crown does more than it
seems. But there is a wide discrepancy in opinion as to
the quality of that action. Mr. Fox did not scruple
to describe the hidden influence of George III. as the
undetected agency of " an infernal spirit." The action of
the Crown at that period was the dread and terror of
Liberal politicians. But now the best Liberal politicians
say, " We shall never know, but when history is written our
children may know, what we owe to the Queen and Prince
Albert." The mystery of the constitution, which used to
be hated by our calmest, most thoughtful, and instructed
statesmen, is now loved and reverenced by them.
Before we try to account for this change, there is one
part of the duties of the Queen which should be struck
out of the discussion. I mean the formal part. The
Queen has to assent to and sign countless formal docu-
ments, which contain no matter of policy, of which the
purport is insignificant, which any clerk could sign as
well. One great class of documents George III. used to
read before he signed them, till Lord Thurlow told him,
" It was nonsense his looking at them, for he could not
understand them." But the worst case is that of commis-
THE MONARCHY. 61
sions in the army. Till an Act passed only three years
since the Queen used to sign all military commissions,
and she still signs all fresh commissions. The inevitable
and natural consequence is that such commissions were,
and to some extent still are, in arrears by thousands.
Men have often been known to receive their commissions
for the first time years after they have left the service.
If the Queen had been an ordinary officer she would long
since have complained, and long since have been relieved
of this slavish labour. A cynical statesman is said to
have defended it on the ground " that you 'may have a
fool for a sovereign, and then it would be desirable he
should have plenty of occupation in which he can do no
harm." But it is in truth childish to heap formal duties
of business upon a person who has of necessity so many
formal duties of society. It is a remnant of the old days
when George III. would know everything, however trivial
and assent to everything, however insignificant. These
labours of routine may be dismissed from the discussions.
It is not by them that the sovereign acquires his authority
either for evil or for good.
The best mode of testing what we owe to the Queen is
to make a vigorous effort of the imagination, and see how
we should get on without her. Let us strip cabinet
government of all its accessories, let us reduce it to its
two necessary constituents a representative assembly (a
House of Commons) and a cabinet appointed by that as-
sembly and examine how we should manage with them
only. We are so little accustomed to analyse the consti-
tution ; we are so used to ascribe the whole effect of the
62 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
constitution to the whole constitution, that a great many
people will imagine it to be impossible that a nation
should thrive or even live with only these two simple
elements. But it is upon that possibility that the general
imitability of the English Government depends. A
monarch that can be truly reverenced, a House of Peers
that can be really respected, are historical accidents
nearly peculiar to this one island, and entirely peculiar to
Europe. A new country, if it is to be capable of a cabinet
government, if it is not to degrade itself to presidential
government, must create that cabinet out of its native
resources must not rely on these old world debris.
Many modes might be suggested by which a parlia-
ment might do in appearance what our parliament does
in reality, viz., appoint a premier. But I prefer to select
the simplest of all modes. We shall then see the bare
skeleton of this polity, perceive in what it differs from
the royal form, and be quite free from the imputation
of having selected an unduly charming and attractive
substitute.
Let us suppose the House of Commons existing alone
and by itself -to appoint the premier quite simply, just
as the shareholders of a railway choose a director. At
each vacancy, whether caused by death or resignation,
let any member or members have the right of nominating
a successor ; after a proper interval, such as the time now
commonly occupied by a ministerial crisis, ten days or a
fortnight, let the members present vote for the candidate
they prefer ; then let the Speaker count the votes, and
the candidate with the greatest number be premier-
THE MONARCHY. 63
This mode of election would throw the whole choice into
the hands of party organisation, just as our present mode
does, except in so far as the Crown interferes with it; no
outsider would ever be appointed, because the immense
number of votes which every great party brings into
the field would far outnumber every casual and petty
minority. The premier should not be appointed for a
fixed time, but during good behaviour or the pleasure of
parliament. Mutatis mutandis, subject to the differences
now to be investigated, what goes on now would go on
then. The premier then, as now, must resign upon a
vote of want of confidence, but the volition of parliament
would then be the overt and single force in the selection
of a successor, whereas it is now the predominant though
^atent force.
It will help the discussion very much if we divide it
into three parts. The whole course of a representative
government has three stages first, when a ministry is
appointed; next, during its continuance; last, when it
ends. Let us consider what is the exact use of the Queen
at each of these stages, and how our present form of
government differs in each, whether for good or for evil
from that simpler form of cabinet government which
might exist without her.
At the beginning of an administration there would
not be much difference between the royal and unroyal
species of cabinet governments when there were only two
great parties in the State, and when the greater of those
parties was thoroughly agreed within itself who should
be its parliamentary leader, and who therefore should be
64 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
its premier. The sovereign must now accept that re-
cognised leader ; and if the choice were directly made by
the House of Commons, the House must also choose him ;
its supreme section, acting compactly and harmoniously,
would sway its decisions without substantial resistance,
and perhaps without even apparent competition. A pre-
dominant party, rent by no intestine demarcation, would
be despotic. In such a case cabinet government would
go on without friction whether there was a Queen or
whether there was no Queen. The best sovereign could
then achieve no good, and the worst effect no harm.
But the difficulties are far greater when the predo-
minant party is not agreed who should be its leader.
In the royal form of cabinet government the sovereign
then has sometimes a substantial selection; in the un-
royal, who would choose ? There must be a meeting at
" Willis's Rooms ; " there must be that sort of interior
despotism of the majority over the minority within the
party, by which Lord John Russell in 1859 was made to
resign his pretensions to the supreme government, and
to be content to serve as a subordinate to Lord Palmer-
ston. The tacit compression which a party anxious for
office would exercise over leaders who divided its strength,
would be used and must be used. Whether such a party
would always choose precisely the best man may well be
doubted. In a party once divided it is very difficult to
secure unanimity in favour of the very person whom a
disinterested bystander would recommend. All manner
of jealousies and enmities are immediately awakened,
and it is always difficult, often impossible, to get them
THE MONARCHY. 65
to sleep again. But though such a party might not
select the very best leader, they have the strongest mo-
tives to select a very good leader. The maintenance of
their rule depends on it. Under a presidential consti-
tution the preliminary caucuses which choose the presi-
dent need not care as to the ultimate fitness of the
man they choose. They are solely concerned with his
attractiveness as a candidate ; they need not regard his
efficiency as a ruler. If they elect a man of weak judg-
ment, he will reign his stated term; even though he
show the best judgment, at the end of that term there
will be by constitutional destiny another election. But
tinder a ministerial government there is no such fixed
destiny. The government is a removable government,
its tenure depends upon its conduct. If a party in power
were so foolish as to choose a weak man for its head, it
would cease to be in power. Its judgment is its life.
Suppose in 1859 that the Whig party had determined
to set aside both Earl Russell and Lord Palmerston
and to choose for its head an incapable nonentity, the
Whig party would probably have been exiled from office
at the Schleswig-Holstein difficulty. The nation would
have deserted them, and Parliament would have deserted
them, too ; neither would have endured to see a secret
negotiation, on which depended the portentous alterna-
tive of war or peace, in the hands of a person who was
thought to be weak who had been promoted because of
his mediocrity whom his own friends did not respect.
A ministerial government, too, is carried on in the face
of day. Its life is in debate. A president may be a
F
66 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
weak man ; yet if he keep good ministers to the end of
his administration, he may not be found out it may still
be a dubious controversy whether he is wise or foolish.
But a prime minister must show what he is. He must
meet the House of Commons in debate ; he must be able
to guide that assembly in the management of its business,
to gain its ear in every emergency, to rule it in its hours
of excitement. He is conspicuously submitted to a
searching test, and if he fails he must resign.
Nor would any party like to trust to a weak man the
great power which a cabinet government commits to its
premier. The premier, though elected by parliament
can dissolve parliament. Members would be naturally
anxious that the power which might destroy their coveted
dignity should be lodged in fit hands. They dare not
place in unfit hands a power which, besides hurting the
nation, might altogether ruin them. We may be sure,
therefore, that whenever the predominant party is
divided, the U7i-royal form of cabinet government would
secure for us a fair and able parliamentary leader that
it would give us a good premier, if not the very best.
Can it be said that the royal form does more ?
In one case I think it may. If the constitutional
monarch be a man of singular discernment, of unpreju-
diced disposition, and great political knowledge, he may
pick out from the ranks of the divided party its very
best leader, even at a time when the party, if left to
itself, would not nominate him. If the sovereign be able
to play the part of that thoroughly intelligent but
perfectly disinterested spectator who is so prominent in
THE MONARCHY. 67
the works of certain moralists, he may be able to choose
better for his subjects than they would choose for them-
selves. But if the monarch be not so exempt from
prejudice, and have not this nearly miraculous discern-
ment, it is not likely that he will be able to make a wiser
choice than the choice of the party itself. He certainly
is not under the same motive to choose wisely. His place
is fixed whatever happens, but the failure of an appointing
party depends on the capacity of their appointee.
There is great danger, too, that the judgment of the
sovereign may be prejudiced. For more than forty
years the personal antipathies of George III. materially
impaired successive administrations. Almost at the
beginning of his career he discarded Lord Chatham:
almost at the end he would not permit Mr. Pitt to
coalesce with Mr. Fox. He always preferred mediocrity ;
he generally disliked high ability; he always disliked
great ideas. If constitutional monarchs be ordinary men
of restricted experience and common capacity (and we
have no right to suppose that by miracle they will be
more), the judgment of the sovereign will often be worse
than the judgment of the party, and he will be very
subject to the chronic danger of preferring a respectful
common-place man, such as Addington, to an inde-
pendent first-rate man, such as Pitt.
"We shall arrive at the same sort of mixed conclusion
if we examine the choice of a premier under both systems
in the critical case of cabinet government the case of
three parties. This is the case in which that species
of government is most sure tQ exhibit its defects, and
68 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
least likely to exhibit its merits. The defining charac-
teristic of that government is the choice of the executive
ruler by the legislative assembly; but when there are
three parties a satisfactory choice is impossible. A really
good selection is a selection by a large majority which
trusts those it chooses, but when there are three parties
there is no such trust. The numerically weakest has the
casting vote it can determine which candidate shall be
chosen. But it does so under a penalty. It forfeits the
right of voting for its own candidate. It settles which
of other people's favourites shall be chosen, on condition
of abandoning its own favourite. A choice based on such
self-denial can never be a firm choice it is a choice at
any moment liable to be revoked. The events of 1858,
though not a perfect illustration of what I mean, are a
sufficient illustration. The Radical party, acting apart
from the moderate Liberal party, kept Lord Derby in
power. The ultra-movement party thought it expedient
to combine with the non-movement party. As one of
them coarsely but clearly put it, " We get more of our
way under these men than under the other men;" he
meant that, in his judgment, the Tories would be more
obedient to the Radicals than the Whigs. But it is
obvious that a union of opposites so marked could not
be durable. The Radicals bought it by choosing the
men whose principles were most adverse to them ; the
Conservatives bought it by agreeing to measures whose
scope was most adverse to them. After a short interval
the Radicals returned to their natural alliance and
their natural discontent with the moderate Whigs. They
THE MONARCHY. 69
used their determining vote first for a government of
one opinion and then for a government of the contrary
opinion.
I am not blaming this policy. I am using it merely
as an illustration. I say that if we imagine this sort
of action greatly exaggerated and greatly prolonged
parliamentary government becomes impossible. If there
are three parties, no two of which will steadily combine
for mutual action, but of which the weakest gives a
rapidly oscillating preference to the two others, the
primary condition of a cabinet polity is not satisfied.
We have not a parliament fit to choose ; we cannot rely
on the selection of a sufficiently permanent executive,
because there is no fixity in the thoughts and feelings of
the choosers.
Under every species of cabinet government, whether ,
the royal or the unroyal, this defect can be cured in one
way only. The moderate people of every party must
combine to support the government which, on the whole,
suits every party best. This is the mode in which Lord
Palmerston's administration has been lately maintained ;
a ministry in many ways defective, but more beneficially
vigorous abroad, and more beneficially active at home,
than the vast majority of English ministries. The mode-
rate Conservatives and the moderate Radicals have main-
tained a steady government by a sufficiently coherent
union with the moderate Whigs. Whether there is a
king or no king, this preservative self-denial is the main
force on which we must rely for the satisfactory con-
tinuance of a parliamentary government at this its
70 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
period of greatest trial. Will that moderation be aided
or impaired by the addition of a sovereign ? Will it be
more effectual under the royal sort of ministerial govern-
ment, or will it be less effectual ?
If the sovereign has a genius for discernment, the aid
which he can give at such a crisis will be great. He will
select for his minister, and if possible maintain as his
minister, the statesman upon whom the moderate party
will ultimately fix their choice, but for whom at the
outset it is blindly searching ; being a man of sense,
experience, and tact, he will discern which is the com-
bination of equilibrium, which is the section with whom
the milder members of the other sections will at last ally
themselves. Amid the shifting transitions of confused
parties, it is probable that he will have many opportu-
nities of exercising a selection. It will rest with him to
call either on A B to form an administration, or upon
X Y, and either may have a chance of trial. A disturbed
state of parties is inconsistent with fixity, but it abounds
in momentary tolerance. Wanting something, but not
knowing with precision what, parties will accept for a brief
period anything, to see whether it may be that unknown
something to see what it will do. During the long
succession of weak governments which begins with the
resignation of the Duke of Newcastle in 1762 and ends
with the accession of Mr. Pitt in 1784, the vigorous will
of George III. was an agency of the first magnitude.
If at a period of complex and protracted division of
parties, such as are sure to occur often and last long in
every enduring parliamentary government, the extrinsic
THE MONARCHY. 71
force of royal selection were always exercised discreetly,
it would be a political benefit of incalculable value.
But will it be so exercised ? A constitutional sove-
reign must in the common course of government be a
man of but common ability. I am afraid, looking to
the early acquired feebleness of hereditary dynasties,
that we must expect him to be a man of inferior ability.
Theory and experience both teach that the education
of a prince can be but a poor education, and that a
royal family will generally have less ability than other
families. What right have we then to expect the per-
petual entail on any family of an exquisite discretion,
which if it be not a sort of genius, is at least as rare as
genius ?
Probably in most cases the greatest wisdom of a con-
stitutional king would show itself in well considered in-
action. In the confused interval between 1857 and 1859
the Queen and Prince Albert were far too wise to obtrude
any selection of their own. If they had chosen, perhaps
they would not have chosen Lord Palmerston. But they
saw, or may be believed to have seen, that the world was
settling down without them, and that by interposing an
extrinsic agency, they would but delay the beneficial
crystallisation of intrinsic forces. There is, indeed, a
permanent reason which would make the wisest king, and
the king who feels most sure of his wisdom, very slow to
use that wisdom. The responsibility of parliament should
be felt by parliament. So long as parliament thinks it is
the sovereign's business to find a government it will be
sure not to find a government itself. The royal form of
72 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION".
ministerial government is the worst of all forms if it
erect the subsidiary apparatus into the principal force, if
it induce the assembly which ought to perform para-
mount duties to expect some one else to perform, them.
It should be observed, too, in fairness to the unroyal
species of cabinet government, that it is exempt from one
of the greatest and most characteristic defects of the royal
species. Where there is no court there can be no evil
influence from a court. What these influences are every
one knows ; though no one, hardly the best and closest
observer, can say with confidence and precision how great
their effect is. Sir Robert Walpole, in language too
coarse for our modern, manners,. declared after the death
of Queen Caroline, that he would pay no attention to the
king's daughters (" those girls," as he called them), but
would rely exclusively on Madame de Walmoden, the
king's mistress. " The king," says a writer in G-eorge IV.'s
time, " is in our favour, and what is more to the pur-
pose, the Marchioness of Conyngham is so too." Every-
body knows to what sort of influences several Italian
changes of government since tike unity of Italy have
been attributed. These sinister agencies are likely to be
most effective just when everything else is. troubled, and
when, therefore, they are particularly dangerous. The
wildest and wickedest king's mistress would not plot
against an invulnerable administration. But very many
will intrigue when parliament is perplexed, when parties
are divided, when alternatives are many, when many evil
things are possible, when cabinet government must be
difficult.
THE MONARCHY. 7$
It is very important to see that a good administration
can be started without a sovereign, because some colonial
statesmen have doubted it. "I can conceive," it has been
said, " that a ministry would go on well enough without
a governor when it was launched, but I do not see how to
launch it." It has even been suggested that a colony
which broke away from England, and had to form its
own government, might not unwisely choose a governor
for life, and solely trusted with selected ministers, some-
thing like the Abbs' Sieyes's grand elector. But the intro-
duction of such an officer into such a colony would in fact
be the voluntary erection of an artificial encumbrance to
it. He would inevitably be a party man. The most
dignified post in the State must bean object of contest to
the great sections into which every active political com-
munity is divided. These parties mix in everything and
meddle in everything ; and they neither would nor could
permit the most honoured and conspicuous of all stations
to be filled, except at their pleasure. They know, too,
that the grand elector, the great chooser of ministries,
might be, at a sharp crisis, either a good friend or a bad
enemy. The strongest party would select some one who
would be on their side when he had to take a side, who
would incline to them when he did incline, who should
be a constant auxiliary to them and a constant impedi-
ment to their adversaries. It is absurd to choose by con-
tested party election an impartial chooser of ministers.
But it is during the continuance of a ministry, rather
than at its creation, that the functions of the sovereign
will mainly interest most persons, and that most people-
74 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
will think them to be of the gravest importance. I own
I am myself of that opinion. I think it may be shown
that the post of sovereign over an intelligent and political
people under a constitutional monarchy is the post which
a wise man would choose above any other where he
would find the intellectual impulses best stimulated and
the worst intellectual impulses best controlled.
On the duties of the Queen during an administration
we have an invaluable fragment from her own hand. In
1851 Louis Napoleon had his coup d'etat; in 1852 Lord
John Russell had his he expelled Lord Palmerston. By
a most instructive breach of etiquette he read in the
House a royal memorandum on the duties of his rival.
It is as follows : " The Queen requires, first, that Lord
Palmerston will distinctly state what he proposes in a
given case, in order that the Queen may know as dis-
tinctly to what she is giving her royal sanction. Secondly,
having once given her sanction to such a measure that it
be not arbitrarily altered or modified by the minister.
Such an act she must consider as failing in sincerity
towards the Crown, and justly to be visited by the
exercise of her constitutional right of dismissing that
minister. She expects to be kept informed of what passes
between him and foreign ministers before important
decisions are taken based upon that intercourse ; to re-
ceive the foreign despatches in good time ; and to have
the drafts for her approval sent to her in sufficient time
to make herself acquainted with their contents before
they must be sent off."
In addition to the control over particular ministers
THE MONARCHY. 75
and especially over the foreign minister, the Queen has
a certain control over the Cabinet. The first minister,
it is understood, transmits to her authentic information
of all the most important decisions, together with what
the newspapers would do equally well, the more impor-
tant votes in Parliament. He is bound to take care that
she knows everything which there is to know as to the
passing politics of the nation. She has by rigid usage a
right to complain if she does not know of every great act
of her ministry, not only before it is done, but while
there is yet time to consider it while it is still possible
that it may not be done.
To state the matter shortly, the sovereign has, under
a constitutional monarchy such as ours, three rights
the right to be consulted, the right to encourage, the
right to warn. And a king of great sense and sagacity
would want no others. He would find that his having
no others would enable him to use these with singular
effect. He would say to his minister: "The responsi-
bility of these measures is upon you. Whatever you
think best must be done. Whatever you think best
shall have my full and effectual support. But you will
observe that for this reason and that reason what you
propose to do is bad ; for this reason and that reason
what you do not propose is better. I do not oppose, it
is my duty not to oppose; but observe that I warn"
Supposing the king to be right, and to have what kings
often have, the gift of effectual expression, he could not
help moving his minister. He might not always turn his
course, but he would always trouble his mind.
76 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
In the course of a long reign a sagacious king would
acquire an experience with which few ministers could
contend. The king could say : " Have you referred to
the transactions which happened during such and such
an administration, I think about fourteen years ago ?
They afford an instructive example of the bad results
which are sure to attend the policy which you propose.
You did not at that time take so prominent a part in
public life as you now do, and it is possible you do not
fully remember all the events. I should recommend
you to recur to them, and to discuss them with your older
colleagues who took part in them. It is unwise to recom-
mence a policy which so lately worked so ill" The king
would indeed have the advantage which a permanent
under-secretary has over his superior the parliamentary
secretary that of having shared in the proceedings of
the previous parliamentary secretaries. These proceed-
ings were part of his own life ; occupied the best of his
thoughts, gave him perhaps anxiety, perhaps pleasure,
were commenced in spite of his dissuasion, or were sanc-
tioned by his approval. The parliamentary secretary
vaguely remembers that something was done in the
time of some of his predecessors, when he very likely
did not know the least or care the least about that sort
of public business. He has to begin by learning pain-
fully and imperfectly what the permanent secretary
knows by clear and instant memory. No doubt a par-
liamentary secretary always can, and sometimes does,
silence his subordinate by the tacit might of his superior
dignity. He says : " I do not think there is much in all
THE MONARCHY. 77
that. Many errors were committed at the time you refer
to which we need not now discuss." A pompous man
easily sweeps away the suggestions of those beneath him.
But though a minister may so deal with his subordinate,
he cannot so deal with his king. The social force of
admitted superiority by which he overturned his under-
secretary is now not with him but against him. He has
no longer to regard the deferential hints of an acknow-
ledged inferior, but to answer the arguments of a superior
to whom he has himself to be respectful. George III. in
fact knew the forms of public business as well or better
than any statesman of his time. If, in addition to his
capacity as a man of business and to' his industry, he had
possessed the higher faculties of a discerning statesman,
his influence would have been despotic. The old Consti-
tution of England undoubtedly gave a sort of power
to the Crown which our present Constitution does not
give. While a majority in parliament was principally
purchased by royal patronage, the king was a party to
the bargain either with his minister or without his
minister. But even under our present constitution a
monarch like George III., with high abilities, would
possess the greatest influence. It is known to all Europe
that in Belgium King Leopold has exercised immense
power by the use of such means as I have described.
It is known, too, to every one conversant with the real
course of the recent history of England, that Prince
Albert really did gain great power in precisely the same
way. He had the rare gifts of a constitutional monarch.
If his life had been prolonged twenty years, his name
78 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
would have been known to Europe as that of King
Leopold is known. While he lived he was at a disad-
vantage. The statesmen who had most power in England
were men of far greater experience than himself. He
might, and no doubt did, exercise a great, if not a com-
manding influence over Lord Malmesbury, but he could
not rule Lord Palmerston. The old statesman who
governed England, at an age when most men are unfit to
govern their own families, remembered a whole generation
of statesmen who were dead before Prince Albert was
born. The two were of different ages and different
natures. The elaborateness of the German prince an
elaborateness which has been justly and happily compared
with that of Goethe was wholly alien to the half-Irish,
half-English, statesman. The somewhat boisterous cour-
age in minor dangers, and the obtrusive use of an always
effectual but not always refined, common-place, which
are Lord Palmerston's defects, doubtless grated on Prince
Albert, who had a scholar's caution and a scholar's
courage. The facts will be known to our children's
children, though not to us. Prince Albert did much, but
he died ere he could have made his influence felt on a
generation of statesmen less experienced than he was,
and anxious to learn from him.
It would be childish to suppose that a conference
between a minister and his sovereign can ever be a con-
ference of pure argument. " The divinity which doth
hedge a king " may have less sanctity than it had, but it
still has much sanctity. No one, or scarcely any one, can
argue with a cabinet minister in his own room as well as
THE MONARCHY. 79
he would argue with another man in another room. He
cannot make his own points as well ; he cannot unmake
as well the points presented to him. A monarch's room
is worse. The best instance is Lord Chatham, the most
dictatorial and imperious of English statesmen, and
almost the first English statesman who was borne into
power against the wishes of the king and against the
wishes of the nobility the first popular minister. We
might have expected a proud tribune of the people to be
dictatorial to his sovereign to be to the king what he
was to all others. On the contrary, he was the slave of
his own imagination; there was a kind of mystic enchant-
ment in vicinity to the monarch which divested him of
his ordinary nature. " The least peep into the king's
closet," said Mr. Burke, " intoxicates him, and will to
the end of his life." A wit said that, even at the levde,
he bowed so low that you could see the tip of his hooked
nose between his legs. He was in the habit of kneeling
at the bedside of George III. while transacting business.
Now no man can argue on his knees. The same super-
stitious feeling which keeps him in that physical attitude
will keep him in a corresponding mental attitude. He
will not refute the bad arguments of the king as he will
refute another man's bad arguments. He will not state
his own best arguments effectively and incisively when
he knows that the king would not like to hear them. In
a nearly balanced argument the king must always have
the better, and in politics many most important argu-
ments are nearly balanced. Whenever there was much
to be said for the king's opinion it would have its full
80 THE ENGLISH 'CONSTITUTION.
weight; whatever was said for the minister's opinion
would only have a lessened and enfeebled weight.
The king, too, possesses a power, according to theory,
for extreme use on a critical occasion, but which he can in
law use on any occasion. He can dissolve ; he can say to
his minister, in fact, if not in words, " This parliament
sent you here, but I will see if I cannot get another
parliament to send some one else here." George III.
well understood that it was best to take his stand at times
and on points when it was perhaps likely, or at any rate
not unlikely, the nation would support him. He always
made a minister that he did not like tremble at the
shadow of a possible successor. He had a cunning in
such matters like the cunning of insanity. He had con-
flicts with the ablest men of his time, and he was hardly
ever baffled. He understood how to help a feeble argu-
ment by a tacit threat, and how best to address it to an
habitual deference.
Perhaps such powers as these are what a wise man
would most seek to exercise and least fear to possess.
To wish to be a despot, "to hunger after tyranny," as the
Greek phrase had it, marks in our day an uncultivated
mind. A person who so wishes cannot have weighed
what Butler calls the " doubtfulness things are involved
in." To be sure you are right to impose your will, or to
wish to impose it, with violence upon others; to see
your own ideas vividly and fixedly, and to be tormented
till you can apply them in life and practice, not to like
to hear the opinions of others, to be unable to sit down
and weigh the truth they have, are but crude states o*"
THE MONARCHY. 81
intellect in our present civilisation. "We know, at least,
that facts are many ; that progress is complicated ; that
burning ideas (such as young men have) are mostly false
and always incomplete. The notion of a far-seeing and
despotic statesman, who can lay down plans for ages yet
unborn, is a fancy generated by the pride of the human
intellect to which facts give no support. The plans of
Charlemagne died with him ; those of Richelieu were
mistaken; those of Napoleon gigantesque and frantic.
But a wise and great constitutional monarch attempts
no such vanities. His career is not in the air; he
labours in the world of sober fact ; he deals with schemes
which can be effected schemes which are desirable
schemes which are worth the cost. He says to the
ministry his people send to him, to ministry after minis-
try, " I think so and so ; do you see if there is anything
in it. I have put down my reasons in a certain memo-
randum, which I will give you. Probably it does not
exhaust the subject, but it will suggest materials for
your consideration." By years of discussion with minis-
try after ministry, the best plans of the wisest king
would certainly be adopted, and the inferior plans, the
impracticable plans, rooted out and rejected. He could
not be uselessly beyond his time, for he would have been
obliged to convince the representatives, the characteristic
men of his time. He would have the best means of
proving that he was right on all new and strange
matters, for he would have won to his side probably,
after years of discussion, the chosen agents of the
common-place world men who were where they were,
o
82 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
because they had pleased the men of the existing age,
who will never be much disposed to new conceptions or
profound thoughts. A sagacious and original constitu-
tional monarch might go to his grave in peace if any
man could. He would know that his best laws were in
harmony with his age ; that they suited the people who
were to work them, the people who were to be benefited
by them. And he would have passed a happy life. He
would have passed a life in which he could always get
his arguments heard, in which he could always make
those who have the responsibility of action think of them
before they acted in which he could know that the
schemes which he had set at work in the world were not
the casual accidents of an individual idiosyncrasy, which
are mostly much wrong, but the likeliest of all things
to be right the ideas of one very intelligent man at
last accepted and acted on by the ordinary intelligent
many.
But can we expect such a king, or, for that is the
material point, can we expect a lineal series of such
kings ? Every one has heard the reply of the Emperor
Alexander to Madame de Stael, who favoured him with
a declamation in praise of beneficent despotism. u Yes,
Madame, but it is only a happy accident." He well knew
that the great abilities and the good intentions necessary
to make an efficient and good despot never were con-
tinuously combined in any line of rulers. He knew that
they were far out of reach of hereditary human nature.
Can it be said that the characteristic qualities of a con-
stitutional monarch are more within its reach ? I am
THE MONARCHY. 83
afraid it cannot. We found just now that the charac-
teristic use of an hereditary constitutional monarch, at
the outset of an administration, greatly surpassed the
ordinary competence of hereditary faculties. I fear that
an impartial investigation will establish the same con-
clusion as to his uses during the continuance of an
administration.
If we look at history, we shall find that it is only
during the period of the present reign that in England
the duties of a constitutional sovereign have ever been
well performed. The first two Georges were ignorant
of English affairs, and wholly unable to guide them,
whether well or ill ; for many years in their time the
Prime Minister had, over and above the labour of
managing parliament, to manage the woman sometimes
the queen, sometimes the mistress who managed the
sovereign; George III. interfered unceasingly, but he
did harm unceasingly; George IV. and William IV.
gave no steady continuing guidance, and were unfit to
give it. On the Continent, in first-class countries, con-
stitutional royalty has never lasted out of one generation.
Louis Philippe, Victor Emmanuel, and Leopold are the
founders of their dynasties ; we must not reckon in con-
stitutional monarchy any more than in despotic monarchy
on the permanence in the descendants of the peculiar
genius which founded the race. As far as experience
goes, there is no reason to expect an hereditary series of
useful limited monarchs.
If we look to theory, there is even less reason to
expect it. A monarch is useful when he gives an effectual
84( THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
and beneficial guidance to his ministers. But these
ministers are sure to be among the ablest men of their
time. They will have had to conduct the business of
parliament so as to satisfy it ; they will have to speak so
as to satisfy it. The two together cannot be done save
by a man of very great and varied ability. The exercise
of the two gifts is sure to teach a man much of the
world ; and if it did not, a parliamentary leader has to
pass through a magnificent training before he becomes a
leader. He has to gain a seat in parliament ; to gain the
ear of parliament ; to gain the confidence of parliament ;
to gain the confidence of his colleagues. No one can
achieve these no one, still more, can both achieve them
and retain them without a singular ability, nicely
trained in the varied detail of life. What chance has an
hereditary monarch such as nature forces him to be, such
as history shows he is, against men so educated and so
born ? He can but be an average man to begin with ;
sometimes he will be clever, but sometimes he will be
stupid; in the long run he will be neither clever nor
stupid ; he will be the simple, common man who plods
the plain routine of life from the cradle to the grave.
His education will be that of one who has never had to
struggle; who has always felt that he has nothing to
gain ; who has had the first dignity given him ; who has
never seen common life as in truth it is. It is idle to
expect an ordinary man born in the purple to have
greater genius than an extraordinary man born out of
the purple; to expect a man whose place has always
been fixed to have a better judgment than one who has
THE MONARCHY. 85
lived by his judgment ; to expect a man whose career
will be the same whether he is discreet or whether he is
indiscreet to have the nice discretion of one who has
risen by his wisdom, who will fall if he ceases to be wise.
The characteristic advantage of a constitutional king
is the permanence of his place. This gives him the
opportunity of acquiring a consecutive knowledge of com-
plex transactions, but it gives only an opportunity. The
king must use it. There is no royal road to political
affairs : their detail is vast, disagreeable, complicated, and
miscellaneous. A king, to be the equal of his ministers
in discussion, must work as they work ; he must be a
man of business as they are men of business. Yet a con-
stitutional prince is the man who is most tempted to
pleasure, and the least forced to business. A despot
must feel that he is the pivot of the State. The stress
of his kingdom is upon him. As he is, so are his affairs.
He may be seduced into pleasure ; he may neglect all
else ; but the risk is evident. He will hurt himself; he
may cause a revolution. If he becomes unfit to govern,
some one else who is fit may conspire against him. But
a constitutional king need fear nothing. He may neglect
his duties, but he will not be injured. His place will be
as fixed, his income as permanent, his opportunities of
selfish enjoyment as full as ever. Why should he work ?
It is true he will lose the quiet and secret influence
which in the course of years industry would gain for
him; but an eager young man, on whom the world is
squandering its luxuries and its temptations, will not be
much attracted by the distant prospect of a moderate
86 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
influence over dull matters. He may form good inten-
tions ; he may say, " Next year I will read these papers ;
I will try and ask more questions ; I will not let these
women talk to me so." But they will talk to him. The
most hopeless idleness is that most smoothed with ex-
cellent plans. " The Lord Treasurer," says Swift, " pro-
mised he will settle it to-night, and so he will say a
hundred nights." We may depend upon it the ministry
whose power will be lessened by the prince's attention
will not be too eager to get him to attend.
So it is if the prince come young to the throne ; but
the case is worse when he comes to it old or middle-aged.
He is then unfit to work. He will then have spent the
whole of youth and the first part of manhood in idleness,
and it is unnatural to expect him to labour. A pleasure-
loving lounger in middle life will not begin to work as
George III. worked, or as Prince Albert worked. The
only fit material for a constitutional king is a prince who
begins early to reign who in his youth is superior to
pleasure who in his youth is willing to labour who
has by nature a genius for discretion. Such kings are
among God's greatest gifts, but they are also among His
rarest.
An ordinary idle king on a constitutional throne will
leave no mark on his time : he will do little good and as
little harm; the royal form of cabinet government will
work in his time pretty much as the unroyal The
addition of a cypher will not matter though it take pre-
cedence of the significant figures. But corruptio optima
pessima. The most evil case of the royal form is far
THE MONARCHY. 87
worse than the most evil case of the unroyal. It is easy
to imagine, upon a constitutional throne, an active and
meddling fool who always acts when he should not, who
never acts when he should, who warns his ministers
against their judicious measures, who encourages them in
their injudicious measures. It is easy to imagine that
such a king should be the tool of others ; that favourites
should guide him ; that mistresses should corrupt him ;
that the atmosphere of a bad court should be used to
degrade free government.
We have had an awful instance of the dangers of con-
stitutional royalty. We have had the case of a meddling
maniac. During great part of his life George III.'s
reason was half upset by every crisis. Throughout his
life he had an obstinacy akin to that of insanity. He
was an obstinate and an evil influence ; he could not be
turned from what was inexpedient; by the aid of his
station he turned truer but weaker men from what was
expedient. He gave an excellent moral example to his
contemporaries, but he is an instance of those whose
good dies with them, while their evil lives after them.
He prolonged the American war, perhaps he caused the
American war, so we inherit the vestiges of an American
hatred ; he forbad Mr. Pitt's wise plans, so we inherit an
Irish difficulty. He would not let us do right in time, so
now our attempts at right are out of time and fruitless.
Constitutional royalty under an active and half-insane
king is one of the worst of governments. There is in it
a secret power which is always eager, which is generally
obstinate, which is often wrong, which rules ministers
88 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
more than they know themselves, which overpowers
them much more than the public believe, which is
irresponsible because it is inscrutable, which cannot be
prevented because it cannot be seen. The benefits of a
good monarch are almost invaluable, but the evils of
a bad monarch are almost irreparable.
We shall find these conclusions confirmed if we ex-
amine the powers and duties of an English monarch at
the break-up of an administration. But the power of
dissolution and the prerogative of creating peers, the
cardinal powers of that moment are too important and
involve too many complex matters to be sufficiently
treated at the very end of a paper as long as this.
89
No. IV.
THE HOUSE OF LORDS.
IN my last essay I showed that it was possible for a con-
stitutional monarch to be, when occasion served, of first-
rate use both at the outset and during the continuance of
an administration ; but that in matter of fact it was not
likely that he would be useful The requisite ideas,
habits, and faculties, far surpass the usual competence
of an average man, educated in the common manner of
sovereigns. The same arguments are entirely applicable
at the close of an administration. But at that conjunc-
ture the two most singular prerogatives of an English
king the power of creating new peers and the power of
dissolving the Commons come into play ; and we cannot
duly criticise the use or misuse of these powers till we
know what the peers are and what the House of Com-
mons is.
The use of the House of Lords or, rather, of the
Lords, in its dignified capacity is very great. It does
not attract so much reverence as the Queen, but it at-
tracts very much. The office of an order of nobility is to
impose on the common people not necessarily to impose
on them what is untrue, yet less what is hurtful; but
90 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
still to impose on their quiescent imaginations what
would not otherwise be there. The fancy of the mass
of men is incredibly weak ; it can see nothing without
a visible symbol, and there is much that it can scarcely
make out with a symbol. Nobility is the symbol of
mind. It has the marks from which the mass of men
always used to infer mind, and often still infer it. A
common clever man who goes into a country place will
get no reverence ; but the " old squire " will get reverence.
Even after he is insolvent, when every one knows that
his ruin is but a question of time, he will get five times
as much respect from the common peasantry as the
newly-made rich man who sits beside him. The common
peasantry will listen to his nonsense more submissively
than to the new man's sense. An old lord will get infi-
nite respect. His very existence is so far useful that it
awakens the sensation of obedience to a sort of mind in
the coarse, dull, contracted multitude, who could neither
appreciate nor perceive any other.
The order of nobility is of great use, too, not only in
what it creates, but in what it prevents. It prevents
the rule of wealth the religion of gold. This is the
obvious and natural idol of the Anglo-Saxon. He is
always trying to make money ; he reckons everything
in coin ; he bows down before a great heap and sneers
as he passes a little heap. He has a " natural instinctive
admiration of wealth for its own sake." And within good
limits the feeling is quite right. So long as we play the
game of industry vigorously and eagerly (and I hope we
shall long play it, for we must be very different from
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 91
what we are if we do anything better), we shall of neces-
sity respect and admire those who play successfully, and
a little despise those who play unsuccessfully. Whether
this feeling be right or wrong, it is useless to discuss ; to
a certain degree, it is involuntary ; it is not for mortals
to settle whether we will have it or not ; nature settles
for us that, within moderate limits, we must have it. But
the admiration of wealth in many countries goes far
beyond this ; it ceases to regard in any degree the skill
of acquisition; it respects wealth in the hands of the
inheritor just as much as in the hands of the maker ; it
is a simple envy and love of a heap of gold as a heap of
gold. From this our aristocracy preserves us. There is
no country where a " poor devil of a millionnaire is so ill
off as in England." The experiment is tried every day,
and every day it is proved that money alone money
pur et simple will not buy " London Society." Money
is kept down, and, so to say, cowed by the predominant
authority of a different power.
But it may be said that this is no gain ; that worship
for worship, the worship of money is as good as the
worship of rank. Even granting that it were so, it is a
great gain to society to have two idols : in the competi-
tion of idolatries the true worship gets a chance. But it
is not true that the reverence for rank at least, for here-
ditary rank is as base as the reverence for money. As
the world has gone, manner has been half -hereditary in
certain castes, and manner is one of the fine arts. It is
the style of society ; it is in the daily-spoken intercourse
of human beings what the art of literary expression is
92 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
in their occasional written intercourse. In reverencing
wealth we reverence not a man, but an appendix to a
man ; in reverencing inherited nobility, we reverence the
probable possession of a great faculty the faculty of
bringing out what is in one. The unconscious grace of
life may be in the middle classes : finely-mannered per-
sons are born everywhere; but it ought to be in the
aristocracy : and a man must be born with a hitch in his
nerves if he has not some of it. It is a physiological
possession of the race, though it is sometimes wanting in
the individual.
There is a third idolatry from which that of rank pre-
; serves us, and perhaps it is the worst of any that of
office. The basest deity is a subordinate employe, and
yet just now in civilised governments it is the commonest.
In France and all the best of the Continent it rules like a
superstition. It is to no purpose that you prove that the
pay of petty officials is smaller than mercantile pay ; that
their work is more monotonous than mercantile work;
that their mind is less useful and their life more tame.
They are still thought to be greater and better. They are
decor es ; they have a little red on the left breast of their
coat, and no argument will answer that. In England, by
the odd course of our society, what a theorist would desire
has in fact turned up. The great offices, whether per-
manent or parliamentary, which require mind now give
social prestige, and almost only those. An Under-Secretary
of State with 2000 a-year is a much greater man than
the director of a finance company with 5000, and the
country saves the difference. But except in a few offices
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 93
like the Treasury, which were once filled with aristocratic
people, and have an odour of nobility at second-hand,
minor place is of no social use. A big grocer despises the
exciseman ; and what in many countries would be thought
impossible, the exciseman envies the grocer. Solid wealth
tells where there is no artificial dignity given to petty
public functions. A clerk in the public service is " no-
body ; " and you could not make a common Englishman
see why he should be anybody.
But it must be owned that this turning of society into
a political expedient has half spoiled it. A great part of
the "best" English people keep their mind in a state
of decorous dulness. They maintain their dignity ; they
get obeyed; they are good and charitable to their de-
pendants. But they have no notion of play of mind :
no conception that the charm of society depends upon it.
They think cleverness an antic, and have a constant
though needless horror of being thought to have any of
it. So much does this stiff dignity give the tone, that
the few Englishmen capable of social brilliancy mostly
secrete it. They reserve it for persons whom they can
trust, and whom they know to be capable of appreciating
its nuances. But a good government is well worth a
great deal of social dulness. The dignified torpor of
English society is inevitable if we give precedence, not
to the cleverest classes, but to the oldest classes, and we
have seen how useful that is.
The social prestige of the aristocracy is, as every one
knows, immensely less than it was a hundred years or even
fifty years since. Two great movements the two greatest
94 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
<of modern society have been unfavourable to it. The
1 rise of industrial wealth in countless forms has brought in
a competitor which has generally more mind, and which
would be supreme were it not for awkwardness and intel-
lectual gene. Every day our companies, our railways,
our debentures, and our shares, tend more and more to
multiply these surroundings of the aristocracy, and in
time they will hide it. And while this undergrowth has
I come up, the aristocracy have come down. They have
less means of standing out than they used to have. Their
power is in their theatrical exhibition, in their state.
But society is every day becoming less stately. As our
great satirist has observed, " The last Duke of St. David's
used to cover the north road with his carriages ; landladies
and waiters bowed before him. The present Duke sneaks
away from a railway station, smoking a cigar, in a
brougham." The aristocracy cannot lead the old life if
they would ; they are ruled by a stronger power. They
suffer from the tendency of all modern society to raise
the average, and to lower comparatively, and perhaps
absolutely, to lower the summit. As the picturesqueness,
the featureliness, of society diminishes, aristocracy loses
the single instrument of its peculiar power.
If we remember the great reverence which used to be
paid to nobility as such, we shall be surprised that the
House of Lords as an assembly, has always been inferior ;
that it was always just as now, not the first, but the second
of our assemblies. I am not, of course, now speaking of
the middle ages : I am not dealing with the embryo or the
infant form of our Constitution ; I am only speaking of
THE HOUSE OF LOEDS. 95
its adult form. Take the times of Sir R. Walpole. He
was Prime Minister because he managed the House of
Commons ; he was turned out because he was beaten on
an election petition in that House ; he ruled England
because he ruled that House. Yet the nobility were then
the governing power in England. In many districts the
word of some lord was law. The " wicked Lord Lowther,"
as he was called, left a name of terror in Westmoreland
during the- memory of men now living. A great part of
the borough members and a great part of the country
members were their nominees ; an obedient, unquestioning
deference was paid them. As individuals the peers were
the greatest people ; as a House the collected peers were
but the second House.
Several causes contributed to create this anomaly, but
the main cause was a natural one. The House of Peers
has never been a House where the most important peers
were most important. It could not be so. The qualities
which fit a man for marked eminence, in a deliberative
assembly, are not hereditary, and are not coupled with
great estates. In the nation, in the provinces, in his own
province, a Duke of Devonshire, or a Duke of Bedford,
was a much greater man than Lord Thurlow. They had
great estates, many boroughs, innumerable retainers,
folio wings like a court. Lord Thurlow had no boroughs, no
retainers ; he lived on his salary. Till the House of Lords
met, the dukes were not only the greatest, but immea-
surably the greatest. But as soon as the House met, Lord
Thurlow became the greatest. He could speak, and the
others could not speak. He could transact business in half
96 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
an hour which they could not have transacted in a day, or
could not have transacted at all. When some foolish peer,
who disliked his domination, sneered at his birth, he had
words to meet the case : he said it was better for any one
to owe his place to his own exertions than to owe it to
descent, to being the "accident of an accident." But
such a House as this could not be pleasant to great
noblemen. They could not like to be second in their own
assembly (and yet that was their position from age to
age) to a lawyer who was of yesterday, whom everybody
could remember without briefs, who had talked for
"hire," who had "hungered after six-and-eightpence."
Great peers did not gain glory from the House ; on the
contrary, they lost glory when they were in the House.
They devised two expedients to get out of this difficulty :
/ they invented proxies which enabled them to vote without
being present, without being offended by vigour and
invective, without being vexed by ridicule, without
leaving the rural mansion or the town palace where they
were demigods. And what was more effectual still, they
used their influence in the House of Commons instead of
- the House of Lords. In that indirect manner a rural
potentate, who half returned two county members, and
wholly returned two borough members, who perhaps
gave seats to members of the government, who possibly
seated the leader of the Opposition, became a much
greater man than by sitting on his own bench, in his own
House, hearing a chancellor talk. The House of Lords
was a second-rate force, even when the peers were a first-
rate force, because the greatest peers, those who had the
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 97
greatest social importance, did not care for their own
House, or like it, but gained great part of their political
power by a hidden but potent influence in the competing
House.
When we cease to look at the House of Lords under
its dignified aspect, and come to regard it under its
strictly useful aspect, we find the literary theory of the
English Constitution wholly wrong, as usual. This theory
says that the House of Lords is a co-ordinate estate of
the realm, of equal rank with the House of Commons ;
that it is the aristocratic branch, just as the Commons is
the popular branch; and that by the principle of our
Constitution the aristocratic branch has equal authority
with the popular branch. So utterly false is this doctrine
that it is a remarkable peculiarity, a capital excellence of
the British Constitution, that it contains a sort of Upper
House, which is not of equal authority to the Lower
House, yet still has some authority.
The evil of two co-equal Houses of distinct natures is
obvious. Each House can stop all legislation, and yet
some legislation may be necessary. At this moment we
have the best instance of this which could be conceived.
The Upper House of our Victorian Constitution, repre-
senting the rich wool-growers, has disagreed with the
Lower Assembly, and most business is suspended. But
for a most curious stratagem, the machine of government
would stand still. Most constitutions have committed
this blunder. The two most remarkable ^Republican in^
stitutions in the world commit it. In both the American
and the Swiss Constitutions the Upper House has as much
H
98 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
,authority as the second : it could produce the maximum
of impediment the dead -lock, if it liked ; if it does not
do so, it is owing not to the goodness of the legal consti-
tution, but to the discreetness of the members of the
Chamber. In both these constitutions, this dangerous
division is defended by a peculiar doctrine with which I
have nothing to do now. It is said that there must be in
a Federal Government, some institution, some authority,
some body possessing a veto in which the separate States
composing the Confederation are all equal. I confess this
doctrine has to me no self-evidence, and it is assumed,
but not proved. The State of Delaware is not equal in
power or influence to the State of New York, and you
cannot make it so by giving it an equal veto in an Upper
Chamber. The history of such an institution is indeed
most natural. A little State will like, and must like to
see some token, some memorial mark of its old inde-
pendence preserved in the Constitution by which that
independence is extinguished. But it is one thing for an
institution to be natural, and another for it to be expe-
dient. If indeed it be that a Federal Government compels
the erection of an Upper Chamber of conclusive and co-
ordinate authority, it is one more in addition to the many
other inherent defects of that kind of government. It may
be necessary to have the blemish, but it is a blemish just
as much.
There ought to be in every Constitution an available
authority somewhere. The sovereign power must be
come-at-able. And the English have made it so. The
House of Lords, at the passing of the Reform Act of 1832,
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 99
was as unwilling to concur with the House of Commons
as the Upper Chamber at Victoria to concur with the
Lower Chamber. But it did concur. The Crown has
the authority to create new peers ; and the king of the
day had promised the ministry of the day to create them.
The House of Lords did not like the precedent, and they
passed the Bill. The power was not used, but its existence
was as useful as its energy. Just as the knowledge that
his men can strike makes a master yield in order that
they may not strike, so the knowledge that their House
could be swamped at the will of the king at the will of
the people made the Lords yield to the people.
From the Reform Act the function of the House of
Lords has been altered in English History. Before that
Act it was, if not a directing Chamber, at least a Chamber
of Directors. The leading nobles, who had most influence
in the Commons, and swayed the Commons, sat there.
Aristocratic influence was so powerful in the House of
Commons, that there never was any serious breach of
unity. When the Houses quarrelled, it was as in the
great Aylesbury case, about their respective privileges,
and not about the national policy. The influence of the
nobility was then so potent, that it was not necessary to
exert it. The English Constitution, though then on this
point very different from what it now is, did not even
then contain the blunder of the Victorian or of the Swiss
Constitution. It had not two Houses of distinct origin ;
it had two Houses of common origin two Houses in
which the predominant element was the same. The
danger of discordance was obviated by a latent unity.
100 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Since the Reform Act the House of Lords has become
a revising and suspending House. It can alter Bills ; it
can reject Bills on which the House of Commons is not
yet thoroughly in earnest upon which the nation is not
yet determined. Their veto is a sort of hypothetical
veto. They say, We reject your Bill for this once or
these twice, or even these thrice: but if you keep on
sending it up, at last we won't reject it. The House has
ceased to be one of latent directors, and has become one
of temporary rejectors and palpable alterers.
It is the sole claim of the Duke of Wellington to the
name of a statesman, that he presided over this change.
He wished to guide the Lords to their true position, and
he did guide them. In 1846, in the crisis of the Corn-
Law struggle, and when it was a question whether the
House of Lords should resist or yield, he wrote a very
curious letter to the late Lord Derby :
"For many years, indeed from the year 1830, when I
retired from office, I have endeavoured to manage the
House of Lords upon the principle on which I conceive
that the institution exists in the Constitution of the
country, that of Conservatism. I have invariably objected
to all violent and extreme measures, which is not exactly
the mode of acquiring influence in a political party in
England, particularly one in opposition to Government.
I have invariably supported Government in Parliament
upon important occasions, and have always exercised my
personal influence to prevent the mischief of anything
like a difference or division between the two Houses,
of which there are some remarkable instances, to which I
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 101
I will advert here, as they will tend to show you the
nature of my management, and possibly, in some degree,
account for the extraordinary power which I have for so
many years exercised, without any apparent claim to it.
" Upon finding the difficulties in which the late King
William was involved by a promise made to create peers,
the number, I believe, indefinite, I determined myself,
and I prevailed upon others, the number very large, to
be absent from the House in the discussion of the last
atages of the Reform Bill, after the negotiations had
failed for the formation of a new Administration. This
course gave at the time great dissatisfaction to the party
notwithstanding that I believe it saved the existence of
the House of Lords at the time, and the Constitution of
the country.
" Subsequently, throughout the period from 1835 to
1841, 1 prevailed upon the House of Lords to depart from
many principles and systems which they as well as I had
adopted and voted on Irish tithes, Irish corporations, and
other measures, much to the vexation and annoyance of
many. But I recollect one particular measure, the union
of the provinces of Upper and Lower Canada, in the
early stages of which I had spoken in opposition to the
measure, and had protested against it ; and in the last
stages of it I prevailed upon the House to agree to, and
pass it, in order to avoid the injury to the public interests
of a dispute between the Houses upon a question of such
importance. Then I supported the measures of the
Government, and protected the servant of the Govern-
ment, Captain Elliot, in China. All of which tended to
102 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
weaken my influence with some of the party; others,
possibly a majority, might have approved of the course
which I took. It was at the same time well known that
from the commencement at least of Lord Melbourne's
Government, I was in constant communication with it,
upon all military matters, whether occurring at home or
abroad, at all events. But likewise upon many others.
" All this tended of course to diminish my influence
in the Conservative party, while it tended essentially to
the ease and satisfaction of the Sovereign, and to the
maintenance of good order. At length came the resig-
nation of the Government by Sir Robert Peel, in the
month of December last, and the Queen desiring Lord
John Russell to form an Administration. On the 12th
of December the Queen wrote to me the letter of which
I enclose the copy, and the copy of my answer of the
same date ; of which it appears that you have never seen
copies, although I communicated them immediately to Sir
Robert Peel. It was impossible for me to act otherwise
than is indicated in my letter to the Queen. I am the
servant of the Crown and people. I have been paid and
rewarded, and I consider myself retained ; and that I
can't do otherwise than serve as required, when I can do
so without dishonour, that is to say, as long as I have
health and strength to enable me to serve. But it is
obvious that there is, and there must be, an end of all
connection and counsel between party and me. I might
with consistency, and some may think that I ought to
have declined to belong to Sir Robert Peel's Cabinet on
the night of the 20th of December. But my opinion is,
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 103
that if I had, Sir Robert Peel's Government would not
have been framed; that we should have had and
in office next morning.
" But, at all events, it is quite obvious that when that
arrangement comes, which sooner or later must come,
there will be an end to all influence on my part over the
Conservative party, if I should be so indiscreet as to
attempt to exercise any. You will see, therefore, that
the stage is quite clear for you, and that you need not
apprehend the consequences of differing in opinion from
me when you will enter upon it ; as in truth I have, by
my letter to the Queen of the 12th of December, put an
end to the connection between the party and me, when
the party will be in opposition to her Majesty's Govern-
ment.
" My opinion is, that the great object of all is that
you should assume the station, and exercise the influence,
which I have so long exercised in the House of Lords.
The question is, how is that object to be attained ? By
guiding their opinion and decision, or by following it ?
You will see that I have endeavoured to guide their
opinion, and have succeeded upon some most remarkable
occasions. But it has been by a good deal of management.
"Upon the important occasion and question now
before the House, I propose to endeavour to induce them
to avoid to involve the country in the additional diffi-
culties of a difference of opinion, possibly a dispute be-
tween the Houses, on a question in the decision of which
it has been frequently asserted that their lordships had a
personal interest; which assertion, however false as
104 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION,
affecting each of them personally, could not be denied as
affecting the proprietors of land in general I am aware
of the difficulty, but I don't despair of carrying the Bill
through. You must be the best judge of the course which
you ought to take, and of the course most likely to con-
ciliate the confidence of the House of Lords. My opinion
is, that you should advise the House to vote that which
would tend most to public order, and would be most
beneficial to the immediate interests of the country."
This is the mode in which the House of Lords came
to be what it now is, a chamber with (in most cases) a
veto of delay with (in most cases) a power of revision,
but with no other rights or powers. The question we
have to answer is, " The House of Lords being such)
what is the use of the Lords ? "
The common notion evidently fails, that it is a bul-
wark against imminent revolution. As the Duke's
letter in every line evinces, the wisest members, the
guiding members of the House, know that the House
must yield to the people if the people is determined.
The two cases that of the Reform Act and the Corn
Laws were decisive cases. The great majority of the
Lords thought Reform revolution, Free-trade confis-
cation, and the two together ruin. If they could ever
have been trusted to resist the people, they would then
have resisted it. But in truth it is idle to expect a
second chamber a chamber of notables ever to resist a
popular chamber, a nation's chamber, when that chamber
is vehement and the nation vehement too. There is no
strength in it for that purpose. Every class chamber,
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 105
every minority chamber, so to speak, feels weak and
helpless when the nation is excited. In a time of revo-
lution there are but two powers, the sword and the
people. The executive commands the sword ; the great
lesson which the First Napoleon taught the Parisian
populace the contribution he made to the theory of
revolutions at the 18th Brumaire is now well known.
Any strong soldier at the head of the army can use the
army. But a second chamber cannot use it. It is a
pacific assembly composed of timid peers, aged lawyers,
or, as abroad, clever litterateurs. Such a body has no
force to put down the nation, and if the nation will have
it do something it must do it.
The very nature, too, as has been seen, of the Lords
in the English Constitution, shows that it cannot stop
revolution. The constitution contains an exceptional
provision to prevent it stopping it. The executive, thej
appointee of the popular chamber and the nation, can'
make new peers, and so create a majority in the peers;:
it can say to the Lords, " Use the powers of your House ;
as we like, or you shall not use them at all. We will
find others to use them ; your virtue shall go out of you
if it is not used as we like, and stopped when we please."
An assembly under such a threat cannot arrest, and could
not be intended to arrest, a determined and insisting
executive.
In fact the House of Lords, as a House, is not a bul-
wark that will keep out revolution, but an index that
revolution is unlikely. Resting as it does upon old
deference, and inveterate homage, it shows that the spasm
106 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
of new forces, the outbreak of new agencies, which we call
revolution, is for the time simply impossible. So long as
many old leaves linger on the November trees, you know
that there has been little frost and no wind; just so
while the House of Lords retains much power, you may
know that there is no desperate discontent in the country,
no wild agency likely to cause a great demolition.
There used to be a singular idea that two chambers
a revising chamber and a suggesting chamber were
essential to a free government. The first person who threw
a hard stone an effectually hitting stone against the
theory was one very little likely to be favourable to demo-
cratic influence, or to be blind to the use of aristocracy ;
it was the present Lord Grey. He had to look at the
matter practically. He was the first great colonial minister
of England who ever set himself to introduce representa-
tive institutions into all her capable colonies, and the diffi-
culty stared him in the face that in those colonies there
were hardly enough good people for one assembly, and not
near enough good people for two assemblies. It happened
and most naturally happened that a second assembly
was mischievous. The second assembly was either the
nominee of the Crown, which in such places naturally
allied itself with better instructed minds, or was elected
by people with a higher property qualification some
peculiarly well-judging people. Both these choosers
choose the best men in the colony, and put them into
the second assembly. But thus the popular assembly
was left without those best men. The popular assembly
was denuded of those guides and those leaders who
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 107
would have led and guided it best. Those superior men
were put aside to talk to one another, and perhaps
dispute with one another; they were a concentrated
instance of high but neutralised forces. They wished to
do good, but they could do nothing. The Lower House,
with all the best people in the colony extracted, did what
it liked. The democracy was strengthened rather than
weakened by the isolation of its best opponents in a
weak position. As soon as experience had shown this,
or seemed to show it, the theory that two chambers were
essential to a good and free government vanished away.
With a perfect Lower House it is certain that an
Upper House would be scarcely of any value. If we had
an ideal House of Commons perfectly representing the
nation, always moderate, never passionate, abounding in
men of leisure, never omitting the slow and steady forms
necessary for good consideration, it is certain that we
should not need a higher chamber. The work would be
done so well that we should not want any one to look
over or revise it. And whatever is unnecessary in govern-
ment is pernicious. Human life makes so much com-
plexity necessary that an artificial addition is sure to do
harm : you cannot tell where the needless bit of machinery
will catch and clog the hundred needful wheels ; but the
chances are conclusive that it will impede them some-
where, so nice are they and so delicate. But though
beside an ideal House of Commons the Lords would be
unnecessary, and therefore pernicious, beside the actual
House a revising and leisured legislature is extremely
useful, if not quite necessary.
108 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
At present the chance majorities on minor questions
in the House of Commons are subject to no effectual
control. The nation never attends to any but the princi-
pal matters of policy and state. Upon these it forms that
rude, rough, ruling judgment which we call public
opinion ; but upon other things it does not think at all,
and it would be useless for it to think. It has not the
materials for forming a judgment : the detail of Bills, the
instrumental part of policy, the latent part of legislation,
are wholly out of its way. It knows nothing about
them, and could not find time or labour for the careful
investigation by which alone they can be apprehended.
A casual majority of the House of Commons has therefore
dominant power : it can legislate as it wishes. And
though the whole House of Commons upon great subjects
very fairly represents public opinion, and though its
judgment upon minor questions is, from some secret ex-
cellencies in its composition, remarkably sound and good ;
yet, like all similar assemblies, it is subject to the sudden
action of selfish combinations. There are said to be two
hundred " members for the railways " in the present
Parliament. If these two hundred choose to combine on
a point which the public does not care for, and which
they care for because it affects their purse, they are
absolute. A formidable sinister interest may always
obtain the complete command of a dominant assembly by
some chance and for a moment, and it is therefore of
great use to have a second chamber of an opposite sort,
differently composed, in which that interest in all likeli-
hood will not rule.
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 109
The most dangerous of all sinister interests is that of -
the executive Government, because it is the most power-
ful. It is perfectly possible it has happened, and will
happen again that the Cabinet, being very powerful in
the Commons, may inflict minor measures on the nation
which the nation did not like, but which it did not
understand enough to forbid. If, therefore, a tribunal
of revision can be found in which the executive, though
powerful, is less powerful, the government will be the
better; the retarding chamber will impede minor in-
stances of parliamentary tyranny, though it will not
prevent or much impede revolution.
Every large assembly is, moreover, a fluctuating body ;
it is not one house, so to say, but a set of houses ; it is
one set of men to-night and another to-morrow night. A
certain unity is doubtless preserved by the duty which
the executive is supposed to undertake, and does under-
take, of keeping a house ; a constant element is so pro-
vided about which all sorts of variables accumulate and
pass away. But even after due allowance for the full
weight of this protective machinery, our House of Com-
mons is, as all such chambers must be, subject to sudden
turns and bursts of feeling, because the members who
compose it change from time to time. The pernicious
result is perpetual in our legislation ; many acts of Par-
liament are medleys of different motives, because the
majority which passed one set of its clauses is different
from that which passed another set.
But the greatest defect of the House of Commons is
that it has no leisure. The life of the House is the
110 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
worst of all lives a life of distracting routine. It has
an amount of business brought before it such as no
similar assembly ever has had. The British empire is a
miscellaneous aggregate, and each bit of the aggregate
brings its bit of business to the House of Commons. It is
India one day and Jamaica the next ; then again China,
and then Sleswig-Holstein. Our legislation touches on
all subjects, because our country contains all ingredients.
The mere questions which are asked of the ministers run
over half human affairs ; the Private Bill Acts, the mere
privilegia of our Government subordinate as they
ought to be probably give the House of Commons
more absolute work than the whole business, both
national and private, of any other assembly which has
ever sat. The whole scene is so encumbered with chang-
ing business, that it is hard to keep your head in it.
Whatever, too, may be the case hereafter, when a
better system has been struck out, at present the House
does all the work of legislation, all the detail, and all the
clauses itself. One of the most helpless exhibitions of
helpless ingenuity and wasted mind is a committee of
the whole House on a Bill of many clauses which eager
enemies are trying to spoil, and various friends are trying
to mend. An Act of Parliament is at least as complex
as a marriage settlement; and it is made much as a
settlement would be if it were left to the vote and settled
by the major part of persons concerned, including the
unborn children. There is an advocate for every interest,
and every interest clamours for every advantage. The
executive Government by means of its disciplined forces,
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. Ill
and the few invaluable members who sit and think, pre-
serves some sort of unity. But the result is very im-
perfect. The best test of a machine is the work it turns
out. Let any one who knows what legal documents
ought to be, read first a will he has just been making
and then an Act of Parliament; he will certainly say,
"I would have dismissed my attorney if he had done
my business as the legislature has done the nation's
business." While the House of Commons is what it is,
a good revising, regulating, and retarding House would
be a benefit of great magnitude.
But is the House of Lords such a chamber ? Does it
do this work ? This is almost an undiscussed question.
The House of Lords, for thirty years at least, has been in
popular discussion an accepted matter. Popular passion
has not crossed the path, and no vivid imagination has
been excited to clear the matter up.
The House of Lords has the greatest merit which such;
a chamber can have ; it is possible. It is incredibly diffi-
cult to get a revising assembly, because it is difficult to
find a class of respected revisers. A federal senate, a
second House, which represents State Unity, has this
advantage; it embodies a feeling at the root of society
a feeling which is older than complicated politics,
which is stronger a thousand times over than com-
mon political feelings the local feeling. "My shirt,"
said the Swiss state- right patriot, " is dearer to me than
my coat." Every State in the American Union would
feel that disrespect to the Senate was disrespect to itself.
Accordingly, the Senate is respected ; whatever may be
112 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
the merits or demerits of its action, it can act ; it is real,
independent, and efficient. But in common governments
it is fatally difficult to make an unpopular entity power-
ful in a popular government.
It is almost the same thing to say that the House of
Lords is independent. It would not be powerful, it would
not be possible, unless it were known to be independent.
The Lords are in several respects more independent than
the Commons; their judgment may not be so good a
judgment, but it is emphatically their own judgment.
The House of Lords, as a body, is accessible to no social
bribe. And this, in our day, is no light matter. Many
members of the House of Commons, who are to be in-
fluenced by no other manner of corruption, are much
influenced by this its most insidious sort. The con-
ductors of the press and the writers for it are worse at
least the more influential who come near the temptation ;
for " position," as they call it, for a certain intimacy with
the aristocracy, some of them would do almost anything
and say almost anything. But the Lords are those who
give social bribes, and not those who take them. They
are above corruption because they are the corruptors.
They have no constituency to fear or wheedle ; they have
the best means of forming a disinterested and cool judg-
ment of any class in the country. They have, too, leisure
to form it. They have no occupations to distract them
which are worth the name. Field sports are but play-
things, though some Lords put an Englishman's serious-
ness into them. Few Englishmen can bury themselves in
science or literature ; and the aristocracy have less, per-
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 113
haps, of that impetus than the middle classes. Society is
too correct and dull to be an occupation, as in other times
and ages it has been. The aristocracy live in the fear
of the middle classes of the grocer and the merchant.
They dare not frame a society of enjoyment as the French
aristocracy once formed it. Politics are the only occupa-
tion a peer has worth the name. He may pursue them
undistractedly. The House of Lords, besides inde-
pendence to revise judicially and position to revise
effectually, has leisure to revise intellectually.
These are great merits : and, considering how difficult
it is to get a good second chamber, and how much with
our present first chamber we need a second, we may well
be thankful for them. But we must not permit them to
blind our eyes. Those merits of the Lords have faults
close beside them which go far to make them useless.
With its wealth, its place, and its leisure, the House of
Lords would, on the very surface of the matter, rule us
far more than it does if it had not secret defects which
hamper and weaken it.
The first of these defects is hardly to be called secret,
though, on the other hand, it is not well known. A severe
though not unfriendly critic of our institutions said that
"the cure for admiring the House of Lords was to go and
look at it " to look at it not on a great party field-day,
or at a time of parade, but in the ordinary transaction of
business. There are perhaps ten peers in the House,
possibly only six ; three is the quorum for transacting
business. A few more may dawdle in or not dawdle in :
those are the principal speakers, the lawyers (a few years
I
114< THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
ago when Lyndhust, Brougham, and Campbell were in
vigour, they were by far the predominant talkers) and a
few statesmen whom every one knows. But the mass of
the House is nothing. This is why orators trained in the
Commons detest to speak in the Lords. Lord Chatham
used to call it the " Tapestry." The House of Commons
is a scene of life if ever there was a scene of life. Every
member in the throng, every atom in the medley, has his
own objects (good or bad), his own purposes (great or
petty) ; his own notions, such as they are, of what is ;
his own notions, such as they are, of what ought to be.
There is a motley confluence of vigorous elements, but
the result is one and good. There is a " feeling of the
House," a " sense " of the House, and no one who knows
anything of it can despise it. A very shrewd man of
the world went so far as to say that " the House of Com-
mons has more sense than any one in it." But there is
no such " sense " in the House of Lords, because there
is no life. The Lower Chamber is a chamber of eager
politicians ; the Upper (to say the least) of not eager ones.
This apathy is not, indeed, as great as the outside
show would indicate. The committees of the Lords (as is
well known) do a great deal of work and do it very well.
And such as it is, the apathy is very natural. A House
composed of rich men who can vote by proxy without
coming will not come very much.* But after every abate-
ment the real indifference to their duties of most peers
is a great defect, and the apparent indifference is a
* In accordance with a recent resolution of the House of Lords,
proxies are now disused. Note to second edition.
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 115
dangerous defect. As far as politics go there is profound
truth in Lord Chesterfield's axiom, that " the world must
judge of you by what you seem, not by what you are."
The world knows what you seem ; it does not know
what you are. An assembly a revising assembly espe-
cially which does not assemble, which looks as if it
does not care how it revises, is defective in a main
political ingredient. It may be of use, but it will hardly
convince mankind that it is so.
The next defect is even more serious : it affects not
simply the apparent work of the House of Lords but the
real work. For a revising legislature, it is too uniformly
made up. Errors are of various kinds ; but the constitu-
tion of the House of Lords only guards against a single
error that of too quick change. The Lords leaving out
a few lawyers and a few outcasts are all landowners of
more or less wealth. They all have more or less the
opinions, the merits, the faults of that one class. They
revise legislation, as far as they do revise it, exclusively
according to the supposed interests, the predominant
feelings, the inherited opinions, of that class. Since the
Reform Act, this uniformity of tendency has been very
evident. The Lords have felt it would be harsh to
say hostile, but still dubious, as to the new legislation.
There was a spirit in it alien to their spirit, and which
when they could they have tried to cast out. That
spirit is what has been termed the " modern spirit." It
is not easy to concentrate its essence in a phrase; it lives
in our life, animates our actions, suggests our thoughts.
We all know what it means, though it would take an
116 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
essay to limit it and define it. To this the Lords object ;
wherever it is concerned, they are not impartial revisers,
but biased revisers.
This singleness of composition would be no fault ; it
would be, or might be, even a merit, if the criticism of
the House of Lords, though a suspicious criticism, were
yet a criticism of great understanding. The characteristic
legislation of every age must have characteristic defects ;
it is the outcome of a character, of necessity faulty and
limited. It must mistake some kind of things ; it must
overlook some other. If we could get hold of a comple-
mental critic, a critic who saw what the age did not see,
and who saw rightly what the age mistook, we should
have a critic of inestimable value. But is the House of
Lords that critic ? Can it be said that its unfriendliness
to the legislation of the age is founded on a perception of
what the age does not see, and a rectified perception of
what the age does see ? The most extreme partisan, the
most warm admirer of the Lords, if of fair and tempered
mind, cannot say so. The evidence is too strong. On
free trade, for example, no one can doubt that the Lords
in opinion, in what they wished to do, and would have
done, if they had acted on their own minds were utterly
wrong. This is the clearest test of the " modern spirit."
It is easier here to be sure it is right than elsewhere.
Commerce is like war; its result is patent. Do you
make money or do you not make it ? There is as little
appeal from figures as from battle. Now no one can
doubt that England is a great deal better off because of
free trade ; that it has more money, and that its money
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 117
is diffused more as we should wish it diffused. In the
one case in which we can unanswerably test the modern
spirit, it was right, and the dubious Upper House the
House which would have rejected it, if possible was
wrong.
There is another reason. The House of Lords, being
i
an hereditary chamber, cannot be of more than common I
ability. It may contain it almost always has contained,
it almost always will contain extraordinary men. But
its average born law-makers cannot be extraordinary.
Being a set of eldest sons picked out by chance and
history, it cannot be very wise. It would be a standing
miracle if such a chamber possessed a knowledge of its
age superior to the other men of the age ; if it possessed
a superior and supplemental knowledge ; if it descried
what they did not discern, and saw truly that which they
saw, indeed, but saw untruly.
The difficulty goes deeper. The task of revising, of
adequately revising the legislation of this age, is not only
that which an aristocracy has no facility in doing, but one
Avhich it has a difficulty in doing. Look at the statute
book for 1865 the statutes at large for the year. You
will find, not pieces of literature, not nice and subtle
matters, but coarse matters, crude heaps of heavy busi-
ness. They deal with trade, with finance, with statute
law reform, with common law reform ; they deal with
various sorts of business, but with business always. And
there is no educated human being less likely to know
business, worse placed for knowing business than a young
lord. Business is really more agreeable than pleasure ; it
118 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
interests the whole mind, the aggregate nature of man
more continuously, and more deeply. But it does not
look as if it did. It is difficult to convince a young man,
who can have the best of pleasure, that it will A young
lord just come into 30,000?. a year will not, as a rule,
care much for the law of patents, for the law of " passing
tolls," or the law of prisons. Like Hercules, he may
choose virtue, but hardly Hercules could choose business.
He has everything to allure him from it, and nothing to
allure him to it. And even if he wish to give himself to
business, he has indifferent means. Pleasure is near him,
but business is far from him. Few things are more
amusing than the ideas of a well-intentioned young man,
who is born out.of the business world, but who wishes to
take to business, about business. He has hardly a notion
in what it consists. It really is the adjustment of certain
particular means to equally certain particular ends. But
hardly any young man destitute of experience is able to
separate end and means. It seems to him a kind of
mystery ; and it is lucky if he do not think that the
forms are the main part, and that the end is but se-
condary. There are plenty of business men falsely so
called, who will advise him so. The subject seems a
kind of maze. "What would you recommend me to
read ? " the nice youth asks ; and it is impossible to ex-
plain to him that reading has nothing to do with it, that
he has not yet the original ideas in his mind to read
about; that administration is an art as painting is an
art; and that no book can teach the practice of either.
Formerly this defect in the aristocracy was hidden by
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 119
their own advantages. Being the only class at ease for
money and cultivated in mind they were without compe-
tition; and though they might not be, as a rule, and
extraordinary ability excepted, excellent in State busi-
ness, they were the best that could be had. Even in
old times, however, they sheltered themselves from the
greater pressure of coarse work. They appointed a
manager a Peel or a Walpole, anything but an aristo-
crat in manner or in nature to act for them and manage
for them. But now a class is coming up trained to?
thought, full of money, and yet trained to business. As
I write, two members of this class have been appointed
to stations considerable in themselves, and sure to lead
(if anything is sure in politics) to the Cabinet and
power. This is the class of highly-cultivated men of
business who, after a few years, are able to leave business
and begin ambition. As yet these men are few in public
life, because they do not know their own strength. It is
like Columbus and the egg once again ; a few original
men will show it can be done, and then a crowd of
common men will follow. These men know business
partly from tradition, and this is much. There are Uni-
versity families families who talk of fellowships, and who
invest their children's ability in Latin verses as soon as
they discover it ; there used to be Indian families of the
same sort, and probably will be again when the competi-
tive system has had time to foster a new breed. Just so
there are business families to whom all that concerns
money, all that concerns administration, is as familiar as
the air they breathe. All Americans, it has been said,
120 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
know business ; it is in the air of their country. Just so
certain classes know business here ; and a lord can hardly
know it. It is as great a difficulty to learn business in a
palace as it is to learn agriculture in a park.
To one kind of business, indeed, this doctrine does
not apply. There is one kind of business in which our
aristocracy have still, and are likely to retain long, a
certain advantage. This is the business of diplomacy.
Napoleon, who knew men well, would never, if he could
help it, employ men of the Revolution in missions to the
old courts ; he said, " They spoke to no one, and no one
spoke to them ; " and so they sent home no information.
The reason is obvious. The old-world diplomacy of Europe
was largely carried on in drawing-rooms, and, to a great
extent, of necessity still is so. Nations touch at their
summits. It is always the highest class which travels
most, knows most of foreign nations, has the least of the
territorial sectarianism which calls itself patriotism, and
is often thought to be so. Even here, indeed, in England
the new trade-class is in real merit equal to the aristo-
cracy. Their knowledge of foreign things is as great, and
their contact with them often more. But, notwith-
standing, the new race is not as serviceable for diplomacy
as the old race. An ambassador is not simply an agent ;
he is also a spectacle. He is sent abroad for show a?
well as for substance ; he is to represent the Queen among
foreign courts and foreign sovereigns. An aristocracy is
in its nature better suited to such work ; it is trained to
the theatrical part of life ; it is fit for that if it is fit for
anything.
THE HOUSE OF LORDS 121
But, with this exception, an aristocracy is necessarily
inferior in business to the classes nearer business ; and it
is not, therefore, a suitable class, if we had our choice of
classes, out of which to frame a chamber for revising
matters of business. It is indeed a singular example how
natural business is to the English race, that the House of
Lords works as well as it does. The common appearance
of the "whole House" is a jest a dangerous anomaly,
which Mr. Bright will sometimes use ; but a great deal of
substantial work is done in " Committees," and often very
well done. The great majority of the Peers do none of
their appointed work, and could do none of it; but a
minority a minority never so large and never so earnest
as in this age do it, and do it well. Still no one, who
examines the matter without prejudice, can say that the
work is done perfectly. In a country so rich in mind as
England, far more intellectual power can be, and ought
to be, applied to the revision of our laws.
And not only does the House of Lords do its work
imperfectly, but often, at least, it does it timidly. Being
only a section of the nation, it is afraid of the nation.
Having been used for years and years, on the greatest
matters to act contrary to its own judgment, it hardly
knows when to act on that judgment. The depressing
languor with which it damps an earnest young Peer is at
times ridiculous. " When the Corn Laws are gone, and
the rotten boroughs, why tease about Clause IX. in the
Bill to regulate Cotton Factories ? " is the latent thought
of many Peers. A word from the Leaders, from " the
Duke," or Lord Derby, or Lord Lyndhurst, will rouse on
122 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
any matters the sleeping energies ; but most Lords are
feeble and forlorn.
These grave defects would have been at once lessened,
and in the course of years nearly effaced, if the House of
Lords had not resisted the proposal of Lord Palmerston's
first government to create peers for life. The expedient
was almost perfect. The difficulty of reforming an old
institution like the House of Lords is necessarily great ;
its possibility rests on continuous caste and ancient defer-
ence. And if you begin to agitate about it, to bawl at
meetings about it, that deference is gone, its peculiar
charm lost, its reserved sanctity gone. But, by an odd
fatality, there was in the recesses of the Constitution an
old prerogative which would have rendered agitation
needless which would have effected, without agitation,
all that agitation could have effected. Lord Palmerston
was now that he is dead, and his memory can be calmly
viewed as firm a friend to an aristocracy, as thorough an
aristocrat, as any in England ; yet he proposed to use that
power. If the House of Lords had still been under the
rule of the Duke of Wellington, perhaps they would have
acquiesced. The Duke would not indeed have reflected
on all the considerations which a philosophic statesman
would have set out before him ; but he would have been
brought right by one of his peculiarities. He disliked,
above all things, to oppose the Crown. At a great crisis,
at the crisis of the Corn Laws, what he considered was not
what other people were thinking of, the economical issue
under discussion, the welfare of the country hanging in
the balance, but the Queen's ease. He thought the Crown
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 123
so superior a part in the Constitution, that, even on vital
occasions, he looked solely or said he looked solely to
the momentary comfort of the present sovereign. He
never was comfortable in opposing a conspicuous act of
the Crown. It is very likely that, if the Duke had still
been the President of the House of Lords, they would have
permitted the Crown to prevail in its well-chosen scheme.
But the Duke was dead, and his authority or some of it
had fallen to a very different person. Lord Lyndhurst
had many great qualities : he had a splendid intellect
as great a faculty of finding truth as any one in his gene-
ration ; but he had no love of truth. With this great
faculty of finding truth, he was a believer in error in
what his own party now admit to be error all his life
through. He could have found the truth as a statesman
just as he found it when a judge; but he never did find
it. He never looked for it. He was a great partisan, and
he applied a capacity of argument, and a faculty of intel-
lectual argument rarely equalled, to support the tenets of
his party. The proposal to create life-peers was proposed
by the antagonistic party was at the moment likely to
injure his own party. To him this was a great opportu-
nity. The speech he delivered on that occasion lives
in the memory of those who heard it. His eyes did not
at that time let him read, so he repeated by memory, and
quite accurately, all the black-letter authorities bearing
on the question. So great an intellectual effort has rarely
been seen in an English assembly. But the result was
deplorable. Not by means of his black-letter authorities,
but by means of his recognised authority and his vivid
THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
impression, he induced the House of Lords to reject the
proposition of the Government. Lord Lyndhurst said the
Crown could not now create life-peers, and so there are no
life-peers. The House of Lords rejected the inestimable,
the unprecedented opportunity of being tacitly reformed.
Such a chance does not come twice. The life-peers who
would have been then introduced would have been among
the first men in the country. Lord Hacaulay was to have
been among the first; Lord Wensleydale the most learned
and not the least logical of our lawyers to be the very
first. Thirty or forty such men, added judiciously and
sparingly as years went on, would have given to the House
of Lords the very element which, as a criticising Cham-
ber, it needs so much. It would have given it critics.
The most accomplished men in each department might
then, without irrelevant considerations of family and of
fortune, have been added to the Chamber of Review. The
very element which was wanted to the House of Lords
was, as it were, by a constitutional providence, offered to
the House of Lords, and they refused it. By what species
of effort that error can be repaired I cannot tell; but,
unless it is repaired, the intellectual capacity can never
be what it would have been, will never be what it ought
to be, will never be sufficient for its work.
Another reform ought to have accompanied the creation
of life-peers. Proxies ought to have been abolished.
Some time or other the slack attendance of the House of
Lords will destroy the House of Lords. There are occa-
sions in which appearances are realities, and this is one
of them. The House of Lords on most days looks so unlike
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 125
what it ought to be, that most people will not believe it is
what it ought to be. The attendance of considerate peers
will, for obvious reasons, be larger when it can no longer
be overpowered by the 'new-attendance, by the commis-
sioned votes of inconsiderate peers. The abolition of
proxies would have made the House of Lords a real
House ; the addition of life-peers would have made it a
good House.
The greater of these changes would have most mate-
rially aided the House of Lords in the performance of its
subsidiary functions. It always perhaps happens in a
great nation, that certain bodies of sensible men posted
prominently in its constitution, acquire functions, and
usefully exercise functions, which at the outset, no one
expected from them, and which do not identify them-
selves with their original design. This has happened to
the House of Lords especially. The most obvious in-
stance is the judicial function. This is a function which
no theorist would assign to a second chamber in a new
constitution, and which is matter of accident in ours.
Gradually, indeed, the unfitness of the second chamber
for judicial functions has made itself felt. Under our
present arrangements this function is not intrusted to
the House of Lords, but to a Committee of the House
of Lords. On one occasion only, the trial of O'Connell, the
whole House, or some few in the whole House, wished
to vote, and they were told they could not, or they
would destroy the judicial prerogative. No one, indeed,
would venture really to place the judicial function in
the chance majorities of a fluctuating assembly : it is so
126 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
by a sleepy theory; it is not so in living fact. As a
legal question, too, it is a matter of grave doubt whether
there ought to be two supreme courts in this country
the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, and (what
is in fact though not in name) the Judicial Committee
of the House of Lords. Up to a very recent time, one
committee might decide that a man was sane as to
money, and the other committee might decide that he
was insane as to land. This absurdity has been cured ;
but the error from which it arose has not been cured
the error of having two supreme courts, to both of which
as time goes on, the same question is sure often enough
to be submitted, and each of which is sure every now
and then to decide it differently. I do not reckon the
judicial function of the House of Lords as one of its
true subsidiary functions, first because it does not in fact
exercise it, next because I wish to see it in appearance
deprived of it. The supreme court of the English people
ought to be a great conspicuous tribunal, ought to rule
all other courts, ought to have no competitor, ought to
bring our law into unity, ought not to be hidden beneath
the robes of a legislative assembly.
The real subsidiary functions of the House of Lords
are, unlike its judicial functions, very analogous to its
substantial nature. The first is the faculty of criticising
the executive. An assembly in which the mass of the
members have nothing to lose, where most have nothing
to gain, where everyone has a social position firmly fixed,
where no one has a constituency, where hardly any one
cares for the minister of the day, is the very assembly in
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 127
which to look for, from which to expect, independent cri-
ticism. And in matter of fact we find it. The criticism
of the acts of late administrations by Lord Grey has been
admirable. But such criticism, to have its full value,
should be many-sided. Every man of great ability puts
his own mark on his own criticism; it will be full of
thought and feeling, but then it is of idiosyncratic thought
and feeling. We want many critics of ability and know-
ledge in the Upper House not equal to Lord Grey, for
they would be hard to find but like Lord Grey. They
should resemble him in impartiality; they should re-
semble him in clearness ; they should most of all resemble
him in taking a supplemental view of a subject. There
is an actor's view of a subject, which (I speak of mature
and discussed action of Cabinet action) is nearly sure to
include everything old and new everything ascertained
and determinate. But there is also a bystander's view
which is likely to omit some one or more of these old and
certain elements, but also to contain some new or distant
matter, which the absorbed and occupied actor could not
see. There ought to be many life-peers in our secondary
chamber capable of giving us this higher criticism. I am
afraid we shall not soon see them, but as a first step we
should learn to wish for them.
The second subsidiary action of the House of Lords is
even more important. Taking the House of Commons,
not after possible but most unlikely improvements, but
in matter of fact and as it stands, it is overwhelmed with
work. The task of managing it falls upon the Cabinet,
and that task is very hard. Every member of the Cabinet
128 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
in the Commons has to "attend the House;" to contribute
by his votes, if not by his voice, to the management of the
House. Even in so small a matter as the education de-
partment, Mr. Lowe, a consummate observer, spoke of the
desirability of finding a chief " not exposed to the pro-
digious labour of attending the House of Commons." It
is all but necessary that certain members of the Cabinet
should be exempt from its toil, and untouched by its ex-
citement. But it is also necessary that they should have
the power of explaining their views to the nation ; of
being heard as other people are heard. There are various
plans for so doing, which I may discuss a little in speak-
ing of the House of Commons. But so much is evident :
the House of Lords, for its own members, attains this
2. object; it gives them a voice, it gives them what no
competing plan does give them position. The leisured
members of the Cabinet speak in the Lords with
authority and power. They are not administrators with
a right to speech clerks (as is sometimes suggested)
brought down to lecture a House, but not to vote in it ;
but they are the equals of those they speak to; they
speak as they like, and reply as they choose; they
address the House, not with the " bated breath " of sub-
ordinates, but with the force and dignity of sure rank.
Life-peers would enable us to use this faculty of our
Constitution more freely and more variously. It would
give us a larger command of able leisure ; it would im-
prove the Lords as a political pulpit, for it would enlarge
the list of its select preachers.
The danger of the House of Commons is, perhaps,
THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 129
that it will be reformed too rashly; the danger of the
House of Lords certainly is, that it may never be
reformed. Nobody asks that it should be so ; it is
quite safe against rough destruction, but it is not safe
against inward decay. It may lose its veto as the
Crown has lost its veto. If most of its members
neglect their duties, if all its members continue to
be of one class, and that not quite the best ; if its doors
are shut against genius that cannot found a family, and
ability which has not five thousand a year, its power
will be less year by year, and at last be gone, as so much
kingly power is gone no one knows how. Its danger
is not in assassination, but atrophy; not abolition, but
decline.
130
No. T.
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.*
THE dignified aspect of the House of Commons is alto-
gether secondary to its efficient use. It is dignified : in
a government in which the most prominent parts are
good because they are very stately, any prominent part,
to be good at all, must be somewhat stately. The human
imagination exacts keeping in government as much as in
art ; it will not be at all influenced by institutions which
do not match with those by which it is principally in-
fluenced. The House of Commons needs to be impressive,
and impressive it is : but its use resides not in its
appearance, but in its reality. Its office is not to win
power by awing mankind, but to use power in governing
mankind.
The main function of the House of Commons is one
which we know quite well, though our common constitu-
tional speech does not recognise it. The House of Com-
mons is an electoral chamber ; it is the assembly which
chooses our president. Washington and his fellow-
* I reprint this chapter substantially as it was first written. It is too
soon, ae I have explained in the introduction, to say what changes the
late Reform Act will make in the House of Commons.
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 131
politicians contrived an electoral college, to be composed
(as was hoped) of the wisest people in the nation, which,
after due deliberation, was to choose for President the
wisest man in the nation. But that college is a sham ; it
has no independence and no life. No one knows, or cares
to know, who its members are. They never discuss, and
never deliberate. They were chosen to vote that Mr.
Lincoln be President, or that Mr. Breckenridge be Presi-
dent; they do so vote, and they go home. But our House
of Commons is a real choosing body ; it elects the people
it likes. And it dismisses whom it likes too. No matter
that a few months since it was chosen to support Lord
Aberdeen or Lord Palmerston ; upon a sudden occasion it
ousts the statesman to whom it at first adhered, and selects
an opposite statesman whom it at first rejected. Doubtless
in such cases there is a tacit reference to probable public
opinion ; but certainly also there is much free will in the
judgment of the Commons. The House only goes where
it thinks in the end the nation will follow ; but it takes
its chance of the nation following or not following; it
assumes the initiative, and acts upon its discretion or its
caprice.
When the American nation has chosen its President,
its virtue goes out of it, and out of the Transmissive Col-
lege through which it chooses. But because the House
of Commons has the power of dismissal in addition to
the power of election, its relations to the Premier are
incessant. They guide him and he leads them. He is
to them what they are to the nation. He only goes
where he believes they will go after him. But he has to
132 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
take the lead ; lie must choose his direction, and begin
the journey. Nor must he flinch. A good horse likes
to feel the rider's bit ; and a great deliberative assembly
likes to fee] that it is under worthy guidance. A minister
who succumbs to the House, who ostentatiously seeks
its pleasure, who does not try to regulate it, who will
not boldly point out plain errors to it, seldom thrives.
The great leaders of Parliament have varied much, but
they have all had a certain firmness. A great assembly
is as soon spoiled by over-indulgence as a little child.
The whole life of English politics is the action and re-
action between the Ministry and the Parliament. The
appointees strive to guide, and the appointors surge under
the guidance.
The elective is now the most important function of
the House of Commons. It is most desirable to insist,
and be tedious, on this, because our tradition ignores it.
At the end of half the sessions of Parliament, you will
read in the newspapers, and you will hear even from
those who have looked close at the matter and should
know better, " Parliament has done nothing this session.
Some things were promised in the Queen's speech, but
they were only little things ; and most of them have not
passed." Lord Lyndhurst used for years to recount the
small outcomings of legislative achievement; and yet those
were the days of the first Whig Governments, who had
more to do in legislation, and did more, than any Govern-
ment. The true answer to such harangues as Lord
Lyndhurst's by a Minister should have been in the first
person. He should have said firmly, "Parliament has
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 133
maintained ME, and that was its greatest duty; Parlia-
ment has carried on what, in the language of traditional
respect, we call the Queen's Government ; it has main-
tained what wisely or unwisely it deemed the best
Executive of the English nation."
The second function of the House of Commons is
what I may call an expressive function. It is its office
to express the mind of the English people on all matters
which come before it. Whether it does so well or ill I
shall discuss presently.
The third function of Parliament is what I may call
preserving a sort of technicality even in familial
matters for the sake of distinctness the teaching func-
tion. A great and open council of considerable men
cannot be placed in the middle of a society without
altering that society. It ought to alter it for the better,
It ought to teach the nation what it does not know
How far the House of Commons can so teach, and how
far it does so teach, are matters for subsequent discussion.
Fourthly, the House of Commons has what may be
called an informing function a function which though
in its present form quite modern is singularly analogous
to a mediaeval function. In old times one office of the
House of Commons was to inform the Sovereign what
was wrong. It laid before the Crown the grievances
and complaints of particular interests. Since the pub-
lication of the Parliamentary debates a corresponding
office of Parliament is to lay these same grievances,
these same complaints, before the nation, which is
the present sovereign. The nation needs it quite as
134 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
much as the king ever needed it. A free people is
indeed mostly fair, liberty practises men in a give-and-
take, which is the rough essence of justice. The English
people, possibly even above other free nations, is fair.
But a free nation rarely can be and the English nation
is not quick of apprehension. It only comprehends
what is familiar to it what comes into its own ex-
perience, what squares with its own thoughts. " I never
heard of such a thing in my life," the middle-class
Englishman says, and he thinks he so refutes an argu-
ment. The common disputant cannot say in reply that
his experience is but limited, and that the assertion may
be true, though he had never met with anything at all
like it. But a great debate in Parliament does bring
home something of this feeling. Any notion, any creed,
any feeling, any grievance which can get a decent number
of English members to stand up for it, is felt by almost
all Englishmen to be perhaps a false and pernicious
opinion, but at any rate possible an opinion within the
intellectual sphere, an opinion to be reckoned with. And
it is an immense achievement. Practical diplomatists say
that a free government is harder to deal with than a
despotic government ; you may be able to get the despot
to hear the other side ; his ministers, men of trained
intelligence, will be sure to know what makes against
them ; and they may tell him. But a free nation never
hears any side save its own. The newspapers only re-
peat the side their purchasers like : the favourable argu-
ments are set out, elaborated, illustrated; the adverse
arguments maimed, misstated, confused. The worst
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 135
judge, they say, is a deaf judge ; the most dull govern-
ment is a free government on matters its ruling classes
will not hear. I am disposed to reckon it as the second
function of Parliament in point of importance, that to
some extent it makes us hear what otherwise we should
not.
Lastly, there is the function of legislation, of which of
course it would be preposterous to deny the great impor-
tance, and which I only deny to be as important as the
executive management of the whole state, or the political
education given by Parliament to the whole nation.
There are, I allow, seasons when legislation is more im-
portant than either of these. The nation may be misfitted
with its laws, and need to change them : some particular
corn law may hurt all industry, and it may be worth a
thousand administrative blunders to get rid of it. But
generally the laws of a nation suit its life; special
adaptations of them are but subordinate ; the administra-
tion and conduct of that life is the matter which presses
most. Nevertheless, the statute-book of every great
nation yearly contains many important new laws, and
the English statute-book does so above any. An im-
mense mass, indeed, of the legislation is not, in the proper
language of jurisprudence, legislation at alL A law is a
general command applicable to many cases. The " special
acts" which crowd the statute-book and weary par-
liamentary committees are applicable to one case only.
They do not lay down rules according to which railways
shall be made, they enact that such a railway shall be
made from this place to that place, and they have no
136 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
bearing upon any other transaction. But after every
deduction and abatement, the annual legislation of
Parliament is a result of singular importance ; were it
not so, it could not be, as it often is considered, the sole
result of its annual assembling.
Some persons will perhaps think that I ought to
enumerate a sixth function of the House of Commons
a financial function. But I do not consider that, upon
broad principle, and omitting legal technicalities, the
House of Commons has any special function with regard
to financial different from its functions with respect to
other legislation. It is to rule in both, and to rule in
both through the Cabinet. Financial legislation is of
necessity a yearly recurring legislation ; but frequency of
occurrence does not indicate a diversity of nature or
compel an antagonism of treatment
In truth, the principal peculiarity of the House of
Commons in financial affairs is nowadays not a special
privilege, but an exceptional disability. On common
subjects any member can propose anything, but not on
money the minister only can propose to tax the people.
This principle is commonly involved in medisDval meta-
physics as to the prerogative of the Crown, but it is as
useful in the nineteenth century as in the fourteenth, and
rests on as sure a principle. The House of Commons
now that it is the true sovereign, and appoints the real
executive has long ceased to be the checking, sparing,
economical body it once was. It now is more apt to
spend money than the minister of the day. I have heard
a very experienced financier say, " If you want to raise a
THE HOUSE Of COMMONS. 137
certain cheer in the House of Commons make a general
panegyric on economy; if you want to invite a sure
defeat, propose a particular saving." The process is
simple. Every expenditure of public money has some
apparent public object; those who wish to spend the
money expatiate on that object; they say, "What is
50,000?. to this great country? Is this a time for
cheeseparing objection ? Our industry was never so
productive ; our resources never so immense. What is
50,OOOZ. in comparison with this great national interest?"
The members who are for the expenditure always come
down ; perhaps a constituent or a friend who will profit
by the outlay, or is keen on the object, has asked them
to attend ; at any rate, there is a popular vote to be
given, on which the newspapers always philanthropic,
and sometimes talked over will be sure to make en-
comiums. The members against the expenditure rarely
come down of themselves; why should they become
unpopular without reason? The object seems decent;
many of its advocates are certainly sincere: a hostile vote
will make enemies, and be censured by the journals. If
there were not some check, the " people's house " would
soon outrun the people's money.
That check is the responsibility of the Cabinet for the
national finance. If any one could propose a tax, they
might let the House spend it as it would, and wash their
hands of the matter ; but now, for whatever expenditure
is sanctioned even when it is sanctioned against the
ministry's wish the ministry must find the money.
Accordingly, they have the strongest motive to oppose
138 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
extra outlay. They will have to pay the bill for it ; they
will have to impose taxation, which is always disa-
greeable, or suggest loans, which, under ordinary circum-
stances, are shameful. The ministry is (so to speak) the
breadwinner of the political family, and has to meet the
cost of philanthropy and glory, just as the head of a
family has to pay for the charities of his wife and the
toilette of his daughters.
In truth, when a Cabinet is made the sole executive,
it follows it must have the sole financial charge, for all
action costs money, all policy depends on money, and it
is in adjusting the relative goodness of action and policies
that the executive is employed.
From a consideration of these functions, it follows
that we are ruled by the House of Commons ; we are,
indeed, so used to be so ruled, that it does not seem to be
at all strange. But of all odd forms of government, the
oddest really is government by a public meeting. Here
are 658 persons, collected from all parts of England,
different in nature, different in interests, different in look,
and language. If we think what an empire the English
is, how various are its components, how incessant its
concerns, how immersed in history its policy ; if we think
what a vast information, what a nice discretion, what a
consistent will ought to mark the rulers of that empire,
we shall be surprised when we see them. We see a
changing body of miscellaneous persons, sometimes few,
sometimes many, never the same for an hour ; sometimes
excited, but mostly dull and half weary, impatient of
eloquence, catching at any joke as an alleviation. These
THE EOCTSE OF COMMONS. 139
are the persons who rule the British Empire, who rule
England, who rule Scotland, who rule Ireland, who
rule a great deal of Asia, who rule a great deal of
Polynesia, who rule a great deal of America, and
scattered fragments everywhere.
Paley said many shrewd things, but he never said a
better thing than that it was much harder to make men
see a difficulty than comprehend the explanation of it.
The key to the difficulties of most discussed and unsettled
questions is commonly in their undiscussed parts : they
are like the background of a picture, which looks obvious,
easy, just what any one might have painted, but which,
in fact, sets the figures in their right position, chastens
them, and makes them what they are. Nobody will
understand parliament government who fancies it an
easy thing, a natural thing, a thing not needing ex-
planation. You have not a perception of the first
elements in this matter till you know that government
by a club is a standing wonder.
There has been a capital illustration lately how helpless
many English gentlemen are when called together on a
sudden. The Government, rightly or wrongly, thought
fit to entrust the quarter-sessions of each county with the
duty of combating its cattle-plague ; but the scene in
most "shire halls" was unsatisfactory. There was the
greatest difficulty in getting, not only a right decision,
but any decision. I saw one myself which went thus.
The chairman proposed a very complex resolution, in
which there was much which every one liked, and much
which every one disliked, though, of course, the favourite
140 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
parts of some were the objectionable parts to others.
This resolution got, so to say, wedged in the meeting ;
everybody suggested amendments ; one amendment was
carried which none were satisfied with, and so the matter
stood over. It is a saying in England, " a big meeting
never does anything ; " and yet we are governed by the
House of Commons by " a big meeting."
It may be said that the House of Commons does not
rule, it only elects the rulers. But there must be some-
thing special about it to enable it to do that. Suppose
the Cabinet were elected by a London club, what con-
fusion there would be, what writing and answering !
" Will you speak to So-and-So, and ask him to vote for
my man ? " would be heard on every side. How the wife
of A. and the wife of B. would plot to confound the wife
of C. Whether the club elected under the dignified
shadow of a queen, or without the shadow, would hardly
matter at all ; if the substantial choice was in them, the
confusion and intrigue would be there too. I propose to
begin this paper by asking, not why the House of Com-
mons governs well ? but the fundamental almost un-
asked question how the House of Commons comes to
be able to govern at all?
The House of Commons can do work which the
quarter-sessions or clubs cannot do, because it is an
organised body, while quarter-sessions and clubs are un-
organised. Two of the greatest orators in England
Lord Brougham and Lord Bolingbroke spent much
eloquence in attacking party government. Bolingbroke
probably knew what he was doing ; he was a consistent
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 141
opponent of the power of the Commons ; he wished to
attack them in a vital part. But Lord Brougham does
not know ; he proposes to amend parliamentary govern-
ment by striking out the very elements which make
parliamentary government possible. At present the ma-
jority of Parliament obey certain leaders; what those
leaders propose they support, what those leaders reject
they reject. An old Secretary of the Treasury used to
say, " This is a bad case, an indefensible case. We must
apply our majority to this question." That secretary
lived fifty years ago, before the Reform Bill, when
majorities were very blind, and very "applicable." Now-
adays, the power of leaders over their followers is strictly
and wisely limited : they can take their followers but a
little way, and that only in certain directions. Yet still
there are leaders and followers. On the Conservative
side of the House there are vestiges of the despotic leader-
ship even now. A cynical politician is said to have
watched the long row of county members, so fresh and
respectable- looking, and muttered, "By Jove, they are
the finest brute votes in Europe ! " But all satire apart,
the principle of Parliament is obedience to leaders.
Change your leader if you will, take another if you will,
but obey No. 1 while you serve No. 1, and obey No. 2
when you have gone over to No. 2. The penalty of not
doing so, is the penalty of impotence. It is not that you
will not be able to do any good, but you will not be able
to do anything at all. If everybody does what he thinks
right, there will be 657 amendments to every motion, and
none of them will be carried or the motion either.
142 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
The moment, indeed, that we distinctly conceive that
the House of Commons is mainly and above all things an
elective assembly, we at once perceive that party is of its
essence. There never was an election without a party.
You cannot get a child into an asylum without a combi-
nation. At such places you may see " Vote for orphan
A." upon a placard, and "Vote for orphan B. (also an
idiot ! ! !) " upon a banner, and the party of each is busy
about its placard and banner. What is true at such
minor and momentary elections must be much more true
in a great and constant election of rulers. The House of
Commons lives in a state of perpetual potential choice ;
at any moment it can choose a ruler and dismiss a ruler.
And therefore party is inherent in it, is bone of its bone,
and breath of its breath.
Secondly, though the leaders of party no longer have
the vast patronage of the last century with which to
bribe, they can coerce by a threat far more potent than
any allurement they can dissolve. This is the secret
which keeps parties together. Mr. Cobden most justly
said, " He had never been able to discover what was the
proper moment, according to members of Parliament, for
a dissolution. He had heard them say they were ready
to vote for everything else, but he had never heard them
say they were ready to vote for that." Efficiency in an
assembly requires a solid mass of steady votes ; and these
are collected by a deferential attachment to particular
men, or by a belief in the principles those men represent,
and they are maintained by fear of those men by the
fear that if you vote against them, you may yourself soon
not have a vote at all.
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 143
Thirdly, it may seem odd to say so, just after incul-
cating that party organisation is the vital principle of
representative government, but that organisation is per-
manently efficient, because it is not composed of warm
partisans. The body is eager, but the atoms are cool. If
it were otherwise, parliamentary government would be-
come the worst of governments a sectarian government.
The party in power would go all the lengths their orators
proposed all that their formulae enjoined, as far as they
had ever said they would go. But the partisans of the
English Parliament are not of such a temper. They are
Whigs, or Radicals, or Tories, but they are much else too.
They are common Englishmen, and, as Father Newman
complains, " hard to be worked up to the dogmatic level."
They are not eager to press the tenets of their party to
impossible conclusions. On the contrary, the way to lead
them the best and acknowledged way is to affect a
studied and illogical moderation. You may hear men
say, " Without committing myself to the tenet that 3 + 2
make 5, though I am free to admit that the honourable
member for Bradford has advanced very grave arguments
in behalf of it, I think I may, with the permission of the
Committee, assume that 2 + 3 do not make 4, which will
be a sufficient basis for the important propositions which
I shall venture to submit on the present occasion." This
language is very suitable to the greater part of the House
of Commons. Most men of business love a sort of twi-
light. They have lived all their lives in an atmosphere
of probabilities and of doubt, where nothing is very clear,
where there are some chances for many events, where
THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
there is much to be said for several courses, where never-
theless one course must be determinedly chosen and
fixedly adhered to. They like to hear arguments suited
to this intellectual haze. So far from caution or hesita-
tion in the statement of the argument striking them as
an indication of imbecility, it seems to them a sign of
practicality. They got rich themselves by transactions
of which they could not have stated the argumentative
ground and all they ask for is a distinct though moderate
conclusion, that they can repeat when asked ; something
which they feel not to be abstract argument, but abstract
argument diluted and dissolved in real life. " There seem
to me," an impatient young man once said, "to be no
stay in Peel's arguments." And that was why Sir Robert
Peel was the best leader of the Commons in our time ; we
like to have the rigidity taken out of an argument, and
the substance left.
Nor indeed, under our system of government, are the
leaders themselves of the House of Commons, for the most
part, eager to carry party conclusions too far. They
are in contact with reality. An Opposition, on coming
into power, is often like a speculative merchant whose
bills become due. Ministers have to make good their
promises, and they find a difficulty in so doing. They
have said the state of things is so and so, and if you
give us the power we will do thus and thus. But when
they come to handle the official documents, to converse
with the permanent under-secretary familiar with dis-
agreeable facts, and though in manner most respectful,
yet most imperturbable in opinion very soon doubts in-
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 145
tervene. Of course, something must be done ; the specu-
lative merchant cannot forget his bills ; the late Opposition
cannot, in office, forget those sentences which terrible
admirers in the country still quote. But just as the
merchant asks his debtor, " Could you not take a bill at
four months ? " so the new minister says to the permanent
under-secretary, " Could you not suggest a middle course ?
I am of course not bound by mere sentences used in de-
bate ; I have never been accused of letting a false ambition
of consistency warp my conduct ; but," etc., etc. And the
end always is that a middle course is devised which looks
as much as possible like what was suggested in opposition,
but which is as much as possible what patent facts facts
which seem to live in the office, so teasing and unceasing
are they prove ought to be done.
Of all modes of enforcing moderation on a party, the
best is to contrive that the members of that party shall
be intrinsically moderate, careful, and almost shrinking
men ; and the next best to contrive that the leaders of
the party, who have protested most in its behalf, shall be
placed in the closest contact with the actual world. Our
English system contains both contrivances ; it makes
party government permanent and possible in the sole
way in which it can be so, by making it mild.
But these expedients, though they sufficiently remove
the defects which make a common club or quarter ses-
sions impotent, would not enable the House of Commons
to govern England. A representative public meeting is
subject to a defect over and above those of other public
meetings. It may not be independent. The constitu-
L
146 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
encies may not let it alone. But if they do not, all the
checks which have been enumerated upon the evils of a
party organisation would be futile. The feeling of a
constituency is the feeling of a dominant party, and that
feeling is elicited, stimulated, sometimes even manufac-
tured by the local political agent. Such an opinion could
not be moderate; could not be subject to effectual dis-
cussion ; could not be in close contact with pressing facts ;
could not be framed under a chastening sense of near
responsibility; could not be formed as those form their
opinions who have to act upon them. Constituency
government is the precise opposite of parliamentary
government. It is the government of immoderate per-
sons far from the scene of action, instead of the govern-
ment of moderate persons close to the scene of action ; it
is the judgment of persons judging in the last resort and
without a penalty, in lieu of persons judging in fear of a
dissolution, and ever conscious that they are subject to
an appeal.
Most persons would admit these conditions of parlia-
mentary government when they read them, but two at
least of the most prominent ideas in the public mind are
inconsistent with them. The scheme to which the argu-
ments of our demagogues distinctly tend, and the scheme
to which the predilections of some most eminent philo-
sophers cleave, are both so. They would not only make
parliamentary government work ill, but they would pre-
vent its working at all ; they would not render it bad,
for they would make it impossible.
The first of these is the ultra-democratic theory. This
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 14-7
theory demands that every man of twenty-one years of
age (if not every woman too) should have an equal vote
in electing Parliament. Suppose that last year there were
twelve million adult males in England. Upon this
theory each man is to have one twelve-millionth share in
electing a Parliament ; the rich and wise are not to have,
by explicit law, more votes than the poor and stupid ; nor
are any latent contrivances to give them an influence
equivalent to more votes. The machinery for carrying
out such a plan is very easy. At each census the country
ought to be divided into 658 electoral districts, in each
of which the number of adult males should be the same ;
and these districts ought to be the only constituencies,
and elect the whole Parliament. But if the above pre-
requisites are needful for parliamentary government, that
Parliament would not work.
Such a Parliament could not be composed of moderate
men. The electoral districts would be, some of them, in
purely agricultural places, and in these the parson and
the squire would have almost unlimited power. They
would be able to drive or send to the poll an entire
labouring population. These districts would return an
unmixed squirearchy. The scattered small towns which
now send so many members to Parliament, would be lost
in the clownish mass ; their votes would send to Par-
liament no distinct members. The agricultural part of
England would choose its representatives from quarter
sessions exclusively. On the other hand a large part of
the constituencies would be town districts, and these
would send up persons representing the beliefs or un-
14:3 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
beliefs of the lowest classes in their towns. They would,
perhaps, be divided between the genuine representatives
of the artizans not possibly of the best of the arti-
zans, who are a select and intellectual class, but of the
common order of workpeople and the merely pretended
members for that class whom I may call the members for
the public-houses. In all big towns in which there is
electioneering these houses are the centres of illicit cor-
ruption and illicit management. There are pretty good
records of what that corruption and management are, but
there is no need to describe them here. Everybody will
understand what sort of things I mean, and the kind of
unprincipled members that are returned by them. Our
new Parliament, therefore, would be made up of two
sorts of representatives from the town lowest class, and
one sort of representatives from the agricultural lowest
class. The genuine representatives of the country would
be men of one marked sort, and the genuine representa-
tives for the county men of another marked sort, but
very opposite : one would have the prejudices of town
artizans, and the other the prejudices of county magis-
trates. Each class would speak a language of its own ;
each would be unintelligible to the other ; and the only
thriving class would be the immoral representatives, who
were chosen by corrupt machination, and who would
probably get a good profit on the capital they laid out in
that corruption. If it be true that a parliamentary
government is possible only when the overwhelming
majority of the representatives are men essentially
moderate, of no marked varieties, free from class pre-
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 149
judices, this ultra-democratic Parliament could not
maintain that government, for its members would
be remarkable for two sorts of moral violence and one
sort of immoral
I do not for a moment rank the scheme of Mr. Hare
with the scheme of the ultra-democrats. One can hardly
help having a feeling of romance about it. The world
seems growing young when grave old lawyers and mature
philosophers propose a scheme promising so much. It is
from these classes that young men suffer commonly the
chilling demonstration that their fine plans are opposed
to rooted obstacles, that they are repetitions of other
plans which failed long ago, and that we must be content
with the very moderate results of tried machinery. But
Mr. Hare and Mr. Mill offer as the effect of their new
scheme results as large and improvements as interesting
as a young enthusiast, ever promised to himself in his
happiest mood.
I do not give any weight to the supposed impractica-
bility of Mr. Hare's scheme because it is new. Of course
it cannot be put in practice till it is old. A great change
of this sort happily cannot be sudden ; a free people can-
not be confused by new institutions which they do not
understand-, for they will not adopt them till they under-
stand them. But if Mr. Hare's plan would accomplish
what its friends say, or half what they say, it would be
worth working for, if it were not adopted till the year
1966. We ought incessantly to popularise the principle
by writing ; and, what is better than writing, small pre-
liminary bits of experiment. There is so much that is
150 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
wearisome and detestable in all other election machineries,
that I well understand, and wish I could share, the sense
of relief with which the believers in this scheme throw
aside all their trammels, and look to an almost ideal
future when this captivating plan is carried.
Mr. Hare's scheme cannot be satisfactorily discussed in
the elaborate form in which he presents it. No common
person readily apprehends all the details in which, with
loving care, he has embodied it. He was so anxious to
prove what could be done, that he has confused most
people as to what it is. I have heard a man say, " He
never could remember it two days running." But the
difficulty which I feel is fundamental, and wholly inde-
pendent of detail.
There are two modes in which constituencies may be
made. First, the law may make them, as in England
and almost everywhere : the law -may say such and such
qualifications shall give a vote for constituency X ; those
who have that qualification shall be constituency X.
These are what we may call compulsory constituencies,
and we know all about them. Or, secondly, the law may
leave the electors themselves to make them. The law
may say all the adult males of a country shall vote, or
those males who can read and write, or those who have
50 a year, or any persons any way defined, and then
leave those voters to group themselves as they like. Sup-
pose there were 658,000 voters to elect the House of
Commons ; it is possible for the legislature to say, " We
do not care how you combine. On a given day let each
set of persons give notice in what group they mean to
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 151
vote ; if every voter gives notice, and every one looks to
make the most of his vote, each group will have just
1000. But the law shall not make this necessary it
shall take the 658 most numerous groups, no matter
whether they have 2000, or 1000, or 900, or 800 votes
the most numerous groups, whatever their number may
be ; and these shall be the constituencies of the nation."
These are voluntary constituencies, if I may so call them ;
the simplest kind of voluntary constituencies. Mr. Hare
proposes a far more complex kind; but to show the
merits and demerits of the voluntary principle the simplest
form is much the best.
The temptation to that principle is very plain. Under
the compulsory form of constituency the votes of the
minorities are thrown away. In the city of London, now,
there are many Tories, but all the members are Whigs ;
every London Tory, therefore, is by law and principle
misrepresented: his city sends to Parliament not the
member whom he wished to have, but the member he
wished not to have. But upon the voluntary system the
London Tories, who are far more than 1000 in number,
may combine ; they may make a constituency, and return
a member. In many existing constituencies the disfran-
chisement of minorities is hopeless and chronic. I have
myself had a vote for an agricultural county for twenty
years, and I am a Liberal ; but two Tories have always
been returned, and all my life will be returned. As mat-
ters now stand, my vote is of no use. But if I could
combine with 1000 other Liberals in that and other Con-
servative counties, we might choose a Liberal member.
152 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Again, this plan gets rid of all our difficulties as to the
size of constituencies. It is said to be unreasonable that
Liverpool should return only the same number of members
as King's Lynn or Lyrne Regis ; but upon the voluntary
plan, Liverpool could come down to King's Lynn. The
Liberal minority in King's Lynn could communicate
with the Liberal minority in Liverpool, and make up
1000 ; and so everywhere. The numbers of popular
places would gain what is called their legitimate advan-
tage ; they would, when constituencies are voluntarily
made, be able to make, and be willing to make the
greatest number of constituencies.
Again, the admirers of a great man could make a
worthy constituency for him. As it is, Mr. Mill was
returned by the- electors of Westminster ; and they have
never, since they had members, done themselves so great
an honour. But what did the electors of Westminster
know of Mr. Mill ? What fraction of his mind could be
imagined by any percentage of their minds ? A great
deal of his genius most of them would not like. They
meant to do homage to mental ability, but it was the
worship of an unknown God if ever there was such a
thing in this world. But upon the voluntary plan, one
thousand out of the many thousand students of Mr. Mill's
book could have made an appreciating constituency for
him.
I could reckon other advantages, but I have to object
to the scheme, not to recommend it. What are the counter-
weights which overpower these merits ? I reply that the
voluntary composition of constituencies appears to me
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 153
inconsistent with the necessary pre-requisites of parlia-
mentary government as they have been just laid down.
Under the voluntary system, the crisis of politics is
not the election of the member, but the making the
constituency. President-making is already a trade in
America; and constituency-making would, under the
voluntary plan, be a trade here. Every party would
have a numerical problem to solve. The leaders would
say, " We have 350,000 votes, we must take care to have
350 members ; " and the only way to obtain them is to
organise. A man who wanted to compose part of a
Liberal constituency must not himself hunt for 1000
other Liberals ; if he did, after writing 10,000 letters, he
would probably find he was making part of a con-
stituency of 100, all whose votes would be thrown away,
the constituency being too small to be reckoned. Such
a Liberal must write to the great Registration Associa-
tion in Parliament Street; he must communicate with
its able managers, and they would soon use his vote for
him. They would say, " Sir, you are late ; Mr. Gladstone,
sir, is full. He got his 1000 last year. Most of the
gentlemen you read of in the papers are full. As soon as
a gentleman makes a nice speech, we get a heap of letters
to say, 'Make us into that gentleman's constituency.'
But we cannot do that. Here is our list. If you do not
want to throw your vote away, you must be guided by
us : here are three very satisfactory gentlemen (and one
is an Honourable) : you may vote for either of these, and
we will write your name down ; but if you go voting
wildly, you'll be thrown out altogether."
154 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
The evident result of this organisation would be the
return of party men mainly. The member-makers would
i look, not for independence, but for subservience and
they could hardly be blamed for so doing. They are
agents for the Liberal party ; and, as such, they should
be guided by what they take to be the wishes of their
principal. The mass of the Liberal party wishes measure
A, measure B, measure C. The managers of the regis-
tration the skilled manipulators are busy men. They
would say, " Sir, here is our card ; if you want to get into
Parliament on our side, you must go for that card; it
was drawn up by Mr. Lloyd ; he used to be engaged on
railways, but since they passed this new voting plan, we
get him to attend to us ; it is a sound card ; stick to that
and you will be right." Upon this (in theory) voluntary
plan, you would get together a set of members bound
hard and fast with party bands and fetters, infinitely
tighter than any members now.
Whoever hopes anything from desultory popular action
if matched against systematised popular action, should con-
sider the way in which the American President is chosen
The plan was that the citizens at large should vote for
the statesman they liked best. But no one does anything
of the sort. They vote for the ticket made by "the
caucus," and the caucus is a sort of representative meet-
ing which sits voting and voting till they have cut out
all the known men against whom much is to be said,
and agreed on some unknown man against whom there
is nothing known, and therefore nothing to be alleged.
Caucuses, or their equivalent, would be far worse here in
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 155
const! tuency-making than there in President-making,
because on great occasions the American nation can fix
on some < ne great man whom it knows, but the English
nation could not fix on 658 great men and choose them.
It does not know so many, and if it did, would go wrong
in the difficulties of the manipulation.
But though a common voter could only be ranged in
an effectual constituency, and a common candidate only
reach a constituency by obeying the orders of the political
election-contrivers upon his side, certain voters and cer-
tain members would be quite independent of both. There
are organisations in this country which would soon make
a set of constituencies for themselves. Every chapel
would be an office for vote transferring before the plan
had been known three months. The Church would be
much slower in learning it and much less handy in using
it; but would learn. At present the Dissenters are a
most energetic and valuable component of the Liberal
party ; but under the voluntary plan they would not be
a component they would be a separate, independent
element. We now propose to group boroughs ; but then
they would combine chapels. There would be a. member
for the Baptist congregation of Tavistock, cum Totnes,
cum, &c., &c.
The full force of this cannot be appreciated except by
referring to the former proof that the mass of a Par-
liament ought to be men of moderate sentiments, or they
will elect an immoderate ministry, and enact violent
laws. But upon the plan suggested, the House would be
made up of party politicians selected by a party com-
THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
mittee, chained to that committee and pledged to party
violence, and of characteristic, and therefore immoderate
representatives, for every " ism " in all England. Instead
of a deliberate assembly of moderate and judicious men,
we should have a various compound of all sorts of
violence.
I may seem to be drawing a caricature, but I have
not reached the worst. Bad as these members would be,
if they were left to themselves if, in a free Parliament,
they were confronted with the perils of government, close
responsibility might improve them and make them
tolerable. But they would not be left to themselves. A
voluntary constituency will nearly always be a despotic
constituency. Even in the best case, where a set of
earnest men choose a member to expound their earnest-
ness, they will look after him to see that he does expound
it. The members will be like the minister of a dissenting
congregation. That congregation is collected by a unity
of sentiment in doctrine A, and the preacher is to preach
doctrine A ; if he does not, he is dismissed. At present
the member is free because the constituency is not in
earnest; no constituency has an acute, accurate doctrinal
creed in politics. The law made the constituencies by
geographical divisions ; and they are not bound together
by close unity of belief. They have vague preferences
for particular doctrines; and that is all. But a voluntary
constituency would be a church with tenets ; it would
make its representative the messenger of its mandates,
and the delegate of its determinations. As in the case of
a dissenting congregation, one /rreat minister sometimes
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 157
rules it, while ninety-nine ministers in the hundred are
ruled by it, so here one noted man would rule his electors,
but the electors would rule all the others.
Thus, the members for a good voluntary constituency
would be hopelessly enslaved, because of its goodness;
but the members for a bad voluntary constituency would
be yet more enslaved because of its badness. The makers
of these constituencies would keep the despotism in their
own hands. In America there is a division of politicians
into wire-pullers and blowers; under the voluntary system
the member of Parliament would be the only momentary
mouth-piece the impotent blower; while the consti-
tuency-maker would be the latent wire-puller the con-
stant autocrat. He would write to gentlemen in Par-
liament, and say, " You were elected upon ' the Liberal
ticket ; ' and if you deviate from that ticket you cannot
be chosen again." And there would be no appeal for a
common-minded man. He is no more likely to make a
constituency for himself than a mole is likely to make a
planet.
It may indeed be said that against a septennial
Parliament such machinations would be powerless ; that
a member elected for seven years might defy the remon-
strances of an earnest constituency, or the imprecations
of the latent manipulators. But after the voluntary
composition of constituencies, there would soon be but
short-lived Parliaments. Earnest constituencies would
exact frequent elections; they would not like to part with
their virtue for a long period; it would anger them to see
it used contrary to their wishes, amid circumstances
158 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
which at the election no one thought of. A seven years'
Parliament is often chosen in one political period, lasts
through a second, and is dissolved in a third. A con-
stituency collected by law and on compulsion endures
this change because it has no collective earnestness ; it
does not mind seeing the power it gave used in a manner
that it could not have foreseen. But a self-formed con-
stituency of eager opinions, a missionary constituency, so
to speak, would object; it would think it its bounden
duty to object ; and the crafty manipulators, though they
said nothing, in silence would object still more. The two
together would enjoin annual elections, and would rule
their members unflinchingly.
O J
The voluntary plan, therefore, when tried in this easy
form, is inconsistent with the extrinsic independence as
well as with the inherent moderation of a Parliament
two of the conditions which, as we have seen, are essential
to the bare possibility of parliamentary government. The
same objections, as is inevitable, adhere to that principle
under its more complicated forms. It is in vain to pile
detail on detail when the objection is one of first prin-
ciple. If the above reasoning be sound, compulsory
constituencies are necessary, voluntary constituencies
destructive ; the optional transferability of votes is not a
salutary aid, but a ruinous innovation.
I have dwelt upon the proposal of Mr. Hare and upon
the ultra-democratic proposal, not only because of the
high intellectual interest of the former and the possible
practical interest of the latter, but because they tend to
bring into relief two at least of the necessary conditions
THE HOUSE OF COMMONi 159
of parliamentary government. But besides these neces-
sary qualities which are needful before a parliamentary
government can work at all, there are some additional
pre-requisites before it can work well. That a House of
Commons may work well it must perform, as we saw, five
functions well : it must elect a ministry well, legislate
well, teach the nation well, express the nation's will well,
bring matters to the nation's attention well.
Tho discussion has a difficulty of its own. What is
meant by " well ? " Who is to judge ? Is it to be some
panel of philosophers, some fancied posterity, or some
other outside authority ? I answer, no philosophy, no
posterity, no external authority, but the English nation
here and now.
Free government is self-government a government of
the people by the people. The best government of this
sort is that which the people think best. An imposed
government, a government like that of the English in
India, may very possibly be better ; it may represent the
views of a higher race than the governed race ; but it is
not therefore a free government. A free government is
that which the people subject to it voluntarily choose.
In a casual collection of loose people the only possible
free government is a democratic government. Where no
one knows, or cares for, or respects any one else all must
rank equal; no one's opinion can be more potent than
that of another. But, as has been : explained, a deferen-
tial nation has a structure of its own. Certain persons
are by common consent agreed to be wiser than others,
and their opinion is, by consent, to rank for much more
160 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
than its numerical value. We may in these happy nations
weigh votes as well as count them, though in less favoured
countries we can count only. But in free nations, the
votes so weighed or so counted must decide. A perfect
free government is one which decides perfectly according
to those votes ; an imperfect, one which so decides imper-
fectly ; a bad, one which does not so decide at all. Public
opinion is the test of this polity ; the best opinion which
with its existing habits of deference, the nation will
accept : if the free government goes by that opinion, it is
a good government of its species ; if it contravenes that
opinion, it is a bad one.
Tried by this rule the House of Commons does its
appointing business welL It chooses rulers as we wish
rulers to be chosen. If it did not, in a speaking and
writing age we should soon know. I have heard a
great Liberal statesman say, "The time was coming
when we must advertise for a grievance/'* What a
good grievance it would be were the ministry appointed
and retained by the Parliament a ministry detested by
the nation. An anti-president government league would
be instantly created, and it would be more instantly
powerful and more instantly successful than the Anti-
Corn-Law League.
It has, indeed, been objected that the choosing business
of Parliament is done ill, because it does not choose strong
governments. And it is certain that when public opinion
does not definitely decide upon a marked policy, and when
in consequence parties in the Parliament are nearly even,
* This was said in 1858.
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 161
individual cupidity and changeability may make Parlia-
ment change its appointees too often ; may induce them
never enough to trust any of them ; may make it keep all
of them under a suspended sentence of coming dismissal.
But the experience of Lord Palmerston's second Govern-
ment proves, I think, that these fears are exaggerated.
When the choice of a nation is really fixed on a statesman.
Parliament will fix upon him too. The parties in the
Parliament of 1859 were as nearly divided as in any pro-
bable Parliament ; a great many Liberals did not much
like Lord Palmerston, and they would have gladly co-
operated in an attempt to dethrone him. Bui the same
influence acted on Parliament within which acted on the
nation without. The moderate men of both parties were
satisfied that Lord Palmerston's was the best government,
and they therefore preserved it though it was hated by
the immoderate on both sides. We have then found by
a critical instance that a government supported by what
I may call " the common element," by the like-minded
men of unlike parties, will be retained in power, though
parties are even, and though, as Treasury counting
reckons, the majority is imperceptible. If happily, by its
intelligence and attractiveness, a cabinet can gain a hold
upon the great middle part of Parliament, it will continue
to exist notwithstanding the hatching of small plots and
the machinations of mean factions.
On the whole, I think it indisputable that the selecting
task of Parliament is performed as well as public opinion
wishes it to be performed ; and if we want to improve
that standard, we must first improve the English nation>
M
102 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
which imposes that standard. Of the substantial part of
its legislative task the same, too, may, I think, be said.
The manner of our legislation is indeed detestable, and
the machinery for settling that manner odious. A com-
mittee of the whole House, dealing, or attempting to deal
with the elaborate clauses of a long Bill, is a wretched
specimen of severe but misplaced labour. It is sure to
wedge some clause into the Act, such as that which the
judge said " seemed to have fallen by itself, perhaps, from
heaven, into the mind of the legislature," so little had it
to do with anything on either side or around it. At such
times government by a public meeting displays its in-
herent defects, and is little restrained by its necessary
checks. But the essence of our legislature may be sepa-
rated from its accidents. Subject to two considerable
defects I think Parliament passes laws as the nation
wishes to have them passed.
Thirty years ago this was not so. The nation had out-
grown its institutions, and was cramped by them. It was
a man in the clothes of a boy ; every limb wanted more
room, and every garment to be fresh made. " D-mn me,"
said Lord Eldon in the dialect of his age, " if I had to
begin life again I would begin as an agitator." The
shrewd old man saw that the best life was that of a mis-
cellaneous objector to the old world, though he loved that
world, believed in it, could imagine no other. But he
would not say so now. There is no worse trade than agi-
tation at this time. A man can hardly get an audience
if he wishes to complain of anything. Nowadays, not
only does the mind and policy of Parliament (subject to
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 163
the exceptions before named) possess the common sort of
moderation essential to the possibility of parliamentary
government, but also that exact gradation, that precise
species of moderation, most agreeable to the nation at
large. Not only does the nation endure a parliamentary
government, which it would not do if Parliament were
immoderate, but it likes parliamentary government. A
sense of satisfaction permeates the country because most
of the country feels it has got the precise thing that
suits it.
The exceptions are two. First. That Parliament leans
too much to the opinions of the landed interest. The
Cattle Plague Act is a conspicuous instance of this defect.
The details of that Bill may be good or bad, and its policy
wise or foolisli. But the manner in which it was hurried
through the House savoured of despotism. The cotton
trade or the wine trade could not, in their maximum of
peril, have obtained such aid in such a manner. The
House of Commons would hear of no pause and would heed
no arguments. The greatest number of them feared for
their incomes. The land of England returns many mem-
bers annually for the counties ; these members the con-
stitution gave them. But what is curious is that the
landed interest gives no seats to other classes, but takes
plenty of seats from other classes. Half the boroughs in
England are represented by considerable landowners, and
when rent is in question, as in the cattle case, they think
more of themselves than of those who sent them. In
number the landed gentry in the House far surpass any
other class. They have, too, a more intimate connection
164 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
with one another ; they were educated at the same schools
know one another's family name from boyhood ; form a
society ; are the same kind of men ; marry the same kind
of women. The merchants and manufacturers in Parlia-
ment are a motley race one educated here, another there,
a third not educated at all ; some are of the second gene-
ration of traders, who consider self-made men intruders
upon an hereditary place; others are self-made, and
regard the men of inherited wealth, which they did not
make and do not augment, as beings of neither mind nor
place, inferior to themselves because they have no brains,
and inferior to Lords because they have no rank. Traders
have no bond of union, no habits of intercourse ; their
wives, if they care for society, want to see not the wives
of other such men, but " better people," as they say the
wives of men certainly with land, and, if Heaven help,
with the titles. Men who study the structure of Parlia-
ment, not in abstract books, but in the concrete London
world, wonder not that the landed interest is very power-
ful, but that it is not despotic. I believe it would be
despotic if it were clever, or rather if its representatives
were so, but it has a fixed device to make them stupid.
The counties not only elect landowners, which is natural,
and perhaps wise, but also elect only landowners of their
own county, which is absurd. There is no free trade in
the agricultural mind ; each county prohibits the import
of able men from other counties. This is why eloquent
sceptics Bolingbroke and Disraeli have been so apt to
lead the unsceptical Tories. They will have people with
a great piece of land in a particular spot, and of course
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 165
these people generally cannot speak, and often cannot
think. And so eloquent men who laugh at the party come
to lead the party. The landed interest has much more
influence than it should have ; but it wastes that influence
so much that the excess is, except on singular occurrences
(like the cattle plague), of secondary moment.
It is almost another side of the same matter to say that
the structure of Parliament gives too little weight to the '
growing districts of the country and too much to the
stationary. In old times the south of England was not
only the pleasantest but the greatest part of England.
Devonshire was a great maritime county when the foun-
dations of our representation were fixed ; Somersetshire
and Wiltshire great manufacturing counties. The harsher
climate of the northern counties was associated with a
ruder, a stern, and a sparser people. The immense pre-
ponderance which our Parliament gave before 1832, and
though pruned and mitigated, still gives to England south
of the Trent, then corresponded to a real preponderance
in wealth and mind. How opposite the present contrast
is we all know. And the case gets worse every day. The
nature of modern trade is to give to those who have much
and take from those who have little. Manufacture goes
where manufacture is, because there and there alone it
finds attendant and auxiliary manufacture. Every rail-
way takes trade from the little town to the big town
because it enables the customer to buy in the big town.
\Tear by year the North (as we may roughly call the new
industrial world) gets more important, and the South
(.^s we may call the pleasant remnant of old times) gets
166 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
less important. It is a grave objection to our existing
parliamentary constitution that it gives much power to
regions of past greatness, and refuses equal power to
regions of present greatness.
I think (though it is not a popular notion) that by far
the greater part of the cry for parliamentary reform is due
to this inequality. The great capitalists, Mr. Bright and
his friends, believe they are sincere in asking for more
power for the working man, but, in fact, they very natu-
rally and very properly want more power for themselves.
They cannot endure they ought not to endure that a
rich, able manufacturer should be a less man than a small
stupid squire. The notions of political equality which
Mr. Bright puts forward are as old as political speculation,
and have been refuted by the first efforts of that specula-
tion. But for all that they are likely to last as long as
political society, because they are based upon indelible
principles in human nature. Edmund Burke called the
first East Indians, " Jacobins to a man," because they did
not feel their " present importance equal to their real
wealth." So long as there is an uneasy class, a class which
has not its just power, it will rashly clutch and blindly
believe the notion that all men should have the same
power.
I do not consider the exclusion of the working classes
from effectual representation a defect in this aspect of
our parliamentary representation. The working classes
contribute almost nothing to our corporate public opinion,
and therefore, the fact of their want of influence in Par-
liament does not impair the coincidence of Parliament
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 1C7
with public opinion. They are left out in the representa-
tion, and also in the thing represented.
Nor do I think the number of persons of aristocratic
descent in Parliament impairs the accordance of Par-
liament with public opinion. No doubt the direct de-
scendants and collateral relatives of noble families supply
members to parliament in far greater proportion than is
warranted by the number of such families in comparison
with the whole nation. But I do not believe that these
families have the least corporate character, or any common
opinions, different from others of the landed gentry. They
have the opinions of the propertied rank in which they
were born. The English aristocracy have never been a
caste apart, and are not a caste apart now. They would
keep up nothing that other landed gentlemen would not.
And if any landed gentlemen are to be sent to the House
of Commons, it is desirable that many should be men of
some rank. As long as we keep up a double set of insti-
tutions, one dignified and intended to impress the many,
the other efficient and intended to govern the many, we
should take care that the two match nicely, and hide
where the one begins and where the other ends. This is
in part effected by conceding some subordinate power to
the august part of our polity, but it is equally aided by
keeping an aristocratic element in the useful part of our
polity. In truth, the deferential instinct secures both.
Aristocracy is a power in the " constituencies." A man
who is an honourable or a baronet, or better yet, perhaps,
a real earl, though Irish, is coveted by half the electing
bodies ; and ccetei^is paribus, a manufacturer's son has no
168 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
chance with him. The reality of the deferential feeling
in the community is tested by the actual election of the
class deferred to, where there is a large free choice be-
twixt it and others.
Subject therefore to the two minor, but still not in-
considerable, defects I have named, Parliament conforms
itself accurately enough, both as a chooser of executives
and as a legislature, to the formed opinion of the country.
Similarly, and subject to the same exceptions, it expresses
the nation's opinion in words well, when it happens that
words, not laws, are wanted. On foreign matters, where
we cannot legislate, whatever the English nation thinks,
or thinks it thinks, as to the critical events of the world,
whether in Denmark, in Italy, or America, and no matter
whether it thinks wisely or unwisely, that same some-
thing, wise or unwise, will be thoroughly well said in
Parliament. The lyrical function of Parliament, if I may
use such a phrase, is well done ; it pours out in charac-
teristic words the characteristic heart of the nation. And
it can do little more useful. Now that free government
is in Europe so rare and in America so distant, the
opinion, even the incomplete, erroneous, rapid opinion of
the free English people is invaluable. It may be very
wrong, but it is sure to be unique ; and if it is right it is
sure to contain matter of great magnitude, for it is only
a first-class matter in distant things which a free people
ever sees or learns. The English people must miss a
thousand minutiee that continental bureaucracies know
even too well; but if they see a cardinal truth which
those bureaucracies miss, that cardinal truth may greatly
help the world.
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.
But if in these ways, and subject to these exceptions,
Parliament by its policy and its speech well embodies
and expresses public opinion, I own I think it must be
conceded that it is not equally successful in elevating
public opinion. The teaching task of Parliament is the
task it does worst. Probably at this moment, it is natural
to exaggerate this defect. The greatest teacher of all in
Parliament, the head-master of the nation, the great
elevator of the country so far as Parliament elevates it
must be the Prime Minister: he has an influence, an
authority, a facility in giving a great tone to discussion,
or a mean tone, which no other man has. Now Lord
Palmerston for many years steadily applied his mind to
giving, not indeed a mean tone, but a light tone, to the
proceedings of Parliament. One of his greatest admirers
has since his death told a story of which he scarcely sees,
or seems to see, the full effect. When Lord Palmerston
was first made leader of the House, his jaunty manner
was not at all popular, and some predicted failure. " No,"
said an old member, " he will soon educate us down to his
level ; the House will soon prefer this Ha ! Ha ! style to
the wit of Canning and the gravity of Peel." I am afraid
that we must own that the prophecy was accomplished.
No prime minister, so popular and so influential, has
ever left in the public memory so little noble teaching.
Twenty years hence, when men inquire as to the then
fading memory of Palmerston, we shall be able to point
to no great truth which he taught, no great distinct policy
which he embodied, no noble words which once fascinated
his age, and which, in after years, men would not willingly
170 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
let die. But we shall be able to say " he had a genial
manner, a firm, sound sense ; he had a kind of cant of
insincerity, but we always knew what he meant ; he had
the brain of a ruler in the clothes of a man of fashion."
Posterity will hardly understand the words of the aged
reminiscent, but we now feel their effect. The House of
Commons, since it caught its tone from such a statesman,
has taught the nation worse, and elevated it less, than
usual
I think, however, that a correct observer would decide
that in general, and on principle, the House of Commons
does not teach the public as much as it might teach it,
or as the public would wish to learn. I do not wish very
abstract, very philosophical, very hard matters to be stated
in Parliament. The teaching there given must be popular,
and to be popular it must be concrete, embodied, short.
The problem is to know the highest truth which the
people will bear, and to inculcate and preach that.
Certainly Lord Palmerston did not preach it. He a
little degraded us by preaching a doctrine just below GUI
own standard ; a doctrine not enough below us to repel
us much, but yet enough below to harm us by augment-
ing a worldliness which needed no addition, and by
diminishing a love of principle and philosophy which did
not want deduction.
In comparison with the debates of any other assembly,
it is true the debates by the English Parliament are most
instructive. The debates in the American Congress have
little teaching efficacy; it is the characteristic vice of
Presidential Government to deprive them of that efficacy;
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 171
in that government a debate in the legislature has little
effect, for it cannot turn out the executive, and the exe-
cutive can veto all it decides. The French Chambers*
are suitable appendages to an Empire which desires the
power of despotism without its shame ; they prevent the
enemies of the Empire being quite correct when they say
there is no free speech ; a few permitted objectors fill the
air with eloquence, which every one knows to be often
true, and always vain. The debates in an English Par-
liament fill a space in the world which, in these auxiliary
chambers, is not possible. But I think any one who
compares the discussions on great questions in the higher
part of the press, with the discussions in Parliament, will
feel that there is (of course amid much exaggeration and
vagueness) a greater vigour and a higher meaning in the
writing than in the speech : a vigour which the public
appreciate a meaning that they like to hear.
The Saturday Review said, some years since, that the
ability of Parliament was a " protected ability : " that
there was at the door a differential duty of at least 2,000?.
a year. Accordingly the House of Commons, represent-
ing only mind coupled with property, is not equal in mind
to a legislature chosen for mind only, and whether accom-
panied by wealth or not. But I do not for a moment
wish to see a representation of pure mind ; it would be
contrary to the main thesis of this essay. I maintain that
Parliament ought to embody the public opinion of the
English nation ; and, certainly, that opinion is much more
fixed by its property than by its mind. The " too clever
* This of course relates to the assemblies of the Empire.
172 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
by half " people who live in "Bohemia," ought to have
no more influence in Parliament than they have in
England, and they can scarcely have less. Only, after
every great abatement and deduction, I think the country
would bear a little more mind; and that there is a pro-
fusion of opulent dulness in Parliament which might a
little though only a little be pruned away.
The only function of Parliament which remains to be
considered is the informing function, as I just now called
it ; the function which belongs to it, or to members of it,
to bring before the nation the ideas, grievances, and
wishes of special classes. This must not be confounded,
with what I have called its teaching function. In life-,
no doubt, the two run one into another. But so do many
things which it is very important in definition to separate.
The facts of two things being often found together is
rather a reason for, than an objection to, separating them,
in idea. Sometimes they are not found together, and!
then we may be puzzled if we have not trained ourselves,
to separate them. The teaching function brings true
ideas, before the nation, and is the function of its highest
minds. The expressive function brings only special ideas,
and is the function of but special minds. Each class
has its ideas, wants, and notions; and certain brains
are ingrained with them. Such sectarian conceptions
are not those by which a determining nation should
regulate its action, nor are orators, mainly animated by
such conceptions, safe guides in policy. But those orators
should be heard; those conceptions should be kept in
Bight. The great maxim of modern thought is not only
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 173
the toleration of everything, but the examination of
everything. It is by examining very bare, very dull,
very unpromising things, that modern science has come
to be what it is. There is a story of a great chemist who
said he owed half his fame to his habit of examining
after his experiments, what was going to be thrown
away: everybody knew the result of the experiment
itself, but in the refuse matter there were many little
facts and unknown changes, which suggested the dis-
coveries of a famous life to a person capable of looking
for them. So with the special notions of neglected
classes. They may contain elements of truth which,
though small, are the very elements which we now
require, because we already know all the rest.
This doctrine was well known to our ancestors. They
laboured to give a character to the various constituencies,
or to many of them. They wished that the shipping
trade, the wool trade, the linen trade, should each have
their spokesman ; that the unsectional Parliament should
know what each section in the nation thought before it
gave the national decision. This is the true reason for
admitting the working classes to a share in the repre-
sentation, at least as far as the composition of Parliament
is to be improved by that admission. A great many ideas,
a great many feelings have gathered among the town
artisans a peculiar intellectual life has sprung up among
them. They believe that they have interests which arc
misconceived or neglected; that they know something
which others do not know ; that the thoughts of Parlia-
ment are not as their thoughts. They ought to be allowed
174i THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
to try to convince Parliament ; their notions ought to be
stated as those of other classes are stated ; their advocates
should be heard as other people's advocates are heard.
Before the Reform Bill, there was a recognised machinery
for that purpose. The member for Westminster, and
other members, were elected by universal suffrage (or
what was in substance such) ; those members did, in their
day, state what were the grievances and ideas or were
thought to be the grievances and ideas of the working
classes. It was the single, unbending franchise introduced
in 1832 that has caused this difficulty, as it has others.
Until such a change is made the House of Commons
will be defective, just as the House of Lords was defective.
It will not look right. As long as the Lords do not come
to their own House, we may prove on paper that it is a
good revising chamber, but it will be difficult to make
the literary argument felt. Just so, as long as a great
class, congregated in political localities, and known to
have political thoughts and wishes, is without notorious
and palpable advocates in Parliament, we may prove on
paper that our representation is adequate, bub the world
will not believe it. There is a saying in the eighteenth
century, that in politics, "gross appearances are great
realities." It is in vain to demonstrate that the working
classes have no grievances ; that the middle classes have
done all that is possible for them, and so on with a crowd
of arguments which I need not repeat, for the newspapers
keep them in type, and we can say them by heart. But
so long as the " gross appearance " is that there are no
evident, incessant representatives to speak the wants of
THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 175
artizans, the " great reality " will be a diffused dissatis-
faction. Thirty years ago it was vain to prove that
Gatton and Old Sarum were valuable seats, and sent good
members. Everybody said, " Why, there are no people
there." Just so everybody must say now, " Our repre-
sentative system must be imperfect, for an immense class
has no members to speak for it." The only answer to
the cry against constituencies without inhabitants was to
transfer their power to constituencies with inhabitants.
Just so, the way to stop the complaint that artizans have
no members is to give them members, to create a body
of representatives, chosen by artizans, believing, as Mr.
Carlyle would say, " that artizanism is the one thing
needful"
176
No. VL
ON CHANGES OF MINISTRY,
THERE is one error as to the English Constitution which
crops up periodically. Circumstances which often, though
irregularly, occur naturally suggests that error, and as
surely as they happen it revives. The relation of Parlia-
ment, and especially of the House of Commons, to the
Executive Government is the specific peculiarity of our
constitution, and an event which frequently happens
much puzzles some people as to it.
That event is a change of ministry. All our adminis-
trators go out together. The whole executive govern-
ment changes at least, all the heads of it change in a
body, and at every such change some speculators are sure
to exclaim that such a habit is foolish. They say, " No
doubt Mr. Gladstone and Lord Russell may have been
wrong about Reform ; no doubt Mr. Gladstone may have
been cross in the House of Commons; but why should
either or both of these events change all the heads of all
our practical departments ? What could be more absurd
than what happened in 1858 ? Lord Palmerston was for
once in his life over-buoyant ; he gave rude answers to
stupid inquiries ; he brought into the Cabinet a nobleman
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 177
concerned in an ugly trial about a woman; he, or his
Foreign Secretary, did not answer a French despatch by
a despatch, but told our ambassador to reply orally. And
because of these trifles, or at any rate these isolated un-
administrative mistakes, all our administration had fresh
heads. The Poor Law Board had a new chief, the Home
Department a new chief, the Public Works a new chief.
Surely this was absurd." Now, is this objection good or
bad ? Speaking generally, is it wise so to change all our
rulers ?
The practice produces three great evils. First, it |
brings in on a sudden new persons and untried persons >
to preside over our policy. A little while ago Lord Cran-
borne * had no more idea that he would now be Indian
Secretary than that he would be a bill broker. He had
never given any attention to Indian affairs ; he can get
them up, because he is an able educated man who can
get up anything. But they are not " part and parcel " of
his mind; not his subjects of familiar reflection, nor
things of which he thinks by predilection, of which he
cannot help thinking. But because Lord Russell and
Mr. Gladstone did not please the House of Commons
about Reform, there he is. A perfectly inexperienced
man, so far as Indian affairs go, rules all our Indian em-
pire. And if all our heads of offices change together, so
very frequently it must be. If twenty offices are vacant
at once, there are almost never twenty tried, competent,
clever men ready to take them. The difficulty of making
* Now Lord Salisbury, who, when this was written, was Indian
Secretary. Note to second edition.
N
178 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION".
up a government is very much like the difficulty of put-
ting together a Chinese puzzle: the spaces do not suit
what you have to put into them. And the difficulty of
matching a ministry is more than that of fitting a puzzle,
because the ministers to be put in can object, though the
bits of a puzzle cannot. One objector can throw out the
combination. In 1847 Lord Grey would not join Lord
John Russell's projected government if Lord Palmerston
was to be Foreign Secretary ; Lord Palmerston would be
Foreign Secretary, and so the government was not
formed. The cases in which a single refusal prevents a
government are rare, and there must be many concurrent
circumstances to make it effectual. But the cases in
which refusals impair or spoil a government are very
common. It almost never happens that the ministry-
maker can put into his offices exactly whom he would
like ; a number of placemen are always too proud, too
eager, or too obstinate to go just where they should.
Again, this system not only makes new ministers
ignorant, but keeps present ministers indifferent. A man
cannot feel the same interest that he might in his work
if he knows that by events over which he has no control,
by errors in which he had no share, by metamorphoses
of opinion which belong to a different sequence of pheno-
mena, he may have to leave that work in the middle, and
may very likely never return to it. The new man put
into a fresh office ought to have the best motive to learn
his task thoroughly, but, in fact, in England, he has not
at all the best motive. The last wave of party and poli-
tics brought him there, the next may take him away.
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 170
Young and eager men take, even at this disadvantage, a
keen interest in office work, but most men, especially old
men, hardly do so. Many a battered minister may be
seen to think much more of the vicissitudes which make
him and unmake him, than of any office matter.
Lastly, a sudden change of ministers may easily cause ;
a mischievous change of policy. In many matters of'
business, perhaps in most, a continuity of mediocrity is
better than a hotch-potch of excellences. For example,
now that progress in the scientific arts is revolutionising
the instruments of war, rapid changes in our head-
preparers for land and sea war are most costly and most
hurtful. A single competent selector of new inventions
would probably in the course of years, after some expe-
rience, arrive at something tolerable ; it is in the nature
of steady, regular, experimenting ability to diminish, if
not vanquish, such difficulties. But a quick succession
of chiefs has no similar facility. They do not learn from
each other's experience ; you might as well expect the
new head boy at a public school to learn from the expe-
rience of the last head boy. The most valuable result
of many years is a nicely balanced mind instinctively
heedful of various errors ; but such a mind is the incom-
municable gift of individual experience, and an outgoing
minister can no more leave it to his successor, than an
elder brother can pass it on to a younger. Thus a desul-
tory and incalculable policy may follow from a rapidi
change of ministers.
These are formidable arguments, but four things may,
I think, be said in reply to, or mitigation of them. A
ISO THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
little examination will show that this change of ministers
is essential to a Parliamentary government ; that some-
thing like it will happen in all elective governments, and
that worse happens under presidential government;
that it is not necessarily prejudicial to a good administra-
tion, but that, on the contrary, something like it is a
prerequisite of good administration; that the evident
evils of English administration are not the results of
Parliamentary government, but of grave deficiencies in
other parts of our political and social state ; that, in a
word, they result not from what we have, but from what
we have not.
As to the first point, those who wish to remove the
choice of ministers from Parliament have not adequately
considered what a Parliament is. A Parliament is nothing
less than a big meeting of more or less idle people. In
proportion as you give it power it will inquire into every-
thing, settle everything, meddle in everything. In an
ordinary despotism, the powers of a despot are limited
by his bodily capacity, and by the calls of pleasure ; he
is but one man ; there are but twelve hours in his day,
and he is not disposed to employ more than a small part
in dull business : he keeps the rest for the court, or the
harem, or for society. He is at the top of the world, and
all the pleasures of the world are set before him. Mostly
there is only a very small part of political business which
he cares to understand, and much of it (with the shrewd
sensual sense belonging to the race) he knows that he
will never understand. But a Parliament is composed of
a great number of men by no means at the top of the
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 181
world. When you establish a predominant Parliament,
you give over the rule of the country to a despot who
has unlimited time, who has unlimited vanity, who
has, or believes he has, unlimited comprehension, whose
pleasure is in action, whose life is work. There is no
limit to the curiosity of Parliament. Sir Robert Peel
once suggested that a list should be taken down of the
questions asked of him in a single evening ; they touched
more or less on fifty subjects, and there were a thousand
other subjects which by parity of reason might have been
added too. As soon as bore A ends, bore B begins.
Some inquire from genuine love of knowledge, or from
a real wish to improve what they ask about, others
to see their name in the papers, others to show a
watchful constituency that they are alert, others to
get on and to get a place in the government, others
from an accumulation of little motives they could not
themselves analyse, or because it is their habit to ask
things. And a proper reply must be given. It was said
that "Darby Griffith destroyed Lord Palmerston's first
Government," and undoubtedly the cheerful impertinence
with which in the conceit of victory that minister
answered grave men much hurt his Parliamentary power.
There is one thing which no one will permit to be treated
lightly, himself. And so there is one too which a
sovereign assembly will never permit to be lessened or
ridiculed, its own power. The minister of the day will
have to give an account in Parliament of all branches
of administration, to say why they act when they do,
and why they do not when they don't.
182 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Nor is chance inquiry all a public department lias
most to fear. Fifty members of Parliament may be
zealous for a particular policy affecting the department,
and fifty others for another policy, and between them
they may divide its action, spoil its favourite aims, and
prevent its consistently working out either of their own
aims. The process is very simple. Every department
at times looks as if it was in a scrape; some apparent
blunder, perhaps some real blunder, catches the public
eye. At once the antagonist Parliamentary sections,
which want to act on the department, seize the oppor-
tunity. They make speeches, they move for documents,
they amass statistics. They declare "that in no other
country is such a policy possible as that which the
department is pursuing; that it is mediaeval; that it
costs money ; that it wastes life ; that America does the
contrary; that Prussia does the contrary." The news-
papers follow according to their nature. These bits of
administrative scandal amuse the public. Articles on
them are very easy to write, easy to read, easy to talk
about. They please the vanity of mankind. We think
as we read, " Thank God, I am not as that man ; I did
not send green coffee to the Crimea; / did not send
patent cartridge to the common guns, and common
cartridge to the breech loaders. / make money; that
miserable public functionary only wastes money." As
for the defence of the department, no one cares for it
or reads it. Naturally at first hearing it does not sound
true. The opposition have the unrestricted selection of
the point of attack, and they seldom choose a case in
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 183
which the department, upon the surface of the matter,
seems to be right. The case of first impression will
always be that something shameful has happened ; that
such and such men did die; that this and that gun
would not go off-, that this or that ship will not sail.
All the pretty reading is unfavourable, and all the praise
is very dull
Nothing is more helpless than such a department in
Parliament if it has no authorised official defender. The
wasps of the House fasten on it ; here they perceive is
something easy to sting, and safe, for it cannot sting in
return. The small grain of foundation for complaint
germinates, till it becomes a whole crop. At once the
minister of the day is appealed to ; he is at the head of
the administration, and he must put the errors right, if
such they are. The opposition leader says, " I put it to
the right honourable gentleman, the First Lord of the
Treasury. He is a man of business. I do not agree with
him in his choice of ends, but he is an almost perfect
master of methods and means. What he wishes to do he
does do. Now I appeal to him whether such gratuitous
errors, such fatuous incapacity, are to be permitted in the
public service. Perhaps the right honourable gentleman
will grant me his attention while I show from the very
documents of the departments," &c., &c. What is the
minister to do ? He never heard of this matter ; he does
not care about the matter. Several of the supporters of
the Government are interested in the opposition to the
department ; a grave man, supposed to be wise, mutters,
" This is too bad." The Secretary of the Treasury tells
ISi THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION,
him, "The House is uneasy. A good many men are
shaky. A. B. said yesterday he had been dragged
through the dirt four nights following. Indeed I am dis-
posed to think myself that the department has been
somewhat lax. Perhaps an inquiry," &c., &c. And
upon that the Prime Minister rises and says, " That Her
Majesty's Government having given very serious and
grave consideration to this most important subject, are
not prepared to say that in so complicated a matter the
department has been perfectly exempt from error. He
does not indeed concur in all the statements which have
been made; it is obvious that several of the charges
advanced are inconsistent with one another. If A. had
really died from eating green coffee on the Tuesday, it is
plain he could not have suffered from insufficient medical
attendance on the following Thursday. However, on so
complex a subject, and one so foreign to common ex-
perience, he will not give a judgment. And if the
honourable member would be satisfied with having the
matter inquired into by a committee of that House, he
will be prepared to accede to the suggestion."
Possibly the outlying department, distrusting the
ministry, crams a friend But it is happy indeed if it
chances on a judicious friend. The persons most ready
to take up that sort of business are benevolent amateurs,
very well intentioned, very grave, very respectable, but
also rather dull. Their words are good, but about the
joints their arguments are weak. They speak very well,
but while they are speaking, the decorum is so great that
everybody goes away. Such a man is no match for a
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 185
couple of House of Commons gladiators. They pull what
he says to shreds. They show or say that he is wrong
about his facts. Then he rises in a fuss and must
explain : but in his hurry he mistakes, and cannot find
the right paper, and becomes first hot, then confused,
next inaudible, and so sits down. Probably he leaves
the House with the notion that the defence of the
department has broken down, and so the Times an-
nounces to all the world as soon as it awakes.
Some thinkers have naturally suggested that the
heads of departments should as such have the right of
speech in the House. But the system when it has been
tried has not answered. M. Guizot tells us from his own
experience that such a system is not effectual. A great
popular assembly has a corporate character; it has its
own privileges, prejudices, and notions. And one of
these notions is that its own members the persons it
sees every day whose qualities it knows, whose minds
it can test, are those whom it can most trust. A clerk
speaking from without would be an unfamiliar object.
He would be an outsider. He would speak under sus-
picion ; he would speak without dignity. Very often he
would speak as a victim. All the bores of the House
would be upon him. He would be put upon examina-
tion. He would have to answer interrogatories. He
would be put through the figures and cross-questioned in
detail. The whole effect of what he said would be
lost in qucestiunculce and hidden in a controversial
detritus.
Again, such a person would rarely speak with great
186 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
ability. He would speak as a scribe. His habits must
have been formed in the quiet of an office : he is used to
red tape, placidity, and the respect of subordinates. Such
a person will hardly ever be able to stand the hurly-
burly of a public assembly. He will lose his head he
will say what he should not. He will get hot and red;
he will feel he is a sort of culprit. After being used to
the flattering deference of deferential subordinates, he will
be pestered by fuss and confounded by invective. He
will hate the House as naturally as the House does not
like him. He will be an incompetent speaker addressing
a hostile audience.
And what is more, an outside administrator address-
ing Parliament can move Parliament only by the good-
ness of his arguments. He has no votes to back them
up with. He is sure to be at chronic war with some
active minority of assailants or others. The natural
mode in which a department is improved on great points
and new points is by external suggestion ; the worse foes
of a department are the plausible errors which the most
visible facts suggest, and which only half visible facts
confute. Both the good ideas and the bad ideas are sure
to find advocates first in the press and then in Parlia-
ment. Against these a permanent clerk would have to
contend by argument alone. The Minister, the head of
the parliamentary Government, will not care for him. The
Minister will say in some undress soliloquy, " These per-
manent ' fellows ' must look after themselves. I cannot
be bothered. I have only a majority of nine, and a very
shaky majority, too. I cannot afford to make enemies
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 187
for those whom I did not appoint. They did nothing for
me, and I can do nothing for them." And if the perma-
nent clerk come to ask his help, he will say in decorous
language, " I am sure that if the department can evince
to the satisfaction of Parliament that its past manage-
ment has been such as the public interests require, no
one will be more gratified than myself. I am not aware
if it will be in my power to attend in my place on Mon-
day ; but if I can be so fortunate, I shall listen to your
official statement with my very best attention." And so
the permanent public servant will be teased by the wits,
oppressed by the bores, and massacred by the innovators
of Parliament.
The incessant tyranny of Parliament over the public
offices is prevented and can only be prevented by the
appointment of a parliamentary head, connected by close
ties with the present ministry and the ruling party in!
Parliament. The parliamentary head is a protecting
machine. He and the friends he brings stand between
the department and the busybodies and crotchet-makers
of the House and the country. So long as at any moment
the policy of an office could be altered by chance votes in
either House of Parliament, there is no security for any
consistency. Our guns and our ships are not, perhaps,
very good now. But they would be much worse if any
thirty or forty advocates for this gun or that gun could
make a motion in Parliament, beat the department, and
get their ships or their guns adopted. The "Black
Breech Ordnance Company " and the " Adamantine Ship
Company" would soon find representatives in Parliament,
188 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
if forty or fifty members would get the national custom
for their rubbish. But this result is now prevented by
the parliamentary head of the department. As soon as
the opposition begins the attack, he looks up his means
of defence. He studies the subject, compiles his argu-
ments, and builds little piles of statistics, which he hopes
will have some effect. He has his reputation at stake,
and he wishes to show that he is worth his present place,
and fit for future promotion. He is well known, perhaps
liked, by the House at any rate the House attends to
him ; he is one of the regular speakers whom they hear
.and heed. He is sure to be able to get himself heard,
land he is sure to make the best defence he can. And
after he has settled his speech he loiters up to the Secre-
tary of the Treasury, and says quietly, " They have got a
motion against me on Tuesday, you know. I hope you
will have your men here. A lot of fellows have crotchets,
and though they do not agree a bit with one another,
they are all against the department ; they will all vote
for the inquiry." And the Secretary answers, " Tuesday,
you say ; no (looking at a paper), I do not think it will
come on on Tuesday. There is Higgins on Education.
He is good for a long time. But anyhow it shall be all
right." And then he glides about and speaks a word here
and a word there, in consequence of which, when the anti-
official motion is made, a considerable array of steady,
grave faces sits behind the Treasury Bench nay, pos-
sibly a rising man who sits in outlying independence
below the gangway rises to defend the transaction ; the
department wins by thirty-three, and the management
of that business pursues its steady way.
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 139
This contrast is no fancy picture. The experiment of
conducting the administration of a public department by
an independent unsheltered authority has often been tried,
and always failed. Parliament always poked at it, till it
made it impossible. The most remarkable is that of the
Poor Law. The administration of that law is not now
very good, but it is not too much to say that almost the
whole of its goodness has been preserved by its having
an official and party protector in the House of Commons.
Without that contrivance we should have drifted back
into the errors of the old Poor Law, and superadded to
them the present meanness and incompetence in our large
towns. All would have been given up to local manage-
ment. Parliament would have interfered with the central
board till it made it impotent, and the local authorities
would have been despotic. The first administration of
the new Poor Law was by " Commissioners " the three
kings of Somerset House, as they were called. The system
was certainly not tried in untrustworthy hands. At the
crisis Mr. Chadwick, one of the most active and best
administrators in England, was the secretary and the
motive power: the principal Commissioner was Sir
George Lewis, perhaps the best selective administrator of
our time. But the House of Commons would not let the
Commission alone. For a long time it was defended
because the Whigs had made the Commission, and felt
bound as a party to protect it. The new law started
upon a certain intellectual impetus, and till that was
spent its administration was supported in a rickety
existence by an abnormal strength. But afterwards the
190 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Commissioners were left to their intrinsic weakness.
There were members for all the localities, but there were
none for them. There were members for every crotchet
and corrupt interest, but there were none for them. The
rural guardians would have liked to eke out wages by
rates; the city guardians hated control, and hated to
spend money. The Commission had to be dissolved, and
a parliamentary head was added ; the result is not perfect,
but it is an amazing improvement on what would have
happened in the old system. The new system has not
worked well because the central authority has too little
power ; but under the previous system the central autho-
rity was getting to have, and by this time would have
had, no power at all. And if Sir George Lewis and Mr.
Chadwick could not maintain an outlying department
in the face of Parliament, how unlikely that an inferior
compound of discretion and activity will ever maintain it !
These reasonings show why a changing parliamentary
head, a head changing as the ministry changes, is a
necessity of good Parliamentary government, and there
is happily a natural provision that there will be such
heads. Party organisation ensures it. In America, where
on account of the fixedly recurring presidential election,
and the perpetual minor elections, party organisation is
much more effectually organised than anywhere else, the
effect on the offices is tremendous. Every office is filled
anew at every presidential change, at least every change
which brings in a new party. Not only the greatest
posts, as in England, but the minor posts change their
occupants. The scale of the financial operations of the
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 191
Federal government is now so increased that most likely
in that department, at least, there must in future remain
a permanent element of great efficiency; a revenue of
90,000,000?. sterling cannot be collected and expended
with a trifling and changing staff. But till now the
Americans have tried to get on not only with changing
heads to a bureaucracy, as the English, but without any
stable bureaucracy at all. They have facilities for trying :
it which no one else has. All Americans can administer,
and the number of them really fit to be in succession
lawyers, financiers, or military managers is wonderful;
they need not be as afraid of a change of all their officials
as European countries must, for the incoming substitutes
are sure to be much better there than here ; and they do
not fear, as we English fear, that the outgoing officials
will be left destitute in middle life, with no hope for the
future and no recompense for the past, for in America
(whatever may be the cause of it) opportunities are
numberless, and a man who is ruined by being " off the
rails " in England soon there gets on another line. The
Americans will probably to some extent modify their
past system of total administrative cataclysms, but their
very existence in the only competing form of free govern-
ment should prepare us for and make us patient with
the mild transitions of Parliamentary government.
These arguments will, I think, seem conclusive to
almost every one ; but, at this moment, many people will
meet them thus : they will say, " You prove what we do
not deny, that this system of periodical change is a neces-
sary ingredient in Parliamentary government, but you
192 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
have not proved what we do deny, that this change is a
good thing. Parliamentary government may have that
sffect, among others, for anything we care : we maintain
merely that it is a defect." In answer, I think it may
bo shown not, indeed, that this precise change is neces-
sary to a permanently perfect administration, but that
some analogous change, some change of the same species,
is so.
At this moment, in England, there is a sort of leaning
towards bureaucracy at least, among writers and talkers.
There is a seizure of partiality to it. The English people
do not easily change their rooted notions, but they have
many unrooted notions. Any great European event is
sure for a moment to excite a sort of twinge of conver-
sion to something or other. Just now, the triumph of
the Prussians the bureaucratic people, as is believed,
par excellence has excited a kind of admiration for
bureaucracy, which a few years since we should have
thought impossible. I do not presume to criticise the
Prussian bureaucracy of my own knowledge ; it certainly
is not a pleasant institution for foreigners to come across,
though agreeableness to travellers is but of very second-
rate importance. But it is quite certain that the Prussian
bureaucracy, though we, for a moment, half admire it at
a distance, does not permanently please the most intelli-
gent and liberal Prussians at home. What are two among
the principal aims of the Fortsckritt Partei the party of
progress as Mr. Grant Duff, the most accurate and philo-
sophical of our describers, delineates them ?
First, "a liberal system, conscientiously carried out
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 193
in all the details of the administration, with a view to
avoiding the scandals now of frequent occurrence, when
an obstinate or bigoted official sets at defiance the liberal
initiations of the government, trusting to backstairs
influence."
Second, "an easy method of bringing to justice guilty
officials, who are at present, as in France, in all conflicts
with simple citizens, like men armed cap-db-pie fighting
with undefenceless." A system against which the most
intelligent native liberals bring even with colour of reason
such grave objections, is a dangerous model for foreign
imitation.
The defects of bureaucracy are, indeed, well known.
It is a form of government which has been tried often
enough in the world, and it is easy to show what, human
nature being what it in the long run is, the defects of a
bureaucracy must in the long run be.
It is an inevitable defect, that bureaucrats will care
more for routine than for results ; or, as Burke put it,
" that they will think the substance of business not to
be much more important than the forms of it." Their
whole education and all the habit of their lives make
them do so. They are brought young into the particular
part of the public service to which they are attached ;
they are occupied for years in learning its forms after-
wards, for years too, in applying these forms to trifling
matters. They are, to use the phrase of an old writer,
"but the tailors of business; they cut the clothes, but
they do not find the body." M3n so trained must come to
think the routine of business not a means, but an end
o
THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
to imagine the elaborate machinery of which they form
a part, and from which they derive their dignity, to be a
grand and achieved result, not a working and changeable
instrument. But in a miscellaneous world, there is now
one evil and now another. The very means which best
helped you yesterday, may very likely be those which
most impede you to-morrow you may want to do a
different thing to-morrow, and all your accumulation of
means for yesterday's work is but an obstacle to the new
work. The Prussian military system is the theme of
popular wonder now, yet it sixty years pointed the moral
against form. We have all heard the saying that " Frederic
the Great lost the battle of Jena." It was the system
which he had established a good system for his wants
and his times, which, blindly adhered to, and continued
into a different age put to strive with new competitors
brought his country to ruin. The "dead and formal "
Prussian system was then contrasted with the " living "
French system the sudden outcome of the new explosive
democracy. The system which now exists is the product
of the reaction ; and the history of its predecessor is a
warning what its future history may be too. It is not
more celebrated for its day than Frederic's for his, and
principle teaches that a bureaucracy, elated by sudden
success, and marvelling at its own merit, is the most un-
improving and shallow of governments.
Not only does a bureaucracy thus tend to under-
government, in point of quality ; it tends to over-govern-
ment, in point of quantity. The trained official hates
the rude, untrained public. He thinks that they are
CHANGES OF MINISTET. 195
stupid, ignorant, reckless that they cannot tell their own
interest that they should have the leave of the office
before they do anything. Protection is the natural in-
born creed of every official body ; free trade is an ex-
trinsic idea, alien to its notions, and hardly to be assimi-
lated with life ; and it is easy to see how an accomplished
critic, used to a free and active life, could thus describe
the official.
" Every imaginable and real social interest," says Mr.
Laing, "religion, education, law, police, every branch of
public or private business, personal liberty to move from
place to place, even from parish to parish within the
same jurisdiction; liberty to engage in any branch of
trade or industry, on a small or large scale, all the
objects, in short, in which body, mind, and capital can be
employed in civilised society, were gradually laid hold of
for the employment and support of functionaries, were
centralised in bureaux, were superintended, licensed, in-
spected, reported upon, and interfered with by a host of
officials scattered over the land, and maintained at the
public expense, yet with no conceivable utility in their
duties. They are not, however, gentlemen at large, en-
joying salary without service. They are under a semi-
military discipline. In Bavaria, for instance, the superior
civil functionary can place his inferior functionary under
house-arrest, for neglect of duty, or other offence against
civil functionary discipline. In Wurtemberg, the func-
tionary cannot marry without leave from his superior.
Voltaire says, somewhere, that, ' the art of government is
to make two-thirds of a nation pay all it possibly can
196 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
pay for the benefit of the other third.' This is realised
in Germany by the functionary system. The function-
aries are not there for the benefit of the people, but the
people for the benefit of the functionaries. All this
machinery of functionarism, with its numerous ranks
and gradations in every district, filled with a staff of
clerks and expectants in every department looking for
employment, appointments, or promotions, was intended
to be a new support of the throne in the new social state
of the Continent ; a third class, in connection with the
people by their various official duties of interference in
all public or private affairs, yet attached by their in-
terests to the kingly power. The Beamptenstand, or
functionary class, was to be the equivalent to the class of
nobility, gentry, capitalists, and men of larger landed
property than the peasant-proprietors, and was to make
up in numbers for the want of individual weight and
influence. In France, at the expulsion of Louis Philippe,
the civil functionaries were stated to amount to 807,030
individuals. This civil army was more than double of
the military. In Germany, this class is necessarily more
numerous in proportion to the population, the landwehr
system imposing many more restrictions than the con-
scription on the free action of the people, and requiring
more officials to manage it, and the semi-feudal jurisdic-
tions and forms of law requiring much more writing and
intricate forms of procedure before the courts than the
Code Napoleon."
A bureaucracy is sure to think that its duty is to
augment official power, official business, or official mem-
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 197
bers, rather than to leave free the energies of mankind ;
it overdoes the quantity of government, as well as im-
pairs its quality.
The truth is, that a skilled bureaucracy a bureau-
cracy trained from early life to its special avocation is,
though it boasts of an appearance of science, quite incon-
sistent with the true principles of the art of business.
That art has not yet been condensed into precepts, but a
great many experiments have been made, and a vast
floating vapour of knowledge floats through society. One
of the most sure principles is, that success depends on a
due mixture of special and nonspecial minds of minds
which attend to the means, and of minds which attend
to the end. The success of the great joint-stock banks
of London the most remarkable . achievement of recent
business has been an example of the use of this mix-
ture. These banks are managed by a board of persons
mostly not trained to the business, supplemented by, and
annexed to, a body of specially trained officers, who have
been bred to banking all their lives. These mixed banks
have quite beaten the old banks, composed exclusively of
pure bankers ; it is found that the board of directors has
greater and more flexible knowledge more insight into
the wants of a commercial community knows when to
lend and when not to lend, better than the old bankers,
who had never looked at life, except out of the bank
windows. Just so the most successful railways in Europe
have been conducted not by engineers or traffic managers
but by capitalists ; by men of a certain business culture,
if of no other. These capitalists buy and use the services
198 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
of skilled managers, as the unlearned attorney buys and
uses the services of the skilled barrister, and manage far
better than any of the different sorts of special men
under them. They combine these different specialties
make it clear where the realm of one ends and that of
the other begins, and add to it a wide knowledge of large
affairs, which no special man can have, and which is only
gained by diversified action. But this utility of leading
minds used to generalise, and acting upon various mate-
rials, is entirely dependent upon their position. They
must not be at the bottom they must not even be half
way up they must be at the top. A merchant's clerk
would be a child at a bank counter ; but the merchant
himself could, very likely, give good, clear, and useful
advice in a bank court. The merchant's clerk would be
equally at sea in a railway office, but the merchant him-
self could give good advice, very likely, at a board of
directors. The summits (if I may so say) of the various
kinds of business are, like the tops of mountains, much
more alike than the parts below the bare principles are
much the same ; it is only the rich variegated details of
the lower strata that so contrast with one another. But
it needs travelling to know that the summits are the
same. Those who live on one mountain believe that
their mountain is wholly unlike all others.
The application of this principle to Parliamentary
government is very plain; it shows at once that the
intrusion from without upon an office of an exterior head
of the office, is not an evil, but that, on the contrary, it-
is essential to the perfection of that office. If it is left
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 109
to itself, the office will become technical, self-absorbed,
self-multiplying. It will be likely to overlook the end
in the means ; it will fail from narrowness of mind ; it
will be eager in seeming to do ; it will be idle in real
doing. An extrinsic chief is the fit corrector of such
errors. He can say to the permanent chief, skilled in
the forms and pompous with the memories of his office,
" Will you, Sir, explain to me how this regulation con-
duces to the end in view ? According to the natural
view of things, the applicant should state the whole of
his wishes to one clerk on one paper ; you make him say
it to five clerks on five papers." Or, again, " Does it not
appear to you, Sir, that the reason of this formality is
extinct ? When we were building wood ships, it was
quite right to have such precautions against fire; but
now that we are building iron ships," &c., &c. If a
junior clerk asked these questions, he would be "pooh-
poohed ! " It is only the head of an office that can get
them answered. It is he, and he only, that brings the
rubbish of office to the burning glass of sense.
The immense importance of such a fresh mind is
greatest in a country where business changes most. A
dead, inactive, agricultural country may be governed by
an unalterable bureau for years and years, and no harm
come of it. If a wise man arranged the bureau rightly
in the beginning, it may run rightly a long time. But
if the country be a progressive, eager, changing one, soon
the bureau will either cramp improvement, or be de-
stroyed itself.
This conception of the use of a Parliamentary head
200 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
shows how wrong is the obvious notion which regards
him as the principal administrator of his office. The
late Sir George Lewis used to be fond of explaining this
subject. He had every means of knowing. He was bred
in the permanent civil service. He was a very successful
Chancellor of the Exchequer, a very successful Home
Secretary, and he died Minister for War. He used to
say, " It is not the business of a Cabinet Minister to work
his department. His business is to see that it is properly
worked. If he does much, he is probably doing harm.
The permanent staff of the office can do what he chooses
to do much better, or if they cannot, they ought to be
removed. He is only a bird of passage, and cannot com-
pete with those who are in the office all their lives round."
Sir George Lewis was a perfect Parliamentary head of
an office, so far as that head is to be a keen critic and
rational corrector of it.
But Sir George Lewis was not perfect; he was not
even an average good head in another respect. The use
of a fresh mind applied to the official mind is not only a
corrective use, it is also an animating use. A public
department is very apt to be dead to what is wanting
for a great occasion till the occasion is past. The vague
public mind will appreciate some signal duty before the
precise, occupied administration perceives it. The Duke
of Newcastle was of this use at least in the Crimean war.
He roused up his department, though when roused it
could not act. A perfect Parliamentary minister would
be one who should add the animating capacity of the
Duke of Newcastle to the accumulated sense, the de-
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 201
tective instinct, and the laissez faire habit of Sir George
Lewis.
As soon as we take the true view of Parliamentary
office we shall perceive that, fairly, frequent change in
the official is an advantage, not a mistake. If his
function is to bring a representative of outside sense and
outside animation in contact with the inside world, he
ought often to be changed. No man is a perfect repre-
sentative of outside sense. "There is some one," says
the true French saying, " who is more able than Talley-
rand, more able than Napoleon. C'est tout le monde."
That many-sided sense finds no microcosm in any single
individual. Still less are the critical function and the
animating function of a Parliamentary minister likely
to be perfectly exercised by one and the same man.
Impelling power and restraining wisdom are as opposite
as any two things, and are rarely found together. And
even if the natural mind of the Parliamentary minister
was perfect, long contact with the office would destroy
his use. Inevitably he would accept the ways of office,
think its thoughts, live its life. The " dyer's hand would
be subdued to what it works in." If the function of a
Parliamentary minister is to be an outsider to his office,
we must not choose one who, by habit, thought, and life,
is acclimatised to its ways.
There is every reason to expect that a Parliamentary
statesman will be a man of quite sufficient intelligence,
quite enough various knowledge, quite enough miscel-
laneous experience, to represent effectually general
sense in opposition to bureaucratic sense. Most Cabinet
202 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
ministers in charge of considerable departments are men
of superior ability; I have heard an eminent living
statesman of long experience say that in his time he only
knew one instance to the contrary. And there is the
best protection that it shall be so. A considerable
Cabinet minister has to defend his department in the
face of mankind ; and though distant observers and sharp
writers may depreciate it, this is a very difficult thing.
A fool, who has publicly to explain great affairs, who has
publicly to answer detective questions, who has publicly
to argue against able and quick opponents, must soon be
shown to be a fool. The very nature of Parliamentary
government answers for the discovery of substantial
incompetence.
At any rate, none of the competing forms of govern-
ment have nearly so effectual a procedure for putting
a good untechnical minister to correct and impel the
routine ones. There are but four important forms of
government in the present state of the world, the Par-
liamentary, the Presidential, the Hereditary, and the
Dictatorial, or Revolutionary. Of these I have shown
that, as now worked in America, the Presidential form
of government is incompatible with a skilled bureau-
cracy. If the whole official class change when a new
party goes out or comes in, a good official system is
impossible. Even if more officials should be permanent
in America than now, still, vast numbers will always be
changed. The whole issue is based on a single election
on the choice of President ; by that internecine conflict
all else is won or lost. The managers of the contest have
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 203
that greatest possible facility in using what I may call
patronage-bribery. Everybody knows that, as a fact,
the President can give what places he likes to what
persons, and when his friends tell A. B., "If we win,
C. D. shall be turned out of Utica Post-office, and you,
A. B., shall have it," A. B. believes it, and is justified in
doing so. But no individual member of Parliament can
promise place effectually. He may not be able to give
the places. His party may come in, but he will be
powerless. In the United States party intensity is
aggravated by concentrating an overwhelming importance
on a single contest, and the efficiency of promised offices
as a means of corruption is augmented, because the
victor can give what he likes to whom he likes.
Nor is this the only defect of a Presidential govern-
ment in reference to the choice of officers. The President
has the principal anomaly of a Parliamentary government
without having its corrective. At each change of party
the President distributes (as here) the principal offices to
his principal supporters. But he has an opportunity for
singular favouritism ; the minister lurks in the office ; he
need do nothing in public; he need not show for years
whether he is a fool or wise. The nation can tell what a
Parliamentary member is by the open test of Parliament ;
but no one, save from actual contact, or by rare position,
can tell anything certain of a Presidential minister.
The case of a minister under an hereditary form of
government is yet worse. The hereditary king may be
weak; may be under the government of women; may
appoint a minister from childish motives; may remove
204 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
one from absurd whims. There is no security that an
hereditary king will be competent to choose a good chief
minister, and thousands of such kings have chosen
millions of bad ministers.
By the Dictatorial, or Revolutionary, sort of govern-
ment, I mean that very important sort in which the
sovereign the absolute sovereign is selected by in-
surrection. In theory, one would certainly have hoped
that by this time such a crude elective machinery would
have been reduced to a secondary part. But, in fact, the
greatest nation (or, perhaps, after the exploits of Bismarck,
I should say one of the two greatest nations of the Conti-
nent) vacillates between the Revolutionary and the Par-
liamentary, and now is governed under the Revolutionary
form. France elects its ruler in the streets of Paris.
Flatterers may suggest that the democratic empire will
become hereditary, but close observers know that it can-
not. The idea of the government is that the Emperor
represents the people in capacity, in judgment, in instinct.
But no family through generations can have sufficient, or
half sufficient, mind to do so. The representative despot
must be chosen by fighting, as Napoleon I. and Napoleon
III. were chosen. And such a government is likely,
whatever be its other defects, to have a far better and
abler administration than any other government. The
head of the government must be a man of the most con-
summate ability. He cannot keep his place, he can hardly
keep his life, unless he is. He is sure to be active,
because he knows that his power, and perhaps his head,
may be lost if he be negligent The whole frame of his
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 205
State is strained to keep down revolution. The most
difficult of all political problems is to be solved the
people are to be at once thoroughly restrained and tho-
roughly pleased. The executive must be like a steel shirt
of the Middle Ages extremely hard and extremely flexi-
ble. It must give way to attractive novelties which do
not hurt ; it must resist such as are dangerous ; it must
maintain old things which are good and fitting ; it must
alter such as cramp and give pain. The dictator dare not 1
appoint a bad minister if he would. I admit that such a
despot is a better selector of administrators than a parlia-
ment; that he will know how to mix fresh minds and
used minds better ; that he is under a stronger motive to
combine them well; that here is to be seen the best of
all choosers with the keenest motives to choose. But I
need not prove in England that the revolutionary selection
of rulers obtains administrative efficiency at a price alto-
gether transcending its value; that it shocks credit by
its catastrophes; that for intervals it does not protect
property or life; that it maintains an undergrowth of
fear through all prosperity ; that it may take years to
find the true capable despot ; that the interregna of the
incapable are full of all evil ; that the fit despot may die
as soon as found ; that the good administration and all
else hang by the thread of his life.
But if, with the exception of this terrible revolu-
tionary government, a Parliamentary government upon
principle surpasses all its competitors in administrative
efficiency, why is it that our English government, which
is beyond comparison the best of Parliamentary govern-
THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
ments, is not celebrated through the world for adminis-
trative efficiency ? It is noted for many things, why is
it not noted for that ? Why, according to popular belief
is it rather characterised by the very contrary ?
One great reason of the diffused impression is, that
the English Government attempts so much. Our
military system is that which is most attacked. Ob-
jectors say we spend much more on our army than the
great military monarchies, and yet with an inferior result.
But, then, what we attempt is incalculably more difficult.
The continental monarchies have only to defend compact
European territories by the many soldiers whom they
force to fight; the English try to defend without any
compulsion only by such soldiers as they persuade to
serve territories far surpassing all Europe in magnitude,
and situated all over the habitable globe. Our Horse
Guards and War Office may not be at all perfect I believe
they are not : but if they had sufficient recruits selected
by force of law if they had, as in Prussia, the absolute
command of each man's time for a few years, and the
right to call him out afterwards when they liked, we
should be much surprised at the sudden ease and quick-
ness with which they did things. I have no doubt too
that any accomplished soldier of the Continent would
reject as impossible what we after a fashion effect. He
would not attempt to defend a vast scattered empire,
with many islands, a long frontier line in every continent,
and a very tempting bit of plunder at the centre, by mere
volunteer recruits, who mostly come from the worst class
of the people whom the Great Duke called the " scum
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 207
of the earth," who come in uncertain numbers year by
year who by some political accident may not come in
adequate numbers, or at all, in the year we need them
most. Our War Office attempts what foreign War Offices
(perhaps rightly) would not try at; their officers have
means of incalculable force denied to ours, though ours is
set to harder taska
Again, the English navy undertakes to defend a line
of coast and a set of dependencies far surpassing those of
any continental power. And the extent of our operations
is a singular difficulty just now. It requires us to keep
a large stock of ships and arms. But on the other hand,
there are most important reasons why we should not keep
much. The naval art and the military art are both in
a state of transition ; the last discovery of to-day is out
of date, and superseded by an antagonistic discovery to-
morrow. Any large accumulation of vessels or guns is
sure to contain much that will be useless, unfitting, ante-
diluvian, when it comes to be tried. There are two cries
against the Admiralty which go on side by side : one
says, " We have not ships enough, no ' relief ' ships, no
navy, to tell the truth ; " the other cry says, " We have
all the wrong ships, all the wrong guns, and nothing but
the wrong; in their foolish constructive mania the
Admiralty have been building when they ought to have
been waiting; they have heaped a curious museum of
exploded inventions, but they have given us nothing
serviceable." The two cries for opposite policies go on
together, and blacken our Executive together, though
each is a defence of the Executive against the other.
AJS THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Again, the Home Department in England struggles
3, with difficulties of which abroad they have long got rid.
We love independent "local authorities," little centres
of outlying authority. When the metropolitan executive
most wishes to act, it cannot act effectually because
these lesser bodies hesitate, deliberate, or even disobey.
But local independence has no necessary connection with
Parliamentary government. The degree of local freedom
desirable in a country varies according to many circum-
stances, and a Parliamentary government may consist
with any degree of it. We certainly ought not to debit
Parliamentary government as a general and applicable
polity with the particular vices of the guardians of the
poor in England, though it is so debited every day.
Again, as our administration has in England this
peculiar difficulty, so on the other hand foreign competing
administrations have a peculiar advantage. Abroad a
man under Government is a superior being : he is higher
than the rest of the world ; he is envied by almost all of
it. This gives the Government the easy pick of the dlite
of the nation. All clever people are eager to be under
Government, and are hardly to be satisfied elsewhere.
But in England there is no such superiority, and the
English have no such feeling. We do not respect a
stamp-office clerk, or an exciseman's assistant. A pursy
grocer considers he is much above either. Our Govern-
ment cannot buy for minor clerks the best ability of the
nation in the cheap currency of pure honour, and no
government is rich enough to buy very much of it in
money. Our mercantile opportunities allure away the
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 209
most ambitious minds. The foreign bureaux are filled
with a selection from the ablest men of the nation, but
only a very few of the best men approach the English
offices.
But these are neither the only nor even the principal
reasons why our public administration is not so good
as, according to principle and to the unimpeded effects
of Parliamentary government, it should be. There are !
two great causes at work, which in their consequences
run out into many details, but which in their funda-
mental nature may be briefly described. The first of
these causes is our ignorance. No polity can get out
of a nation more than there is in the nation. A free
government is essentially a government by persuasion;
and as are the people to be persuaded, and as are the
persuaders, so will that government be. On many parts
of our administration the effect of our extreme ignorance
is at once plain. The foreign policy of England has for
many years been, according to the judgment now in
vogue, inconsequent, fruitless, casual ; aiming at no
distinct pre-imagined end, based on no steadily pre-con-
ceived principle. I have not room to discuss with how
much or how little abatement this decisive censure
should be accepted. However, I entirely concede that
our recent foreign policy has been open to very grave
and serious blame. But would it not have been a
miracle if the English people, directing their own policy,
and being what they are, had directed a good policy ?
Are they not above all nations divided from the rest of
the world, insular both in situation and in mind, both for
P
210 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
good and for evil ? Are they not out of the current of
common European causes and affairs ? Are they not a
race contemptuous of others ? Are they not a race with
no special education or culture as to the modern world,
and too often despising such culture ? Who could expect
such a people to comprehend the new and strange events
of foreign places ? So far from wondering that the
English Parliament has been inefficient in foreign policy,
I think it is wonderful, and another sign of the rude,
vague imagination that is at the bottom of our people,
that we have done so well as we have.
Again, the very conception of the English Constitu-
tion, as distinguished from a purely Parliamentary con-
stitution is, that it contains "dignified" parts parts,
that is, retained, not for intrinsic use, but from their
imaginative attraction upon an uncultured and rude
population. All such elements tend to diminish simple
efficiency. They are like the additional and solely-orna-
mental wheels introduced into the clocks of the Middle
Ages, which tell the then age of the moon or the supreme
constellation ; which make little men or birds come out
and in theatrically. All such ornamental work is a
source of friction and error ; it prevents the time being
marked accurately ; each new wheel is a new source of
imperfection. So if authority is given to a person, not
on account of his working fitness, but on account of his
imaginative efficiency, he will commonly impair good
administration. He may do something better than good
work of detail, but will spoil good work of detail. The
English aristocracy is often of this sort. It has an
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 211
influence over the people of vast value still, and of
infinite value formerly. But no man would select the
cadets of an aristocratic house as desirable adminis-
trators. They have peculiar disadvantages in the acqui-
sition of business knowledge, business training, and
business habits, and they have no peculiar advantages.
Our middle class, too, is very unfit to give us the
administrators we ought to have. I cannot now discuss
whether all that is said against our education is well
grounded; it is called by an excellent judge "preten-
tious, insufficient, and unsound." But I will say that it
does not fit men to be men of business as it ought to fit
them. Till lately the very simple attainments and
habits necessary for a banker's clerk had a scarcity-
value. The sort of education which fits a man for the
higher posts of practical life is still very rare ; there is
not even a good agreement as to what it is. Our public
officers cannot be as good as the corresponding officers of
some foreign nations till our business education is as
good as theirs.*
But strong as is our ignorance in deteriorating our
administration, another cause is stronger stilL There are
but two foreign administrations probably better than
ours, and both these have had something which we have
not had. Theirs in both cases were arranged by a man
of genius, after careful forethought, and upon a special
design. Napoleon built upon a clear stage which the
* I am happy to state that this evil is much diminishing. The im-
provement of school education of the middle class in the last twenty-five
years is marvellous.
212 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTIOX.
French Eevolution bequeathed him. The originality
once ascribed to his edifice was indeed untrue ; Tocque-
ville and Lavergne have shown that he did but run up a
conspicuous structure in imitation of a latent one before
concealed by the mediaeval complexities of the old regime.
But what we are concerned with now is, not Napoleon's
originality, but his work. He undoubtedly settled the
administration of France upon an effective, consistent,
and enduring system ; the succeeding governments have
but worked the mechanism they inherited from him.
Frederick the Great did the same in the new monarchy
of Prussia. Both the French sj^stem and the Prussian
are new machines, made in civilised times to do their
appropriate work.
The English offices have never, since they were made,
been arranged with any reference to one another; or
rather they were never made, but grew as each could.
The sort of free trade which prevailed in public insti-
tutions in the English middle ages is very curious. Our
three courts of law the Queen's Bench, the Common
Pleas, and the Exchequer for the sake of the fees ex-
tended an originally contracted sphere into the entire
sphere of litigation. Boni judicis est ampliare jurisdic-
tionem, went the old saying ; or, in English, " It is the
mark of a good judge to augment the fees of his Court," his
own income, and the income of his subordinates. The cen-
tral administration, the Treasury, never asked any account
of the moneys the courts thus received ; so long as it was
not asked to pay anything, it was satisfied. Only last year
one of the many remnants of this system cropped up, to
CHANGES OF MINISTKY. 213
the wondei of the public. A clerk in the Patent Office
stole some fees, and naturally the men of the nineteenth
century thought our principal finance minister, the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer, would be, as in France, respon-
sible for it. But the English law was different somehow.
The Patent Office was under the Lord Chancellor, and the
Court of Chancery is one of the multitude of our insti-
tutions which owe their existence to free competition,
and so it was the Lord Chancellor's business to look after
the fees, which of course, as an occupied judge, he could
not. A certain Act of Parliament did indeed require that
the fees of the Patent Office should be paid into the
" Exchequer; " and, again, the " Chancellor of the Exche-
quer " was thought to be responsible in the matter, but
only by those who did not know. According to our
system the Chancellor of the Exchequer is the enemy of
the Exchequer ; a whole series of enactments try to pro-
tect it from him. Until a few months ago there was a
very lucrative sinecure called the " Comptrollership of the
Exchequer," designed to guard the Exchequer against its
Chancellor ; and the last holder, Lord Monteagle, used to
say he was the pivot of the English Constitution. I have
not room to explain what he meant, and it is not needful ;
what is to the purpose is that, by an inherited series of
historical complexities, a defaulting clerk in an office of
no litigation was not under natural authority, the finance
minister, but under a far-away judge who had never heard
of him.
The whole office of the Lord Chancellor is a heap of
anomalies. He is a judge, and it is contrary to obvious
214 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
principle that any part of administration should be en-
trusted to a judge; it is of very grave moment that the
administration of justice should be kept clear of any sinister
temptations. Yet the Lord Chancellor, our chief judge,
sits in the Cabinet, and makes party speeches in the Lords.
Lord Lyndhurst was a principal Tory politician, and yet
he presided in the O'Connell case. Lord Westbury was
in chronic wrangle with the bishops, but he gave judg-
ment upon " Essays and Reviews." In truth, the Lord
Chancellor became a Cabinet Minister, because, being
near the person of the sovereign, he was high in court
precedence, and not upon a political theory wrong or
right.
A friend once told me that an intelligent Italian asked
him about the principal English officers, and that he was
very puzzled to explain their duties, and especially to ex-
plain the relation of their duties to their titles. I do not
remember all the cases, but I can recollect that the Italian
could not comprehend why the First " Lord of the Trea-
sury " had as a rule nothing to do with the Treasury, or
why the " Woods and Forests " looked after the sewerage
of towns. This conversation was years before the cattle
plague, but I should like to have heard the reasons why
the Privy Council Office had charge of that malady. Of
course one could give an historical reason, but I mean
an administrative reason a reason which would show, not
how it came to have the duty, but why in future it should
keep it.
dl But the unsystematic and casual arrangement of our
.public offices is not more striking than their difference of
af
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 215
arrangement for the one purpose they have in common.
They all, being under the ultimate direction of a Parlia-
mentary official, ought to have the best means of bringing
the whole of the higher concerns of the office before that offi-
cial When the fresh mind rules, the fresh mind requires
to be informed. And most business being rather alike, the
machinery for bringing it before the extrinsic chief ought,
for the most part, to be similar : at any rate, where it is
different, it ought to be different upon reason ; and where
it is similar, similar upon reason. Yet there are almost
no two offices which are exactly alike in the defined rela-
tions of the permanent official to the Parliamentary chief.
Let us see. The army and navy are the most similar in
nature, yet there is in the army a permanent outside office,
called the Horse Guards, to which there is nothing else
like. In the navy, there is a curious anomaly a Board
of Admiralty, also changing with every government, which
is to instruct the First Lord in what he does not know.
The relations between the First Lord and the Board have
not always been easily intelligible, and those between the
War Office and the Horse Guards are in extreme confu-
sion. Even now a Parliamentary paper relating to them
has just been presented to the House of Commons, which
says the fundamental and ruling document cannot be
traced beyond the possession of Sir George Lewis, who
was Secretary for War three years since ; and the confused
details are endless, as they must be in a chronic contention
of offices. At the Board of Trade there is only the hypo-
thesis of a Board ; it has long ceased to exist. Even the
President and Vice-President do not regularly meet for
216 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
the transaction of affairs. The patent of the latter is
only to transact business in the absence of the President,
and if the two are not intimate, and the President chooses
to act himself, the Vice-President sees no papers, and
does nothing. At the Treasury the shadow of a Board
exists, but its members have no power, and are the very
officials whom Canning said existed to make a House, to
keep a House, and to cheer the ministers. The India
Office has a fixed "Council;" but the Colonial Office,
which rules over our other dependencies and colonies, has
not, and never had, the vestige of a council. Any of these
varied constitutions may be right, but all of them can
scarcely be right.
In truth the real constitution of a permanent office to
be ruled by a permanent chief has been discussed only
once in England : that case was a peculiar and anomalous
one, and the decision then taken was dubious. A new
India Office, when the East India Company was abolished,
had to be made. The late Mr. James Wilson, a consum-
mate judge of administrative affairs, then maintained that
no council ought to be appointed eo nomine, but that the
true Council of a Cabinet minister was a certain number
of highly paid, much occupied, responsible secretaries,
whom the minister could consult either separately or
together, as, and when, he chose. Such secretaries, Mr.
Wilson maintained, must be able, for no minister will
sacrifice his own convenience, and endanger his own repu-
tation by appointing a fool to a post so near himself, and
where he can do much harm. A member of a Board may
easily be incompetent ; if some other members and the
CHANGES OF MINISTRY. 217
chairmen are able, the addition of one or two stupid men
will not be felt ; they will receive their salaries and do
nothing. But a permanent under-secretaiy, charged with
a real control over much important business, must be
able, or his superior will be blamed, and there will be " a
scrape in Parliament."
I cannot here discuss, nor am I competent to discuss,
the best mode of composing public offices, and of adjust-
ing them to a Parliamentary head. There ought to be
on record skilled evidence on the subject before a person
without any specific experience can to any purpose think
about it. But I may observe that the plan which Mr.
Wilson suggested is that followed in the most successful
part of our administration, the "Ways and Means " part
When the Chancellor of the Exchequer prepares a
Budget, he requires from the responsible heads of the
revenue department their estimates of the public revenue
upon the preliminary hypothesis that no change is made,
but that last year's taxes will continue; if, afterwards,
he thinks of making an alteration, he requires a report
on that too. If he has to renew Exchequer bills, or
operate anyhow in the City, he takes the opinion, oral or
written, of the ablest and most responsible person at the
National Debt Office, and the ablest and most respon-
sible at the Treasury. Mr. Gladstone, by far the greatest
Chancellor of the Exchequer of this generation, one of the
very greatest of any generation, has often gone out of his
way to express his obligation to these responsible skilled
advisers. The more a man knows himself, the more
habituated he is to action in general, the more sure he is
218 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
to take and to value responsible counsel emanating from
ability and suggested by experience. That this principle
brings good fruit is certain. We have, by unequivocal
admission, the best budget in the world. Why should
not the rest of our administration be as good if we did
but apply the same method to it ?
I leave this to stand as it was originally written
since it does not profess to rest on my own knowledge,
and only offers a suggestion on good authority. Recent
experience seems, however, to show that in all great
administrative departments there ought to be some one
permanent responsible head through whom the changing
Parliamentary chief always acts, from whom he learns
everything, and to whom he communicates everything.
The daily work of the Exchequer is a trine compared
with that of the Admiralty or the Home Office, and
therefore a single principal head is not there so neces-
sary. But the preponderance of evidence at present is
that in all offices of very great work some one such head
is essential.
219
No. VIL
ITS SUPPOSED CHECKS AND BALANCES.
IN a former essay I devoted an elaborate discussion to
the comparison of the royal and unroyal form of Par-
liamentary Government. I showed that at the formation
of a ministry, and during the continuance of a ministry,
a really sagacious monarch might be of rare use. I ascer-
tained that it was a mistake to fancy that at such times
a constitutional monarch had no role and no duties. But
I proved likewise that the temper, the disposition, and
the faculties then needful to fit a constitutional monarch
for usefulness were very rare, at least as rare as the
faculties of a great absolute monarch, and that a common
man in that place is apt to do at least as much harm as
good perhaps more harm. But in that essay I could
not discuss fully the functions of a king at the conclu-
sion of an administration, for then the most peculiar
parts of the English government the power to dissolve
the House of Commons, and the power to create new
peers come into play, and until the nature of the House
of Lords and the nature of the House of Commons had
been explained, I had no premises for an argument as to
the characteristic action of the king upon them. We
220 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
have since considered the functions of the two houses,
and also the effects of changes of ministry on our ad-
ministrative system ; we are now, therefore, in a position
to discuss the functions of a king at the end of an
administration.
I may seem over formal in this matter, but I am
very formal on purpose. It appears to me that the
functions of our executive in dissolving the Commons
o
and augmenting the Peers are among the most impor-
tant, and the least appreciated, parts of our whole
government, and that hundreds of errors have been
made in copying the English Constitution from not com-
prehending them.
Hobbes told us long ago, and everybody now under-
stands, that there must be a supreme authority, a con-
clusive power, in every state on every point somewhere.
The idea of government involves it when that idea
is properly understood. But there are two classes of
governments. In one the supreme determining power
is upon all points the same : in the other, that ultimate
power is different upon different points now resides in
one part of the Constitution and now in another. The
Americans thought that they were imitating the English
in making their Constitution upon the last principle
in having one ultimate authority for one sort of matter,
and another for another sort. But in truth the English
Constitution is the type of the opposite species; it has
only one authority for all sorts of matters. To gain a
living conception of the difference let us see what the
Americans did.
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 221
First, they altogether retained what, in part, they
could not help, the sovereignty of the separate states. A
fundamental article of the Federal Constitution says that
the powers not " delegated " to the central government
are " reserved to the States respectively." And the whole
recent history of the Union perhaps all its history has
been more determined by that enactment than by any
other single cause. The sovereignty of the principal
matters of state has rested not with the highest govern-
ment, but with the subordinate government. The Federal
government could not touch slavery the " domestic in-
stitution " which divided the Union into two halves, un-
like one another in morals, politics, and social condition,
and at last set them to fight. This determining political
fact was not in the jurisdiction of the highest government
in the country, where you might 'expect its highest
wisdom, nor in the central government, where you might
look for impartiality, but in local governments, where
petty interests were sure to be considered, and where
only inferior abilities were likely to be employed. The
capital fact was reserved for the minor jurisdictions.
Again, there has been only one matter comparable to
slavery in the United States, and that has been vitally
affected by the State governments also. Their ultra-
democracy is not a result of Federal legislation, but of
State legislation. The Federal Constitution deputed one
of the main items of its structure to the subordinate
governments. One of its clauses provides that the suf-
frages for the Federal House of Repieseritatives shall be,
in each State, the same as for the most numerous branch
222 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
of the legislature of that State ; and as each State fixes
the suffrage for its own legislatures, the States altogethei
fix the suffrage for the Federal Lower Chamber. By
another clause of the Federal Constitution the States fix
the electoral qualification for voting at a Presidential
election. The primary element in a free government
the determination how many people shall have a share in
it in America depends not on the government but on
certain subordinate local, and sometimes, as in the South
now, hostile bodies.
Doubtless the framers of the Constitution had not
much choice in the matter. The wisest of them were
anxious to get as much power for the central government,
and to leave as little to the local governments as they
could. But a cry was got up that this wisdom would
create a tyranny and impair freedom, and with that help,
local jealousy triumphed easily. All Federal government
is, in truth, a case in which what I have called the
dignified elements of government do not coincide with
the serviceable elements. At the beginning of every
league the separate States are the old governments which
attract and keep the love and loyalty of the people ; the
Federal government is a useful thing, but new and un-
attractive. It must concede much to the State govern-
ments, for it is indebted to them for motive power : they
are the governments which the people voluntarily obey.
When the State governments are not thus loved, they
vanish as the little Italian and the little German poten-
tates vanished ; no federation is needed ; a single central
government rules all,
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 223
But the division of the sovereign authority in the
American Constitution is far more complex than this.
The part of that authority left to the Federal govern-
ment is itself divided and subdivided. The greatest in-
stance is the most obvious. The Congress rules the law,
but the President rules the administration. One means
of unity the constitution does give ; the President can
veto laws he does not like. But when two-thirds of both
houses are unanimous (as has lately happened), they can
overrule the President and make the laws without him ;
so here there are three separate repositories of the legis-
lative power in different cases: first, Congress and the
President when they agree ; next, the President when he
effectually exerts his power; then the requisite two-thirds
of Congress when they overrule the President. And the
President need not be over-active in carrying out a law
he does not approve of. He may indeed be impeached for
gross neglect; but between criminal non-feasance and
zealous activity there are infinite degrees. Mr. Johnson
does not carry out the Freedman's Bureau Bill as Mr.
Lincoln, who approved of it, would have carried it out.
The American Constitution has a special contrivance for
varying the supreme legislative authority in different
cases, and dividing the administrative authority from it
in all cases.
But the administrative power itself is not left thus
simple and undivided. One most important part of
administration is international policy, and the supreme
authority here is not in the President, still less in the
House of Representatives, but in the Senate. The Presi-
224 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
dent can only make treaties, "provided two-thirds of
Senators present " concur. The sovereignty therefore for
the greatest international questions is in a different part
of the State altogether from any common administrative
or legislative question. It is put in a place by itself.
Again, the Congress declares war, but they would find
it very difficult, according to the recent construction of
their laws, to compel the President to make a peace. The
authors of the Constitution doubtless intended that Con-
gress should be able to control the American executive as
our Parliament controls ours. They placed the granting
of supplies in the House of Representatives exclusively.
But they forgot to look after " paper money ; " and now
it has been held that the President has power to emit such
money without consulting Congress at all. The first part
of the late war was so carried on by Mr. Lincoln; he
relied not on the grants of Congress, but on the prero-
gative of emission. It sounds a joke, but it is true never-
theless, that this power to issue greenbacks is decided to
belong to the President as commander-in-chief of the
army ; it is part of what was called the "war power." In
truth money was wanted in the late war, and the ad-
ministration got it in the readiest way ; and the nation,
glad not to be more taxed, wholly approved of it. But
the fact remains that the President has now, by precedent
and decision, a mighty power to continue a war without
the consent of Congress, and perhaps against its wish.
Against the united will of the American people a Presi-
dent would of course be impotent ; such is the genius of
the place and nation that he would never think of it.
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 225
But when the nation was (as of late) divided into two
parties, one cleaving to the President, the other to the
Congress, the now unquestionable power of the President
to issue paper-money may give him the power to continue
the war though Parliament (as we should speak) may
enjoin the war to cease.
And lastly, the whole region of the very highest ques-
tions is withdrawn from the ordinary authorities of the
State, and reserved for special authorities. The " consti-
tution " cannot be altered by any authorities within the
constitution, but only by authorities without it. Every
alteration of it, however urgent or however trifling, must
be sanctioned by a complicated proportion of States or
legislatures. The consequence is that the most obvious
evils cannot be quickly remedied ; that the most absurd
fictions must be framed to evade the plain sense of mis-
chievous clauses ; that a clumsy working and curious tech-
nicality mark the politics of a rough-and-ready people.
The practical arguments and the legal disquisitions in
America are often like those of trustees carrying out a
misdrawn will the sense of what they mean is good, but
it can never be worked out fully or defended simply, so
hampered is it by the old words of an old testament.
These instances (and others might be added) prove, as
history proves too, what was the principal thought of the
American constitution-makers. They shrank from placing
sovereign power anywhere. They feared that it would
generate tyranny; George III. had been a tyrant to
them, and come what might, they would not make a
George IIL Accredited theories said that the English
Q
226 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Constitution divided the sovereign authority, and in
imitation the Americans split up theirs.
The result is seen now. At the critical moment of
their history there is no ready, deciding power. The
South, after a great rebellion, lies at the feet of its con-
querors : its conquerors have to settle what to do with
it.* They must decide the conditions upon which the
Secessionists shall again become fellow citizens, shall
again vote, again be represented, again perhaps govern.
The most difficult of problems is how to change late foes
into free friends. The safety of their great public debt,
and with that debt their future credit and their whole
power in future wars, may depend on their not giving too
much power to those who must see in the debt the cost
of their own subjugation, and who must have an inclina-
tion towards the repudiation of it, now that their own
debt, the cost of their defence, has been repudiated.
A race, too, formerly enslaved, is now at the mercy of
men who hate and despise it, and those who set it free
are bound to give it a fair chance for new life. The slave
was formerly protected by his chains ; he was an article
of value; but now he belongs to himself, no one but
himself has an interest in his life ; and he is at the mercy
of the " mean whites," whose labour he depreciates, and
who regard him with a loathing hatred. The greatest
moral duty ever set before a government, and the most
fearful political problem ever set before a government,
* This was written just after the close of the civil war, bat I do not
know that the great problem stated in it has as yet been adequately
solved.
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 227
are now set before the American. But there is no de-
cision, and no possibility of a decision. The President
wants one course, and has power to prevent any other ;
the Congress wants another course, and has power to
prevent any other. The splitting of sovereignty into
many parts amounts to there being no sovereign.
The Americans of 1787 thought they were copying
the English Constitution, but they were contriving a
contrast to it. Just as the American is the type of
composite governments, in which the supreme power is
divided between many bodies and functionaries, so the
English is the type of simple constitutions, in which
the ultimate power upon all questions is in the hands
of the same persons.
The ultimate authority in the English Constitution is
a newly-elected House of Commons. No matter whether
the question upon which it decides be administrative or
legislative ; no matter whether it concerns high matters
of the essential constitution or small matters of daily
detail ; no matter whether it be a question of making a
war or continuing a war ; no matter whether it be the
imposing a tax or the issuing a paper currency; no
matter whether it be a question relating to India, or
Ireland, or London, a new House of Commons can
despotically and finally resolve.
The House of Commons may, as was explained, assent
in minor matters to the revision of the House of Lords,
and submit in matters about which it cares little to the
suspensive veto of the House of Lords ; but when sure
of the popular assent, and when freshly elected, it is
228 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
absolute, it can rule as it likes and decide as it likes.
And it can take the best security that it does not decide
in vain. It can insure that its decrees shall be executed,
for it, and it alone, appoints the executive ; it can inflict
the most severe of all penalties on neglect, for it can
remove the executive. It can choose, to effect its wishes,
those who wish the same ; and so its will is sure to be
done. A stipulated majority of both Houses of the
American Congress can overrule by stated enactment
their executive; but the popular branch of our legis-
lature can make and unmake ours.
The English Constitution, in a word, is framed on the
principle of choosing a single sovereign authority, and
making it good; the American, upon the principle of
having many sovereign authorities, and hoping that their
multitude may atone for their inferiority. The Americans
now extol their institutions, and so defraud themselves of
their due praise. But if they had not a genius for poli-
tics; if they had not a moderation in action singularly
curious where superficial speech is so violent ; if they had
not a regard for law, such as no great people have yet
evinced, and infinitely surpassing ours, the multiplicity
of authorities in the American Constitution would long
ago have brought it to a bad end. Sensible shareholders,
I have heard a shrewd attorney say, can work any deed
of settlement ; and so the men of Massachusetts could, I
believe, work any constitution.* But political philosophy
* Of conrse I am not speaking here of the South and Sonth-East, &a
they now are. How any free government is to exist in societies where so
many bad elements are so much perturbed, I cannot imagine.
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 229
must analyse political history ; it must distinguish what
is due to the excellence of the people, and what to the ex-
cellence of the laws ; it must carefully calculate the exact
effect of each part of the constitution, though thus it
may destroy many an idol of the multitude, and detect
the secret of utility where but few imagined it to lie.
How important singleness and unity are in political
action no one, I imagine, can doubt. We may distinguish
and define its parts ; but policy is a unit and a whole.
It acts by laws by administrators; it requires now
one, now the other; unless it can easily move both it
will be impeded soon; unless it has an absolute com-
mand of both its work will be imperfect. The interlaced
character of human affairs requires a single determining
energy ; a distinct force for each artificial compartment
will make but a motley patchwork, if it live long enough
to make anything. The excellence of the British Con-
stitution is that it has achieved this unity; that in it
the sovereign power is single, possible, and good.
The success is primarily due to the peculiar provision
of the English Constitution, which places the choice of
the executive in the " people's house ; " but it could not
have been thoroughly achieved except for two parts,
which I venture to call the " safety-valve " of the con-
stitution, and the " regulator."
The safety-valve is the peculiar provision of the con-
stitution, of which I spoke at great length in my essay
on the House of Lords. The head of the executive can
overcome the resistance of the second chamber by choos-
ing new members of that chamber; if he do not find a
230 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
majority, he can make a majority. This is a jsafety-valve
of the truest kind. It enables the popular will the will
of which the executive is the exponent, the will of which
it is the appointee to carry out within the constitution
desires and conceptions which one branch of the con-
stitution dislikes and resists. It lets forth a dangerous
accumulation of inhibited power, which might sweep this
constitution before it, as like accumulations have often
swept away like constitutions.
The regulator, as I venture to call it, of our single
sovereignty is the power of dissolving the otherwise
sovereign chamber confided to the chief executive. The
defects of the popular branch of a legislature as a sove-
reign have been expounded at length in a previous essay.
Briefly, they may be summed up in three accusations.
First. Caprice is the commonest and most formid-
able vice of a choosing chamber. Wherever in our
colonies parliamentary government is unsuccessful, or is
alleged to be unsuccessful, this is the vice which first
impairs it. The assembly cannot be induced to main-
tain any administration ; it shifts its selection now from
one minister to another minister, and in consequence
there is no government at all
Secondly. The very remedy for such caprice entails
another evil. The only mode by which a cohesive majo-
rity and a lasting administration can be upheld in a
Parliamentary government, is party organisation; but
that organisation itself tends to aggravate party violence
and party animosity. It is, in substance, subjecting the
whole nation to the rule of a section of the nation,
CHECKS AND BALANCES.
selected because of its speciality. Parliamentary govern-
ment is, in its essence, a sectarian government, and is
possible only when sects are cohesive.
Thirdly. A parliament, like every other sort of sove-
reign, has peculiar feelings, peculiar prejudices, peculiar
interests ; and it may pursue these in opposition to the
desires, and even in opposition to the well-being of the
nation. It has its selfishness as well as its caprice and
its parties.
The mode in which the regulating wheel of our con-
stitution produces its effect is plain. It does not impair
the authority of Parliament as a species, but it impairs
the power of the individual Parliament. It enables a
particular person outside parliament to say, " You Mem-
bers of Parliament are not doing your duty. You are
gratifying caprice at the cost of the nation. You are
indulging party spirit at the cost of the nation. You
are helping yourself at the cost of the nation. I will see
whether the nation approves what you are doing or not ;
I will appeal from Parliament No. 1 to Parliament No. 2."
By far the best way to appreciate this peculiar pro-
vision of our constitution is to trace it in action, to see,
as we saw before of the other powers of English royalty,
how far it is dependent on the existence of an hereditary
king, and how far it can be exercised by a premier whom
Parliament elects. When we examine the nature of the
particular person required to exercise the power, a vivid
idea of that power is itself brought home to us.
First. As to the caprice of parliament in the choice
of a premier, who is the best person to check it ? Clearly
232 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
the premier himself. He is the person most interested
in maintaining his administration, and therefore the most
likely person to use efficiently and dexterously the power
by which it is to be maintained. The intervention of an
extrinsic king occasions a difficulty. A capricious Par-
liament may always hope that his caprice may coincide
with theirs. In the days when George III. assailed his
governments, the premier was habitually deprived of his
due authority. Intrigues were encouraged because it
was always dubious whether the king-hated minister
would be permitted to appeal from the intriguers, and
always a chance that the conspiring monarch might
appoint one of the conspirators to be premier in his
I room. The caprice of Parliament is better checked when
I the faculty of dissolution is intrusted to its appointee,
than when it is set apart in an outlying and an alien
authority.
But, on the contrary, the party zeal and the self-
seeking of Parliament are best checked by an authority
which has no connection with Parliament or dependence
upon it supposing that such authority is morally and
intellectually equal to the performance of the intrusted
function. The Prime Minister obviously being the nomi-
nee of a party majority is likely to share its feeling, and
is sure to be obliged to say that he shares it. The actual
contact with affairs is indeed likely to purify him from
many prejudices, to tame him of many fanaticisms, to
beat out of him many errors. The present Conservative
Government contains more than one member who re-
gards his party as intellectually benighted \ who either
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 233
never speaks their peculiar dialect, or who speaks it con-
descendingly, and with an " aside ; " who respects their
accumulated prejudices as the "potential energies" on
which he subsists, but who despises them while he lives
by them. Years ago Mr. Disraeli called Sir Robert Peel's
Ministry the last Conservative Ministry that had real
power "an organised hypocrisy," so much did the
ideas of its "head" differ from the sensations of its
"tail." Probably he now comprehends if he did not
always that the air of Downing Street brings certain
ideas to those who live there, and that the hard, compact
prejudices of opposition are soon melted and mitigated in
the great gulf stream of affairs. Lord Palmerston, too,
was a typical example of a leader lulling, rather than
arousing, assuaging rather than acerbating the minds of
his followers. But though the composing effect of close
difficulties will commonly make a premier cease to be an
immoderate partisan, yet a partisan to some extent he
must be, and a violent one he may be ; and in that case
he is not a good person to check the party. When the
leading sect (so to speak) in Parliament is doing what
the nation do not like, an instant appeal ought to be
registered and Parliament ought to be dissolved. But a
zealot of a premier will not appeal ; he will follow his
formulae ; he will believe he is doing good service when,
perhaps, he is but pushing to unpopular consequences the
narrow maxims of an inchoate theory. At such a minute
a constitutional king such as Leopold the First was, and
as Prince Albert might have been is invaluable ; he can.
and will prevent Parliament from hurting the nation.
234* THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Again, too, on the selfishness of Parliament an ex-
trinsic check is clearly more efficient than an intrinsic.
A premier who is made by Parliament may share the
bad impulses of those who chose him ; or, at any rate, he
may have made " capital " out of them he may have
seemed to share them. The self-interests, the jobbing
propensities of the assembly are sure indeed to be of very
secondary interest to him. What he will care most for
is the permanence, is the interest whether corrupt or
uncorrupt of his own ministry. He will be disinclined
to anything coarsely unpopular. In the order of nature,
a new assembly must come before long, and he will be
indisposed to shock the feelings of the electors from
whom that assembly must emanate. But though the
interest of the minister is inconsistent with appalling
jobbery, he will be inclined to mitigated jobbery. He
will temporise; he will try to give a seemly dress to
unseemly matters : to do as much harm as will content
the assembly, and yet not so much harm as will offend
the nation. He will not shrink from becoming a parti-
ceps criminis ; he will but endeavour to dilute the crime.
The intervention of an extrinsic, impartial, and capable
authority if such can be found will undoubtedly re-
strain the covetousness as well as the factiousness of
a choosing assembly.
But can such a head be found ? In one case I think
it has been found. Our colonial governors are precisely
Dei ex machind. They are always intelligent, for they
have to live by a different trade ; they are nearly sure to
be impartial, for they come from the ends of the earth ;
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 235
they are sure not to participate in the selfish desires of
any colonial class or body, for long before those desires
can have attained fruition they will have passed to the
other side of the world, be busy with other faces and
other minds, be almost out of hearing what happens in a
region they have half forgotten. A colonial governor is
a super-parliamentary authority, animated by a wisdom
which is probably in quantity considerable, and is differ-
ent from that of the local Parliament, even if not above
it. But even in this case the advantage of this extrinsic
authority is purchased at a heavy price a price which
must not be made light of, because it is often worth
paying. A colonial governor is a ruler who has no per-
manent interest in the colony he governs ; who perhaps
had to look for it in the map when he was sent thither ;
who takes years before he really understands its parties
and its controversies ; who, though without prejudice
himself, is apt to be a slave to the prejudices of local
people near him ; who inevitably, and almost laudably,
governs not in the interest of the colony, which he may
mistake, but in his own interest, which he sees and is
sure of. The first desire of a colonial governor is not to
get into a " scrape," not to do anything which may give
trouble to his superiors the Colonial Office at home,
which may cause an untimely and dubious recall, which
may hurt his after career. He is sure to leave upon the
colony the feeling that they have a ruler who only half
knows them, and does not so much as half care for them.
We hardly appreciate this common feeling in our colo-
nies, because we appoint their sovereign; but we should
236 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
understand it in an instant if, by a political metamor-
phosis, the choice were turned the other way if they
appointed our sovereign. We should then say at once,
" How is it possible a man from New Zealand can under-
stand England ? how is it possible that a man longing to
get back to the antipodes can care for England ? how can
we trust one who lives by the fluctuating favour of a
distant authority ? how can we heartily obey one who
is but a foreigner with the accident of an identical
language ? "
I dwell on the evils which impair the advantage of
colonial governorship because that is the most favoured
case of super-parliamentary royalty, and because from
looking at it we can bring freshly home to our minds
what the real difficulties of that institution are. We are
so familiar with it that we do not understand it. We are
like people who have known a man all their lives, and
yet are quite surprised when he displays some obvious
characteristic which casual observers have detected at a
glance. I have known a man who did not know what
colour his sister's eyes were, though he had seen her every
day for twenty years ; or rather, he did not know because
he had so seen her : so true is the philosophical maxim
that we neglect the constant element in our thoughts,
though it is probably the most important, and attended
almost only to the varying elements the differentiating
elements (as men now speak) though they are apt to be
less potent. But when we perceive by the roundabout
example of a colonial governor how difficult the task of a
constitutional king is in the exercise of the function of
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 2G7
dissolving parliament, we at once see how unlikely it is
that an hereditary monarch will be possessed of the
requisite faculties.
An hereditary king is but an ordinary person, upon an
average, at best ; he is nearly sure to be badly educated
for business ; he is very little likely to have a taste for
business ; he is solicited from youth by every temptation
to pleasure ; he probably passed the whole of his youth in
the vicious situation of the heir-apparent, who can do
nothing because he has no appointed work, and who will
be considered almost to outstep his function if he under-
take optional work. For the most part, a constitutional
king is a damaged common man ; not forced to business
by necessity as a despot often is, but yet spoiled for busi-
ness by most of the temptations which spoil a despot.
History, too, seems to show that hereditary royal families
gather from the repeated influence of their corrupting
situation some dark taint in the blood, some transmitted
and growing poison which hurts their judgments, darkens
all their sorrow, and is a cloud on half their pleasure. It
has been said, not truly, but with a possible approxima-
tion to truth, "That in 1802 every hereditary monarch
was insane." Is it likely that this sort of monarchs will
be able to catch the exact moment when, in opposition to
the wishes of a triumphant ministry, they ought to dis-
solve Parliament? To do so with efliciency they must be
able to perceive that the Parliament is wrong, and that
the nation knows it is wrong. Now to know that Parlia-
ment is wrong, a man must be, if not a great statesman,
yet a consideiable statesman a statesman of some sort.
238 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
He must have great natural vigour, for no less will com-
prehend the hard principles of national policy. He must
have incessant industry, for no less will keep him abreast
with the involved detail to which those principles relate,
and the miscellaneous occasions to which they must be
applied. A man made common by nature, and made
worse by life, is not likely to have either ; he is nearly
sure not to be both clever and industrious. And a
monarch in the recesses of a palace, listening to a charmed
flattery unbiased by the miscellaneous world, who has
always been hedged in by rank, is likely to be but a poor
judge of public opinion. He may have an inborn tact for
finding it out ; but his life will never teach it him, and
will probably enfeeble it in him.
But there is a still worse case, a case which the life of
George III. which is a sort of museum of the defects
of a constitutional king suggests at once. The Parlia-
ment may be wiser than the people, and yet the king
may be of the same mind with the people. During the
last years of the American war, the Premier, Lord North,
upon whom the first responsibility rested, was averse to
continuing it, and knew it could not succeed. Parlia-
ment was much of the same mind; if Lord North had
been able to come down to Parliament with a peace in his
hand, Parliament would probably have rejoiced, and the
nation under the guidance of Parliament, though sad-
dened by its losses, probably would have been satisfied.
The opinion of that day was more like the American
opinion of the present day than like our present opinion.
It was much slower in its formation than our opinion
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 239
now, and obeyed much more easily sudden impulses from
the central administration. If Lord North had been
able to throw the undivided energy and the undistracted
authority of the Executive Government into the excellent
work of making a peace and carrying a peace, years of
bloodshed might have been spared, and an entail of
enmity cut off that has not yet run out. But there was a
power behind the Prime Minister; George III. was madly
eager to continue the war, and the nation not seeing how
hopeless the strife was, not comprehending the lasting
antipathy which their obstinacy was creating ignorant,
dull, and helpless was ready to go on too. Even if Lord
North had wished to make peace, and had persuaded Par-
liament accordingly, all his work would have been useless;
a superior power could and would have appealed from a
wise and pacific Parliament to a sullen and warlike nation.
The check which our constitution finds for the special
vices of our Parliament was misused to curb its wisdom.
The more we study the nature of Cabinet Government,
the more we shall shrink from exposing at a vital instant
its delicate machinery to a blow from a casual, incompe-
tent, and perhaps semi-insane outsider. The preponder-
ant probability is that on a great occasion the Premier
and Parliament will really be wiser than the king. The
Premier is sure to be able, and is sure to be most anxious
to decide well ; if he fail to decide, he loses his place,
though through all blunders the king keeps his ; the judg-
ment of the man, naturally very discerning, is sharpened
by a heavy penalty, from which the judgment of the man,
by nature much less intelligent, is exempt. Parliament,
240 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
too, is for the most part a sound, careful, and practical
body of men. Principle shows that the power of dis-
missing a Government with which Parliament is satisfied,
and of dissolving that Parliament upon an appeal to the
people, is not a power which a common hereditary monarch
will in the long run be able beneficially to exercise.
Accordingly this power has almost, if not quite, dropped
out of the reality of our constitution. Nothing, perhaps,
would more surprise the English people than if the Queen
by a coup d'etat and on a sudden destroyed a ministry
firm in the allegiance and secure of a majority in Parlia-
ment. That power, indisputably, in theory, belongs to
her; but it has passed so far away from the minds of
men that it would terrify them, if she used it, like a
volcanic eruption from Primrose Hill. The last analogy
to it is not one to be coveted as a precedent. In 1835
William IV. dismissed an administration which, though
disorganised by the loss of its leader in the Commons, was
an existing Government, had a premier in the Lords
ready to go on, and a leader in the Commons willing to
begin. The King fancied that public opinion was leaving
the Whigs and going over to the Tories, and he thought
he should accelerate the transition by ejecting the former.
But the event showed that he misjudged. His perception
indeed was right ; the English people were wavering in
their allegiance to the Whigs, who had no leader that
touched the popular heart, none in whom Liberalism
could personify itself and become a passion who besides
were a body long used to opposition, and therefore making
blunders in office who were borne to power by a popular
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 241
impulse which they only half comprehended, and perhaps
less than half shared. But the King's policy was wrong ;
he impeded the reaction instead of aiding it. He forced
on a premature Tory Government, which was as unsuc-
cessful as all wise people perceived that it must be. The
popular distaste to the Whigs was as yet but incipient,
inefficient; and the intervention of the Crown was advan-
tageous to them, because it looked inconsistent with the
liberties of the people. And in so far as William IV. was
right in detecting an incipient change of opinion, he did
but detect an erroneous change. What was desirable was
the prolongation of Liberal rule. The commencing dis-
satisfaction did but relate to the personal demerits of the
Whig leaders, and other temporary adjuncts of free prin-
ciples, and not to those principles intrinsically. So that
the last precedent for a royal onslaught on a ministry
ended thus : in opposing the right principles, in aiding
the wrong principles, in hurting the party it was meant
to help. After such a warning, it is likely that our
monarchs will pursue the policy which a long course of
quiet precedent at present directs they will leave a
Ministry trusted by Parliament to the judgment of Par-
liament.
Indeed, the dangers arising from a party spirit in Par-
liament exceeding that of the nation, and of a selfishness
in Parliament contradicting the true interest of the nation,
are not great dangers in a country where the mind of
the nation is steadily political, and where its control over
its representatives is constant. A steady opposition to a
formed public opinion is hardly possible in our House
B
242 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
of Commons, so incessant is the national attention to
politics, and so keen the fear in the mind of each mem-
ber that he may lose his valued seat. These dangers be-
long to early and scattered communities, where there are
no interesting political questions, where the distances are
great, where no vigilant opinion passes judgment on par-
liamentary excesses, where few care to have seats in the
chamber, and where many of thpse few are from their
characters and their antecedents better not there than
there. The one great vice of parliamentary government
in an adult political nation, is the caprice of Parliament
in the choice of a ministry. A nation can hardly control
it here ; and it is not good that, except within wide
limits, it should control it. The Parliamentary judgment
of the merits or demerits of an administration very
generally depends on matters which the Parliament, being
close at hand, distinctly sees, and which the distant nation
does not see. But where personality eriters, capricious-
ness begins. It is easy to imagine a House of Commons
which is discontented with all statesmen, which is con-
tented with none, which is made up of little parties,
which votes in small knots, which will adhere steadily to
no leader, which gives every leader a chance and a hope.
Such Parliaments require the imminent check of possible
dissolution ; but that check is (as has been shown) better
in the premier than in the sovereign; and by the late
practice of our constitution, its use is yearly ebbing from
the sovereign, and yearly centering in the premier. The
Queen can hardly now refuse a defeated minister the
chance of a dissolution, any more than she can dissolve
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 21-3
in the time of an undefeated one, and without his con-
sent.
We shall find the case much the same with the safety-
valve, as I have called it, of our constitution. A good,
capable, hereditary monarch would exercise it better than
a premier, but a premier could manage it well enough ;
and a monarch capable of doing better will be born only
once in a century, whereas monarchs likely to do worse
will be born every day.
There are two modes in which the power of our exe-
cutive to create Peers to nominate, that is, additional
members of our upper and revising chamber now acts :
one constant, habitual, though not adequately noticed by
the popular mind as it goes on ; and the other possible
and terrific, scarcely ever really exercised, but always by
its reserved magic maintaining a great and a restraining
influence. The Crown creates Peers, a few year by year,
and thus modifies continually the characteristic feeling of
the House of Lords. I have heard people say, who ought
to know, that the English peerage (the only one upon
which unhappily the power of new creation now acts) is
now more Whig than Tory. Thirty years ago the majo-
rity was indisputably the other way. Owing to very
curious circumstances English parties have not alternated
in power, as a good deal of speculation predicts they would,
and a good deal of current language assumes they have.
The Whig party were in office some seventy years (with
very small breaks) from the Death of Queen Anne to the
coalition between Lord North and Mr. Fox; then the
Tories (with only such breaks), were in power for nearly
244 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
fifty years, till 1832 ; and since, the Whig party has
always, with very trifling intervals, been predominant.
Consequently, each continuously-governing party has had
the means of modifying the Upper House to suit its views.
The profuse Tory creations of half a century had made the
House of Lords bigotedly Tory before the first Reform
Act, but it is wonderfully mitigated now. The Irish
Peers and the Scotch Peers being nominated by an
almost unaltered constituency, and representing the feel-
ings of the majority of that constituency only (no minority
having any voice) present an unchangeable Tory element.
But the element in which change is permitted has been
changed. Whether the English Peerage be or be not
predominantly now Tory, it is certainly not Tory after
the fashion of the Toryism of 1832. The Whig additions
have indeed sprung from a class commonly rather adjoin-
ing upon Toryism, than much inclining to Radicalism.
It is not from men of large wealth that a very great
impetus to organic change should be expected. The
additions to the Peers have matched nicely enough with
the old Peers, and therefore they have effected more easily
a greater and more permeating modification. The ad-
dition of a contrasting mass would have excited the old
leaven, but the delicate infusion of ingredients similar
in genus, though different in species, has modified the
new compound without irritating the old original.
This ordinary and common use of the peer-creating
power is always in the hands of the premier, and depends
for its characteristic use on being there. He, as the head
of the predominant party, is the proper person to modify
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 245
gradually the permanent chamber which, perhaps, was
at starting hostile to him ; and, at any rate, can be best
harmonised with the public opinion he represents by the
additions he makes. Hardly any contrived constitution
possesses a machinery for modifying its secondary house
so delicate, so flexible, and so constant. If the power of
creating life peers had been added, the mitigating in-
fluence of the responsible executive upon the House of
Lords would have been as good as such a thing can be.
The catastrophic creation of Peers for the purpose of
swamping the Upper House is utterly different. If an able
and impartial exterior king is at hand, this power is best
in that king. It is a power only to be used on great
occasions, when the object is immense, and the party
strife unmitigated. This is the conclusive, the swaying
power of the moment, and of course, therefore, it had
better be in the hands of a power both capable and
impartial, than of a premier who must in some degree be
a partizan. The value of a discreet, calm, wise monarch,
if such should happen to be reigning at the acute crisis of
a nation's destiny, is priceless. He may prevent years of
tumult, save bloodshed and civil war, lay up a store of
grateful fame to himself, prevent the accumulated intes-
tine hatred of each party to its opposite. But the question
comes back, Will there be such a monarch just then ?
What is the chance of having him just then ? What will
be the use of the monarch whom the accidents of inheri-
tance, such as we know them to be, must upon an average
bring us just then ?
The answer to these questions is not satisfactory, if
216 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
we take it from the little experience we have had in this
rare matter. There have been but two cases at all ap-
proaching to a catastrophic creation of Peers to a creation
which would suddenly change the majority of the Lords
in English history. One was in Queen Anne's time.
The majority of Peers in Queen Anne's time were Whig,
and by profuse and quick creations Harley's Ministry
changed it to a Tory majority. So great was the popular
effect, that in the next reign one of the most contested
ministerial proposals was a proposal to take the power
of indefinite peer creation from the Crown, and to make
the number of Lords fixed, as that of the Commons is
fixed. But the sovereign had little to do with the matter.
Queen Anne was one of the smallest people ever set in a
great place. Swift bitterly and justly said " she had not
a store of amity by her for more than one friend at a
time," and just then her affection was concentrated on
a waiting-maid. Her waiting-maid told her to make
peers, and she made them. But of large thought and
comprehensive statesmanship she was as destitute as Mrs.
Masham. She supported a bad ministry by the most
extreme of measures, and she did it on caprice. The case
of William IV. is still more instructive. He was a very
conscientious king, but at the same time an exceedingly
weak king. His correspondence with Lord Grey on this
subject fills more than half a large volume, or rather his
secretary's correspondence, for he kept a very clever man
to write what he thought, or at least what those about
him thought. It is a strange instance of high-placed
weakness and conscientious vacillation. After endless
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 247
letters the king consents to make a reasonable number of
peers if required to pass the second reading of the Reform
Bill, but owing to desertion of the " Waverers " from the
Tories, the second reading is carried without it by
nine, and then the king refuses to make peers, or at
least enough peers when a vital amendment is carried by
Lord Lyndhurst, which would have destroyed, and was
meant to destroy the Bill. In consequence, there was a
tremendous crisis and nearly a Revolution. A more
striking example of well-meaning imbecility is scarcely
to be found in history. No one who reads it carefully
will doubt that the discretionary power of making peers
would have been far better in Lord Grey's hands than in
the king's. It was the uncertainty whether the king
would exercise it, and how far he would exercise it, that
mainly animated the opposition. In fact, you may place
power in weak hands at a revolution, but you cannot keep
it in weak hands. It runs out of them into strong ones.
An ordinary hereditary sovereign a William IV., or a
George IV. is unfit to exercise the peer-creating power
when most wanted. A half-insane king, like George III.,
would be worse. He might use it by unaccountable im-
pulse when not required, and refuse to use it out of
sullen madness when required.
The existence of a fancied check on the premier is in
truth an evil, because it prevents the enforcement of a
real check. It would be easy to provide by law 'that
an extraordinary number of Peers say more than ten
annually should not be created except on a vote of some
large majority, suppose three-fourths of the Lower House.
248 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
This would ensure that the premier should not use the
reserve force of the constitution as if it were an ordinary
force ; that he should not use it except when the whole
nation fixedly wished it; that it should be kept for a
revolution, not expended on administration; and it would
ensure that he should then have it to use. Queen Anne's
case and William IV.'s case prove that neither object is
certainly attained by entrusting this critical and extreme
force to the chance idiosyncrasies and habitual mediocrity
of an hereditary sovereign.
It may be asked why I argue at such length a
question in appearance so removed from practice, and in
one point of view so irrelevant to my subject. No one
proposes to remove Queen Victoria ; if any one is in a
safe place on earth, she is in a safe place. In these very
essays it has been shown that the mass of our people
would obey no one else, that the reverence she excites is
the potential energy as science now speaks out of which
all minor forces are made, and from which lesser functions
take their efficiency. But looking not to the present
hour, and this single country, but to the world at large
and coming times, no question can be more practical.
What grows upon the world is a certain matter-of-
factness. The test of each century, more than of the
century before, is the test of results. New countries are
arising all over the world where there are no fixed sources
of reverence ; which have to make them ; which have to
create institutions which must generate loyalty by con-
spicuous utility. This matter- of-factness is the growth
even in Europe of the two greatest and newest intellec-
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 249
tual agencies of our time. One of these is business. We
see so much of the material fruits of commerce, that we
forget its mental fruits. It begets a mind desirous of
things, careless of ideas, not acquainted with the niceties
of words. In all labour there should be profit, is its
motto. It is not only true that we have "left swords
for ledgers," but war itself is made as much by the ledger
as by the sword. The soldier that is, the great soldier
of to-day is not a romantic animal, dashing at forlorn
hopes, animated by frantic sentiment, full of fancies as
to a lady-love or a sovereign ; but a quiet, grave man,
busied in charts, exact in sums, master of the art of
tactics, occupied in trivial detail ; thinking, as the Duke
of Wellington was said to do, most of the shoes of his
soldiers ; despising all manner of eclat and eloquence ;
perhaps, like Count Moltke, " silent in seven languages."
We have reached a " climate " of opinion where figures
rule, where our very supporter of Divine right, as we
deemed him, our Count Bismarck, amputates kings right
and left, applies the test of results to each, and lets none
live who are not to do something. There has in truth
been a great change during the last five hundred years in
the predominant occupations of the ruling part of man-
kind ; formerly they passed their time either in exciting
action or inanimate repose. A feudal baron had nothing
between war and the chase keenly animating things
both and what was called "inglorious ease." Modern
life is scanty in excitements, but incessant in quiet action.
Its perpetual commerce is creating a "stock-taking"
habit the habit of asking each man, thing, and insti-
250 THK ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
tution, "Well, what have you done since I saw you
last?"
Our physical science, which is becoming the dominant
culture of thousands, and which is beginning to permeate
our common literature to an extent which few watch
enough, quite tends the same way. The two peculiarities
are its homeliness and its inquisitiveness ; its value for
the most " stupid " facts, as one used to call them, and its
incessant wish for verification to be sure, by tiresome
seeing and hearing, that they are facts. The old excite-
ment of thought has half died out, or rather it is diffused
in quiet pleasure over a life instead of being concen-
trated in intense and eager spasms. An old philosopher
a Descartes, suppose fancied that out of primitive truths,
which he could by ardent excogitation know, he might
by pure deduction evolve the entire universe. Intense
self-examination, and intense reason would, he thought,
make out everything. The soul " itself by itself," could
tell all it wanted if it would be true to its sublimer
isolation. The greatest enjoyment possible to man was
that which this philosophy promises its votaries the
pleasure of being always right, and always reasoning
without ever being bound to look at anything. But our
most ambitious schemes of philosophy now start quite
differently. Mr. Darwin begins :
" When on board H.M.S. Beagle, as naturalist, I was
much struck with certain facts in the distribution of the
organic beings inhabiting South America, and in the
geological relations of the present to the past inhabitants
of that continent. These facts, as will be seen in the
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 251
latter chapters of this volume, seemed to throw some
light on the origin of species that mystery of mysteries,
as it has been called by one of our greatest philosophers.
On my return home, it occurred to me, in 1837, that
something might perhaps be made out on this question
by patiently accumulating and reflecting on all sorts of
facts which could possibly have any bearing on it. After
five years' work I allowed myself to speculate on the
subject, and drew up some short notes ; these I enlarged
in 1844 into a sketch of the conclusions which then
seemed to me probable : from that period to the present
day I have steadily pursued the same object. I hope that
I may be excused for entering on these personal details,
as I give them to show that I have not been hasty in
coming to a decision."
If he hopes finally to solve his great problem, it is by
careful experiments in pigeon fancying, and other sorts of
artificial variety making. His hero is not a self-inclosed,
excited philosopher, but "that most skilful breeder, Sir
John Sebright, who used to say, with respect to pigeons,
that he would produce any given feathers in three years,
but it would take him six years to obtain a head and a
beak." I am not saying that the new thought is better
than the old ; it is no business of mine to say anything
about that ; I only wish to bring home to the mind, as
nothing but instances can bring it home, how matter-of-
fact, how petty, as it would at first sight look, even our
most ambitious science has become.
In the new communities which our emigrating habit
now constantly creates, this prosaic turn of mind is inten-
252 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
sified. In the American mind and in the colonial mind
there is, as contrasted with the old English mind, a
literalness, a tendency to say, " The facts are so-and-so,
whatever may be thought or fancied about them." We
used before the civil war to say that the Americans wor-
shipped the almighty dollar ; we now know that they can
scatter money almost recklessly when they will But
what we meant was half right they worship visible
value: obvious, undeniable, intrusive result. And in
Australia and New Zealand the same turn comes upper-
most It grows from the struggle with the wilderness.
Physical difficulty is the enemy of early communities,
and an incessant conflict with it for generations leaves a
mark of reality on the mind a painful mark almost to
us, used to impalpable fears and the half-fanciful dangers
of an old and complicated society. The " new Englands "
of all latitudes are bare-minded (if I may so say) as com-
pared with the " old."
When, therefore, the new communities of the colonised
world have to choose a government, they must choose one
in which all the institutions are of an obvious evident
utility. We catch the Americans smiling at our Queen
with her secret mystery, and our Prince of Wales with his
happy inaction. It is impossible, in fact, to convince
their prosaic minds that constitutional royalty is a ra-
tional government, that it is suited to a new age and an
unbroken country that those who start afresh can start
with it. The princelings who run about the world with
excellent intentions, but an entire ignorance of business,
are to them a locomotive advertisement that this sort of
CHECKS AND BALANCES. 253
government is European in its limitations and mediaeval
in its origin ; that though it has yet a great part to play
in the old states, it has no place or part in new states.
The realisme impitoydble which good critics find in a
most characteristic part of the literature of the nineteenth
century, is to be found also in its politics. An ostenta-
tious utility must characterise its creations.
The deepest interest, therefore, attaches to the problem
of this essay. If hereditary royalty had been essential to
parliamentary government, we might well have despaired
of that government. But accurate investigation shows
that this royalty is not essential ; that, upon an average,
it is not even in a high degree useful; that though a
king with high courage and fine discretion, a king with
a genius for the place, is always useful, and at rare mo-
ments priceless, yet that a common king, a king such as
birth brings, is of no use at difficult crises, while in the
common course of things his aid is neither likely nor
required he will do nothing, and he need do nothing.
But we happily find that a new country need not fall
back into the fatal division of powers incidental to a pre-
sidential government ; it may, if other conditions serve,
obtain the ready, well-placed, identical sort of sovereignty
which belongs to the English Constitution, under the
unroyal form of Parliamentary Government.
254.
No. VIIL
THE PRE-REQUISITES OF CABINET GOVERNMENT, AND THE
PECULIAR FORM WHICH THEY HAVE ASSUMED IN
ENGLAND.
CABINET GOVERNMENT is rare because its pre-requi sites
are many. It requires the co-existence of several national
characteristics which are not often found together in the
world, and which should be perceived more distinctly
than they often are. It is fancied that the possession of
a certain intelligence, and a few simple virtues, are the
sole requisites. The mental and moral qualities are
necessary, but much else is necessary also. A cabinet
government is the government of a committee elected by
the legislature, and there are therefore a double set of
conditions to it: first, those which are essential to all
elective governments as such ; and second, those which
are requisite to this particular elective government.
There are pre-requisites for the genus, and additional
ones for the species.
The first pre-requisite of elective government is the
mutual confidence of the electors. We are so accustomed
to submit to be ruled by elected ministers, that we are
apt to fancy all mankind would readily be so too. Know-
CABINET GOVERNMENT. 2oo
ledge and civilisation have at least made this progress,
that we instinctively, without argument, almost without
consciousness, allow a certain number of specified persons
to choose our rulers for us. It seems to us the simplest
thing in the world. But it is one of the gravest things.
The peculiar marks of semi-barbarous people are
diffused distrust and indiscriminate suspicion. People,
in all but the most favoured times and places, are rooted
to the places where they were born, think the thoughts
of those places, can endure no other thoughts. The next
parish even is suspected. Its inhabitants have different
usages, almost imperceptibly different, but yet different ;
they speak a varying accent; they use a few peculiar
words ; tradition says that their faith is dubious. And if
the next parish is a little suspected, the next county is
much more suspected. Here is a definite beginning of
new maxims, new thoughts, new ways : the immemorial
boundary mark begins in feeling a strange world. And
if the next county is dubious, a remote county is untrust-
worthy. "Vagrants come from thence," men know, and
they know nothing else. The inhabitants of the north
speak a dialect different from the dialect of the south :
they have other laws, another aristocracy, another life.
In ages when distant territories are blanks in the mind,
when neighbourhood is a sentiment, when locality is a
passion, concerted co-operation between remote regions is
impossible even on trivial matters. Neither would rely
enough upon the good faith, good sense, and good judg-
ment of the other. Neither could enough calculate on
the other.
256 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
And if such co-operation is not to be expected in
trivial matters, it is not to be thought of in the most
vital matter of government the choice of the executive
ruler. To fancy that Northumberland in the thirteenth
century would have consented to ally itself with Somer-
setshire for the choice of a chief magistrate is absurd ; it
would scarcely have allied itself to choose a hangman.
Even now, if it were palpably explained, neither district
would like it. But no one says at a county election,
" The object of this present meeting is to choose our dele-
gate to what the Americans call the ' Electoral College/
to the assembly which names our first magistrate our
substitute for their president. Representatives from this
county will meet representatives from other counties,
from cities and boroughs, and proceed to choose our
rulers." Such bald exposition would have been impos-
sible in old times ; it would be considered queer, eccen-
tric, if it were used now. Happily, the process of election
is so indirect and hidden, and the introduction of that
process was so gradual and latent, that we scarcely per-
ceive the immense political trust we repose in each other.
The best mercantile credit seems to those who give it,
natural, simple, obvious; they do not argue about it,
or think about it. The best political credit is analogous ;
we trust our countrymen without remembering that we
trust them.
A second and very rare condition of an elective
government is a calm national mind a tone of mind
sufficiently staple to bear the necessary excitement of
conspicuous revolutions. No barbarous, no semi-civilised
CABINET GOVERNMENT. 257
nation has ever possessed this. The mass of uneducated
men could not now in England be told "go to, choose
your rulers ; " they would go wild ; their imaginations
would fancy unreal dangers, and the attempt at election
would issue in some forcible usurpation. The incal-
culable advantage of august institutions in a free state
is, that they prevent this collapse. The excitement of
choosing our rulers is prevented by the apparent ex-
istence of an unchosen ruler. The poorer and more
ignorant classes those who would most feel excitement,
who would most be misled by excitement really believe
that the Queen governs. You could not explain to
them the recondite difference between "reigning" and
" governing ; " the words necessary to express it do not
exist in their dialect ; the ideas necessary to comprehend
it do not exist in their minds. The separation of principal
power from principal station is a refinement which they
could not even conceive. They fancy they are governed
by an hereditary queen, a queen by the grace of God,
when they are really governed by a cabinet and a parlia-
ment men like themselves, chosen by themselves. The
conspicuous dignity awakens the sentiment of reverence,
and men, often very undignified, seize the occasion to
govern by means of it.
Lastly. The third condition of all elective govern-
ment is what I may call rationality, by which I mean a
power involving intelligence, but yet distinct from it.
A whole people electing its rulers must be able to form
a distinct conception of distant objects. Mostly, the
"divinity" that surrounds a king altogether prevents
8
258 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
anything like a steady conception of him. You fancy
that the object of your loyalty is as much elevated above
you by intrinsic nature as he is by extrinsic position;
you deify him in sentiment, as once men deified him in
doctrine. This illusion has been and still is of incalcu-
lable benefit to the human race. It prevents, indeed,
men from choosing their rulers ; you cannot invest with
that loyal illusion a man who was yesterday what you
are, who to-morrow may be so again, whom you chose to
be what he is. But though this superstition prevents
the election of rulers, it renders possible the existence of
unelected rulers. Untaught people fancy that their king,,
crowned with the holy crown, anointed with the oil of
Eheims, descended of the House of Plantagenet, is a
different sort of being from any one not descended of the
Royal House not crowned not anointed. They believe
that there is one man whom by mystic right they should
obey; and therefore they do obey him. It is only in
later times, when the world is wider, its experience
larger, and its thought colder, that the plain rule of a
palpably chosen ruler is even possible.
These conditions narrowly restrict elective govern-
ment. But the pre-requisites of a cabinet government
are rarer still ; it demands not only the conditions I have
mentioned, but the possibility likewise of a good legis-
lature a legislature competent to elect a sufficient
administration.
Now a competent legislature is very rare. Any per-
manent legislature at all, any constantly acting mechanism
for enacting and repealing laws, is, though it seems to us
CABINET GOVERNMENT. 259
so natural, quite contrary to the inveterate conceptions
of mankind. The great majority of nations conceive of
their law, either as something Divinely given, and there-
fore unalterable, or as a fundamental habit, inherited
from the past to be transmitted to the future. The Eng-
lish Parliament, of which the prominent functions are
now legislative, was not all so once. It was rather a pre-
servative body. The custom of the realm the aboriginal
transmitted law the law which was in the breast of the
judges, could not be altered without the consent of par-
liament, and therefore everybody felt sure it would not
be altered except in grave, peculiar, and anomalous cases.
The valued use of parliament was not half so much to
alter the law, as to prevent the laws being altered. And
such too was its real use. In early societies it matters
much more that the law should be fixed than that i
should be good. Any law which the people of ignorant
times enact is sure to involve many misconceptions, and
to cause many evils. Perfection in legislation is not to
be looked for, and is not, indeed, much wanted in a rude,
painful, confined life. But such an age covets fixity.
That men should enjoy the fruits of their labour, that
the law of property should be known, that the law of
marriage should be known, that the whole course of life
should be kept in a calculable track is the summum
bonum of early ages, the first desire of semi-civilised
mankind. In that age men do not want to have their
laws adapted, but to have their laws steady. The pas-
sions are so powerful, force so eager, the social bond so
weak, that the august spectacle of an all but unalterable
260 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
law is necessary to preserve society. In the early stages
of human society all change is thought an evil. And
most change is an evil. The conditions of life are so
simple and so unvarying that any decent sort of rules
suffice, so long as men know what they are. Custom is
the first check on tyranny; that fixed routine of social
life at which modern innovations chafe, and by which
modern improvement is impeded, is the primitive check
on base power. The perception of political expediency
has then hardly begun; the sense of abstract justice is
weak and vague; and a rigid adherence to the fixed
mould of transmitted usage is essential to an unmarred,
unspoiled, unbroken life.
In such an age a legislature continuously sitting,
always making laws, always repealing laws, would have
been both an anomaly and a nuisance. But in the
present state of the civilised part of the world such
difficulties are obsolete. There is a diffused desire in
civilised communities for an adjusting legislation; for
a legislation which should adapt the inherited laws to
the new wants of a world which now changes every
day. It has ceased to be necessary to maintain bad
laws because it is necessary to have some laws. Civili-
sation is robust enough to bear the incision of legal im-
provements. But taking history at large, the rarity of
cabinets is mostly due to the greater rarity of continuous
legislatures.
Other conditions, however, limit even at the present
day the area of a cabinet government. It must be
possible to have not only a legislature, but to have a
CABINET GOVERNMENT 261
competent legislature a legislature willing to elect and
willing to maintain an efficient executive. And this is
no easy matter. It is indeed true that we need not
trouble ourselves to look for that elaborate and compli-
cated organisation which partially exists in the House of
Commons, and which is more fully and freely expanded
in plans for improving the House of Commons. We are
not now concerned with perfection or excellence ; we seek
only for simple fitness and bare competency.
The conditions of fitness are two. First, you must get
a good legislature; and next, you must keep it good.
And these are by no means so nearly connected as might
be thought at first sight. To keep a legislature efficient,
it must have a sufficient supply of substantial business.
If you employ the best set of men to do nearly nothing,
they will quarrel with each other about that nothing.
Where great questions end, little parties begin. And a
very happy community, with few new laws to make, few
old bad laws to repeal, and but simple foreign relations
to adjust, has great difficulty in employing a legislature.
There is nothing for it to enact, and nothing for it to
settle. Accordingly, there is great danger that the legis-
lature, being debarred from all other kind of business,
may take to quarrelling about its elective business ; that
controversies as to ministries may occupy all its time, and
yet that time be perniciously employed ; that a constant
succession of feeble administrations, unable to govern and
unfit to govern, may be substituted for the proper result
of cabinet government, a sufficient body of men long
enough in power to evince their sufficiency. The exact
262 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
amount of non-elective business necessary for a parliament
which is to elect the executive cannot, of course, be for-
mally stated. There are no numbers and no statistics in
the theory of constitutions. All we can say is, that a
parliament with little business, which is to be as efficient
as a parliament with much business, must be in all other
respects much better. An indifferent parliament may be
much improved by the steadying effect of grave atfairs ;
but a parliament which has no such affairs must be in-
trinsically excellent, or it will fail utterly.
But the difficulty of keeping a good legislature, is
evidently secondary to the difficulty of first getting it.
There are two kinds of nations which can elect a good
parliament. The first is a nation in which the mass of
the people are intelligent, and in which they are comfort-
able. Where there is no honest poverty, where education
is diffused, and political intelligence is common, it is easy
for the mass of the people to elect a fair legislature. The
idea is roughly realised in the North American colonies
of England, and in the whole free States of the Union.
In these countries there is no such thing as honest
poverty ; physical comfort, such as the poor cannot
imagine here, is there easily attainable by healthy in-
dustry. Education is diffused much, and is fast spreading.
Ignorant emigrants from the Old World often prize the
intellectual advantages of which they are themselves
destitute, and are annoyed at their inferiority in a place
where rudimentary culture is so common. The greatest
difficulty of such new communities is commonly geo-
graphical The population is mostly scattered ; and
CABINET GOVERNMENT. 2G3
where population is sparse, discussion is difficult. But in
a country very large, as we reckon in Europe, a people
really intelligent, really educated, really comfortable,
would soon form a good opinion. No one can doubt that
the New England States, if they were a separate com-
munity, would have an education, a political capacity,
and an intelligence such as the numerical majority of no
people, equally numerous, has ever possessed. In a state
of this sort, where all the community is fit to choose a
sufficient legislature, it is possible, it is almost easy, to
create that legislature. If the New England States pos-
sessed a cabinet government as a separate nation, they
would be as renowned in the world for political sagacity
as they now are for diffused happiness.
The structure of these communities is indeed based on
the principle of equality, and it is impossible that any
such community can wholly satisfy the severe require-
ments of a political theorist. In every old community its
primitive and guiding assumption is at war with truth.
By its theory all people are entitled to the same political
power, and they can only be so entitled on the ground
that in politics they are equally wise. But at the outset
of an agricultural colony this postulate is as near the
truth as politics want. There are in such communities
no large properties, no great capitals, no refined classes
every one is comfortable and homely, and no one is at all
more. Equality is not artificially established in a new
colony ; it establishes itself. There is a story that among
the first settlers in Western Australia, some, who were
rich, took out labourers at their own expense, and also
264 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
carriages to ride in. But soon they had to try if they
could live in the carriages. Before the masters' houses
were built, the labourers had gone off they were build-
ing houses and cultivating land for themselves, and the
masters were left to sit in their carriages. Whether this
exact thing happened I do not know, but this sort of
thing has happened a thousand times. There have been
a whole series of attempts to transplant to the colonies a
graduated English society. But they have always failed
at the first step. The rude classes at the bottom felt that
they were equal to or better than the delicate classes at
the top ; they shifted for themselves, and left the "gentle-
folks " to shift for themselves ; the base of the elaborate
pyramid spread abroad, and the apex tumbled in and
perished. In the early ages of an agricultural colony,
whether you have political democracy or not, social de-
mocracy you must have, for nature makes it, and not
you. But in time, wealth grows and inequality begins.
A and his children are industrious, and prosper ; B and
his children are idle, and fail. If manufactures on a
considerable scale are established and most young com-
munities strive even by protection to establish them
the tendency to inequality is intensified. The capitalist
becomes a unit with much, and his labourers a crowd
with little. After generations of education, too, there
arises varieties of culture there will be an upper thou-
sand, or ten thousand, of highly cultivated people in the
midst of a great nation of moderately educated people.
In theory it is desirable that this highest class of wealth
and leisure should have an influence far out of proportion
CABINET GOVERNMENT. 265
to its mere number : a perfect constitution would find for
it a delicate expedient to make its fine thought tell upon
the surrounding cruder thought. But as the world goes,
when the whole of the population is as instructed and as
intelligent as in the case I am supposing, we need not
care much about this. Great communities have scarcely
ever never save for transient moments been ruled by
their highest thought. And if we can get them ruled by
a decent capable thought, we may be well enough con-
tented with our work. We have done more than could
be expected, though not all which could be desired. At
any rate, an isocratic polity a polity where every one
votes, and where every one votes alike is, in a com-
munity of sound education and diffused intelligence, a
conceivable case of cabinet government. It satisfies the
essential condition! ; there is a people able to elect a
parliament able to choose.
But suppose the mass of the people are not able to
elect and this is the case with the numerical majority
of all but the rarest nations how is a cabinet govern-
ment to be then possible ? It is only possible in what I
may venture to call deferential nations. It has been
thought strange, but there are nations in which the
numerous unwiser part wishes to be ruled by the less
numerous wiser part. The numerical majority whether
by custom or by choice, is immaterial is ready, is eager
to delegate its power of choosing its ruler to a certain
select minority. It abdicates in favour of its elite, and
consents to obey whoever that dlite may confide in. It
acknowledges as its secondary electors as the choosers
266 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
of its government an educated minority, at once com-
petent and unresisted ; it has a kind of loyalty to some
superior persons who are fit to choose a good govern-
ment, and whom no other class opposes. A nation in
such a happy state as this has obvious advantages for
constructing a cabinet government. It has the best
people to elect a legislature, and therefore it may fairly
be expected to choose a good legislature a legislature
competent to select a good administration.
England is the type of deferential countries, and the
manner in which it is so, and has become so, is extremely
curious. The middle classes the ordinary majority of
educated men are in the present day the despotic power
in England. " Public opinion," nowadays, " is the opinion
of the bald-headed man at the back of the omnibus." It
is not the opinion of the aristocratical classes as such ; or
of the most educated or refined classes as such; it is
simply the opinion of the ordinary mass of educated,
but still commonplace mankind. If you look at the
mass of the constituencies, you will see that they are
not very interesting people; and perhaps if you look
behind the scenes and see the people who manipulate
and work the constituencies, you will find that these are
yet more uninteresting. The English constitution in its
palpable form is this the mass of the people yield
obedience to a select few ; and when you see this select
few, you perceive that though not of the lowest class, nor
of an unrespectable class, they are yet of a heavy sensible
class the last people in the world to whom, if they were
drawn up in a row, an immense nation would ever give
an exclusive preference.
CABINET GOVERNMENT. 267
In fact, the mass of the English people yield a
deference rather to something else than to their rulers.
They defer to what we may call the theatrical show of
society. A. certain state passes before them; a certain
pomp of great men; a certain spectacle of beautiful
women; a wonderful scene of wealth and enjoyment is
displayed, and they are coerced by it. Their imagina-
tion is bowed down; they feel they are not equal
to the life which is revealed to them. Courts and aris-
tocracies have the great quality which rules the mul-
titude, though philosophers can see nothing in it
visibility. Courtiers can do what others cannot. A
common man may as well try to rival the actors on
the stage in their acting, as the aristocracy in their
acting. The higher world, as it looks from without, is
a stage on which the actors walk their parts much better
than the spectators can. This play is played in every
district. Every rustic feels that his house is not like my
lord's house; his life like my lord's life; his wife like
my lady. The climax of the play is the Queen : nobody
supposes that their house is like the court ; their life like
her life ; her orders like their orders. There is in England
a certain charmed spectacle which imposes on the many,
and guides their fancies as it will As a rustic on coming
to London finds himself in presence of a great show and
vast exhibition of inconceivable mechanical things, so by
the structure of our society, he finds himself face to face
with a great exhibition of political things which he could
not have imagined, which he could not make to which
lie feels in himself scarcely anything analogous.
268 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
Philosophers may deride this superstition, but its
results are inestimable. By the spectacle of this august
society, countless ignorant men and women are induced
to obey the few nominal electors the 101. borough
renters, and the 501. county renters who have nothing
imposing about them, nothing which would attract the
eye or fascinate the fancy. What impresses men is not
mind, but the result of mind. And the greatest of these
results is this wonderful spectacle of society, which is
ever new, and yet ever the same ; in which accidents pass
and essence remains ; in which one generation dies and
another succeeds, as if they were birds in a cage, or
animals in a menagerie ; of which it seems almost more
than a metaphor to treat the parts as limbs of a per-
petual living thing, so silently do they seem to change,
so wonderfully and so perfectly does the conspicuous life
of the new year take the place of the conspicuous life of
last year. The apparent rulers of the English nation are
like the most imposing personages of a splendid pro-
cession : it is by them the mob are influenced ; it is they
whom the spectators cheer. The real rulers are secreted
in second-rate carriages; no one cares for them or asks
about them, but they are obeyed implicitly and uncon-
sciously by reason of the splendour of those who eclipsed
and preceded them.
It is quite true that this imaginative sentiment is
supported by a sensation of political satisfaction. It
cannot be said that the mass of the English people are
well off. There are whole classes who have not a con-
ception of what the higher orders call comfort ; who have
CABINET GOVERNMENT. 2G9
not the pre-requi sites of moral existence; who cannot
lead the life that becomes a man. But the most miserable
of these classes do not impute their misery to politics.
If a political agitator were to lecture to the peasants of
Dorsetshire, and try to excite political dissatisfaction,
it is much more likely that he would be pelted than
that he would succeed. Of parliament these miserable
creatures know scarcely anything; of the cabinet they
never heard. But they would say that, "for all they
have heard, the Queen is very good;" and rebelling
against the structure of society is to their minds rebelling
against the Queen, who rules that society, in whom all
its most impressive part the part that they know
culminates. The mass of the English people are politi-
cally contented as well as politically deferential.
A deferential community, even though its lowest
classes are not intelligent, is far more suited to a cabinet
government than any kind of democratic country,
because it is more suited to political excellence. The
highest classes can rule in it; and the highest classes
must, as such, have more political ability than the lower
classes. A life of labour, an incomplete education, a
monotonous occupation, a career in which the hands are
used much and the judgment is used little, cannot create
as much flexible thought, as much applicable intelligence,
as a life of leisure, a long culture, a varied experience, an
existence by which the judgment is incessantly exercised,
and by which it may be incessantly improved A country
of respectful poor, though far less happy than where there
are no poor to be respectful, is nevertheless far more fitted
270 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
for the best government. You can use the best classes of
the respectful country ; you can only use the worst where
every man thinks he is as good as every other.
It is evident that no difficulty can be greater than
that of founding a deferential nation. Respect is tra-
ditional; it is given not to what is proved to be good,
jbut to what is known to be old. Certain classes in
certain nations retain by common acceptance a marked
political preference, because they have always possessed
it, and because they inherit a sort of pomp which seems
to make them worthy of it. But in a new colony, in a
community where merit may be equal, and where there
cannot be traditional marks of merit and fitness, it is
obvious that a political deference can be yielded to
higher culture only upon proof, first of its existence, and
next of its political value. But it is nearly impossible to
give such a proof so as to satisfy persons of less culture.
In a future and better age of the world it may be
effected ; but in this age the requisite premises scarcely
exist ; if the discussion be effectually open, if the debate
be fairly begun, it is hardly possible to obtain a rational,
an argumentative acquiescence in the rule of the culti-
vated few. As yet the few rule by their hold, not over
the reason of the multitude, but over their imaginations,
and their habits ; over their fancies as to distant things
they do not know at all, over their customs as to near
things which they know very well.
A deferential community in which the bulk of the
people are ignorant, is therefore in a state of what is
called in mechanics unstable equilibrium. If the equili-
CABINET GOVEKNMEJJTT. 271
brium is once disturbed there is no tendency to return to
it, but rather to depart from it. A cone balanced on its
point is in unstable equilibrium, for if you push it ever
so little it will depart farther and farther from its posi-
tion and fall to the earth. So in communities where the
masses are ignorant but respectful, if you once permit
the ignorant class to begin to rule you may bid farewell
to deference for ever. Their demagogues will inculcate,
their newspapers will recount, that the rule of the exist-
ing dynasty (the people) is better than the rule of the
fallen dynasty (the aristocracy). A people very rarely
hears two sides of a subject in which it is much in-
terested; the popular organs take up the side which is
acceptable, and none but the popular organs in fact reach
the people. A people never hears censure of itself. No
one will tell it that the educated minority whom it de-
throned governed better or more wisely than it governs.
A democracy will never, save after an awful catastrophe,
return what has once been conceded to it, for to do so
would be to admit an inferiority in itself, of which,
except by some almost unbearable misfortune, it could
never be convinced.
272
No. IX.
ITS HISTORY, AND THE EFFECTS OF THAT HISTORY.
CONCLUSION.
A VOLUME might seem wanted to say anything worth
saying * on the History of the English Constitution, and
a great and new volume might still be written on it, if a
competent writer took it in hand. The subject has never
been treated by any one combining the lights of the
newest research and the lights of the most matured phi-
losophy. Since the masterly book of Hallam was
written, both political thought and historical knowledge
have gained much, and we might have a treatise apply-
ing our strengthened calculus to our augmented facts. I
do not pretend that I could write such a book, but there
are a few salient particulars which may be fitly brought
together, both because of their past interest and of their
present importance.
* Since the first edition of this book was published several valuable
works have appeared, which, on many points, throw much light on onr
early constitutional history, especially Mr. Stnbbs' " Select Charters and
other Illustrations of English Constitutional History, from the Earliest
Times to the Reign of Edward the First," Mr. Freeman's lecture on
" The Growth of the English Constitution," and the chapter on the
A.nglo-Saxon Constitution in his " History of the Norman Conquest : "
but we have not yet a great and authoritative work on the whole subject
such as I wished for when I wrote the passage in the text, and as it is
most desirable that we should have.
ITS HISTORY. 273
There is a certain common polity, or germ of polity,
which we find in all the rude nations that have attained
civilisation. These nations seem to begin in what I may
call a consultative and tentative absolutism. The king of
early days, in vigorous nations, was not absolute as des-
pots now are; there was then no standing army to repress
rebellion, no organised espionage to spy out discontent,
no skilled bureaucracy to smooth the ruts of obedient life.
The early king was indeed consecrated by a religious
sanction ; he was essentially a man apart, a man above
others, divinely anointed, or even God-begotten. But in
nations capable of freedom this religious domination was
never despotic. There was indeed no legal limit; the
very words could not be translated into the dialect of
those times. The notion of law as we have it of a rule
imposed by human authority, capable of being altered by
that authority when it likes, and in fact, so altered habi-
tually could not be conveyed to early nations, who
regarded law half as an invincible prescription, and half
as a Divine revelation. Law "came out of the king's
mouth;" he gave it as Solomon gave judgment em-
bedded in the particular case, and upon the authority of
Heaven as well as his own. A Divine limit to the
Divine revealer was impossible, and there was no other
source of law. But though there was no legal limit,
there was a practical limit to subjection in (what may be
called) the pagan part of human nature, the inseparable
obstinacy of freemen. They never would do exactly
what they were told.
To early royalty, as Homer describes it in Greece and
T
274 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
as we may well imagine it elsewhere, there were always
two adjuncts : one the " old men," the men of weight, the
council, the j3owXr}, of which the king asked advice,
from the debates in which the king tried to learn what
he could do and what he ought to do. Besides this there
was the ayopa, the purely listening assembly, as some
have called it, but the tentative assembly, as I think it
might best be called. The king came down to his as-
sembled people in form to announce his will, but in
reality, speaking in very modern words, to "feel his
way." He was sacred, no doubt; and popular, very
likely ; still he was half like a popular premier speaking
to a high-spirited chamber; there were limits to his
authority and power limits which he would discover by
trying whether eager cheers received his mandate, or*
only hollow murmurs and a thinking silence.
This polity is a good one for its era and its place,
but there is a fatal defect in it. The reverential associa-
tions upon which the government is built are transmitted
according to one law, and the capacity needful to work
the government is transmitted according to another law.
The popular homage clings to the line of god-descended
kings ; it is transmitted by inheritance. But very soon
that line comes to a child or an idiot, or one by some
defect or other incapable. Then we find everywhere the
truth of the old saying, that liberty thrives under weak
princes ; then the listening assembly begins not only to
murmur, but to speak ; then the grave council begins not
so much to suggest as to inculcate, not so much to advise
as to enjoin.
ITS HISTORY. 275
Mr. Grote has told at length how out of these appen-
dages of the original kingdom the free States of Greece
derived their origin, and how they gradually grew the
oligarchical States expanding the council, and the demo-
cratical expanding the assembly. The history has as
many varieties in detail as there were Greek cities, but
the essence is the same everywhere. The political cha-
racteristic of the early Greeks, and of the early Romans,
too, is that out of the tentacula of a monarchy they
developed the organs of a republic.
English history has been in substance the same,
though its form is different, and its growth far slower
and longer. The scale was larger, and the elements more
various. A Greek city soon got rid of its kings, for the
political sacredness of the monarch would not bear the
daily inspection and constant criticism of an eager and
talking multitude. Everywhere in Greece the slave
population the most ignorant, and therefore the most
unsusceptible of intellectual influences was struck out
of the account. But England began as a kingdom of
considerable size, inhabited by distinct races, none of
them fit for prosaic criticism, and all subject to the
superstition of royalty. In early England, too, royalty
was much more than a superstition. A very strong
executive was needed to keep down a divided, an armed,
and an impatient country; and therefore the problem
of political development was delicate. A formed free
government in a homogeneous nation may have a strong
executive; but during the transition state, while the
republic is in course of development and the monarchy
276 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
in course of decay, the executive is of necessity weak.
The polity is divided, and its action feeble and failing.
The different orders of English people have progressed,
too, at different rates. The change in the state of the
higher classes since the Middle Ages is enormous, and it
is all improvement ; but the lower have varied little, and
many argue that in some important respects they have
got worse, even if in others they have got better. The
development of the English Constitution was of necessity
slow, because a quick one would have destroyed the
executive and killed the State, and because the most
numerous classes, who changed very little, were not pre-
pared for any catastrophic change in our institutions.
I cannot presume to speak of the time before the
Conquest, and the exact nature even of all Anglo-Norman
institutions is perhaps dubious : at least, in nearly all
cases there have been many controversies. Political zeal,
whether Whig or Tory, has wanted to find a model in
the past ; and the whole state of society being confused,
the precedents altering with the caprice of men and
the chance of events, ingenious advocacy has had a
happy field. But all that I need speak of is quite plain.
There was a great " council " of the realm, to which the
king summoned the most considerable persons in Eng-
land, the persons he most wanted to advise him, and the
persons whose tempers he was most anxious to ascertain.
Exactly who came to it at first is obscure and unimpor-
tant. I need not distinguish between the "magnum
concilium in Parliament" and the "magnum concilium
out of Parliament." Gradually the principal assemblies
ITS HISTORY. 277
summoned "by the English sovereign took the precise and
definite form of Lords and Commons, as in their outside
we now see them. But their real nature was very dif-
ferent. The Parliament of to-day is a ruling body ; ^he
mediaeval Parliament was, if I may so say, an expressive
body. Its function was to tell the executive the king
what the nation wished he should do ; to some extent,
to guide him by new wisdom, and, to a very great
extent, to guide him by new facts. These facts were
their own feelings, which were the feelings of the people,
because they were part and parcel of the people. From
thence the king learned, or had the means to learn, what
the nation would endure, and what it would not endure ;
what he might do, and what he might not do. If he
much mistook this, there was a rebellion.
There are, as is well known, three great periods in
the English Constitution. The first of these is the ante-
Tudor period. The English Parliament then seemed to
be gaining extraordinary strength and power. The title
to the crown was uncertain; some monarchs were im-
becile. Many ambitious men wanted to "take the people
into partnership." Certain precedents of that time were
cited with grave authority centuries after, when the time
of freedom had really arrived. But the causes of this
rapid growth soon produced an even more sudden de-
cline. Confusion fostered it, and confusion destroyed
it. The structure of society then was feudal ; the towns
were only an adjunct and a make-weight. The principal
popular force was an aristocratic force, acting with the
co-operation of the gentry and yeomanry, and resting on
273 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
the loyal fealty of sworn retainers. The head of this
force, on whom its efficiency depended, was the high
nobility. But the high nobility killed itself out. The
great barons who adhered to the "Red Rose" or the
" White Rose," or who fluctuated from one to the other,
became poorer, fewer, and less potent every year. When
the great struggle ended at Bosworth, a large part of
the greatest combatants were gone. The restless, aspir-
ing, rich barons, who made the civil war, were broken
by it. Henry VII. attained a kingdom in which there
was a Parliament to advise, but scarcely a Parliament to
control
The consultative government of the ante-Tudor period
had little resemblance to some of the modern govern-
ments which French philosophers call by that name.
The French Empire, I believe, calls itself so. But its
assemblies are symmetrical " shams." They are elected
by a universal suffrage, by the ballot, and in districts
once marked out with an eye to equality, and still
retaining a look of equality. But our English parlia-
ments were imsymmetrical realities. They were elected
anyhow ; the sheriff had a considerable license in send-
ing writs to boroughs, that is, he could in part pick
its constituencies; and in each borough there was a
rush and scramble for the franchise, so that the
strongest local party got it, whether few or many. But
in England at that time there was a great and distinct
desire to know the opinion of the nation, because there
was a real and close necessity. The nation was wanted
to do something to assist the sovereign in some war, to
ITS HISTORY. 279
pay some old debt, to contribute its force and aid in the
critical conjuncture of the time. It would not have
suited the ante-Tudor kings to have had a fictitious
assembly ; they would have lost their sole feeler, their
only instrument for discovering national opinion. Nor
could they have manufactured such an assembly if they
wished. The instrument in that behalf is the centralised
executive, and there was then no prefet by whom the
opinion of a rural locality could be made to order, and
adjusted to suit the wishes of the capital Looking at
the mode of election a theorist would say that these
parliaments were but " chance " collections of influential
Englishmen. There would be many corrections and
limitations to add to that statement if it were wanted to
make it accurate, but the statement itself hits exactly
the principal excellence of those parliaments. If not
" chance " collections of Englishmen, they were " unde-
signed" collections; no administrations made them or
could make them. They were bond-fide counsellors,
whose opinion might be wise or unwise, but was any-
how of paramount importance, because their co-operation
was wanted for what was in hand.
Legislation as a positive power was very secondary in
those old Parliaments. I believe no statute at all, as far
as we know, was passed in the reign of Richard L, and all
the ante-Tudor acts together would look meagre enough
to a modern Parliamentary agent who had to live by
them. But the negative action of parliament upon the
law was essential to its whole idea, and ran through every
part of its use. That the king could not change what
280 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
was then the almost sacred datum of the common law,
without seeing whether his nation liked it or not, was an
essential part of the " tentative " system. The king had
to feel his way in this exceptional, singular act, as those
ages deemed original legislation, as well as in lesser acts.
The legislation was his at last ; he enacted after consult-
ing his Lords and Commons ; his was the sacred mouth
which gave holy firmness to the enactment ; but he only
dared alter the rule regulating the common life of his
people after consulting those people ; he would not have
been obeyed if he had not, by a rude age which did not
fear civil war as we fear it now. Many most important
enactments of that period (and the fact is most character-
istic) are declaratory acts. They do not profess to enjoin
by inherent authority what the law shall in future be,
but to state and mark what the law is ; they are declara-
tions of immemorial custom, not precepts of new duties.
Even in the " Great Charter " the notion of new enact-
ments was secondary, it was a great mixture of old and
new ; it was a sort of compact defining what was doubt-
ful in floating custom, and was re-enacted over and over
again, as boundaries are perambulated once a year, and
rights and claims tending to desuetude thereby made
patent and cleared of new obstructions. In truth, such
great "charters" were rather treaties between different
orders and factions, confirming ancient rights, or what
claimed to be such, than laws in our ordinary sense. They
were the "deeds of arrangement" of mediaeval society
affirmed and re-affirmed from time to time, and the prin-
cipal controversy was, of course, between the king and
ITS HISTORY. 281
nation the king trying to see how far the nation would
let him go, and the nation murmuring and recalcitrating,
and seeing how many acts of administration they could
prevent, and how many of its claims they could resist.
Sir James Mackintosh says that Magna Charta " con-
verted the right of taxation into the shield of liberty," but
it did nothing of the sort. The liberty existed before, and
the right to be taxed was an efflorescence and instance of
it, not a substratum or a cause. The necessity of consult-
ing the great council of the realm before taxation, the
principle that the declaration of grievances by the Parlia-
ment was to precede the grant of supplies to the sovereign,
are but conspicuous instances of the primitive doctrine
of the ante-Tudor period, that the king must consult the
great council of the realm, before he did anything, since
he always wanted help. The right of self-taxation was
justly inserted in the "great treaty;" but it would have
been a dead letter, save for the armed force and aristo-
cratic organisation which compelled the king to make a
treaty; it was a result, not a basis an example, not a
cause.
The civil wars of many years killed out the old
councils (if I might so say) : that is, destroyed three parts
of the greater nobility, who were its most potent members,
tired the small nobility and the gentry, and overthrew the
aristocratic organisation on which all previous effectual
resistance to the sovereign had been based.
The second period of the British Constitution begins
with the accession of the House of Tudor, and goes down
to 1688 ; it is in substance the history of the growth,
282 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
development, and gradually acquired supremacy of the
new great council. I have no room and no occasion to
narrate again the familiar history of the many steps by
which the slavish Parliament of Henry VIII. grew into
the murmuring Parliament of Queen Elizabeth, the
mutinous Parliament of James I., and the rebellious
Parliament of Charles I. The steps were many, but the
energy was one the growth of the English middle-class,
using that word in its most inclusive sense, and its ani-
mation under the influence of Protestantism. No one,
I think, can doubt that Lord Macaulay is right in saying
that political causes would not alone have then provoked
such a resistance to the sovereign unless propelled by
religious theory. Of course the English people went to
and fro from Catholicism to Protestantism, and from Pro-
testantism to Catholicism (not to mention that the Pro-
testantism was of several shades and sects), just as the
first Tudor kings and queens wished. But that was in
the pre-Puritan era. The mass of Englishmen were in
an undecided state, just as Hooper tells us his father was
"Not believing in Protestantism, yet not disinclined to
it." Gradually, however, a strong Evangelic spirit (as we
should now speak) and a still stronger anti-Papal spirit
entered into the middle sort of Englishmen, and added to
that force, fibre, and substance which they have never
wanted, an ideal warmth and fervour which they have
almost always wanted. Hence the saying that Cromwell
founded the English Constitution. Of course, in seeming,
Cromwell's work died with him; his dynasty was rejected,
his republic cast aside ; but the spirit which culminated
ITS HISTORY. 283
in him never sank again, never ceased to be a potent,
though often a latent and volcanic force in the country.
Charles II. said that he would never go again on his
travels for anything or anybody ; and he well knew that
though the men whom he met at Worcester might be
dead, still the spirit which warmed them was alive and
young in others.
But the Cromwellian republic and the strict Puritan
creed were utterly hateful to most Englishmen. They
were, if I may venture on saying so, like the " Rouge "
element in France and elsewhere the sole revolutionary
force in the entire State, and were hated as such. That
force could do little of itself; indeed, its bare appearance
tended to frighten and alienate the moderate and dull as
well as the refined and reasoning classes. Alone it was
impotent against the solid clay of the English apathetic
nature. But give this fiery element a body of decent-
looking earth ; give it an excuse for breaking out on an
occasion, when the decent, the cultivated, and aristocratic
classes could join with it, and they would conquer by
means of it, and it could be disguised in their covering.
Such an excuse was found in 1688. James II., by
incredible and pertinacious folly, irritated not only the
classes which had fought against his father, but also
those who had fought for his father. He offended the
Anglican classes as well as the Puritan classes ; all the
Whig nobles, and half the Tory nobles, as well as the dis-
senting bourgeois. The rule of Parliament was estab-
lished by the concurrence of the usual supporters of
royalty with the usual opponents of it. But the result
284i THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
was long weak. Our revolution has been called the
minimum of a revolution, because in law, at least, it only
changed the dynasty, but exactly on that account it was
the greatest shock to the common multitude, who see the
dynasty but see nothing else. The support of the main
aristocracy held together the bulk of the deferential
classes, but it held them together imperfectly, uneasily,
and unwillingly. Huge masses of crude prejudice swayed
hither and thither for many years. If an able Stuart
had with credible sincerity professed Protestantism pro-
bably he might have overturned the House of Hanover.
So strong was inbred reverence for hereditary right, that
until the accession of George III. the English govern-
ment was always subject to the unceasing attrition of a
competitive sovereign.
This was the result of what I insist on tediously, but
what is most necessary to insist on, for it is a cardinal
particular in the whole topic. Many of the English
people the higher and more educated portion had
come to comprehend the nature of constitutional govern-
ment, but the mass did not comprehend it. They looked
to the sovereign as the government, and to the sovereign
only. These were carried forward by the magic of the
aristocracy and principally by the influence of the great
Whig families with their adjuncts. Without that aid
reason or liberty would never have held them.
Though the rule of Parliament was definitely estab-
lished in 1688, yet the mode of exercising that rule has
since changed. At first Parliament did not know how to
exercise it; the organisation of parties and the appoint-
ITS HISTORY. 285
ment of cabinets by parties grew up in the manner
Macaulay has described so well. Up to the latest period
the sovereign was supposed, to a most mischievous
extent, to interfere in the choice of the persons to be
Ministers. When George III. finally became insane, in
1810, every one believed that George IV., on assuming
power as Prince Kegent, would turn out Mr. Perceval's
government and empower Lord Grey or Lord Grenville,
the Whig leaders, to form another. The Tory ministry
was carrying on a successful war a war of existence
against Napoleon ; but in the people's minds, the neces-
sity at such an occasion for an unchanged government
did not outweigh the fancy that George IV. was a Whig.
And a Whig it is true he had been before the French
Revolution, when he lived an indescribable life in St.
James's Street with Mr. Fox. But Lord Grey and Lord
Grenville were rigid men, and had no immoral sort of
influence. What liberalism of opinion the Regent ever
had was frightened out of him (as of other people) by the
Reign of Terror. He felt, according to the saying of
another monarch, that "he lived by being a royalist."
It soon appeared that he was most anxious to retain Mr.
Perceval, and that he was most eager to quarrel with the
Whig Lords. As we all know, he kept the ministry
whom he found in office; but that it should have been
thought he could then change them, is a significant
example how exceedingly modern our notions of the
despotic action of Parliament in fact are.
By the steps of the struggle thus rudely mentioned
(and by others which I have no room to speak of, nor
288 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
need I), the change which in the Greek cities was effected
both in appearance and in fact, has been effected in Eng-
land, though in reality only, and not in outside. Here,
too, the appendages of a monarchy have been converted
into the essence of a republic; only here, because of a
more numerous heterogeneous political population, it is
needful to keep the ancient show while we secretly inter-
polate the new reality.
This long and curious history has left its trace on
almost every part of our present political condition ; its
effects lie at the root of many of our most important
controversies; and because these effects are not rightly
perceived, many of these controversies are misconceived.
One of the most curious peculiarities of the English
people is its dislike of the executive government. We
are not in this respect " un vrai peuple moderne," like
the Americans. The Americans conceive of the executive
as one of their appointed agents ; when it intervenes in
common life, it does so, they consider, in virtue of the
mandate of the sovereign people, and there is no invasion
or dereliction of freedom in that people interfering
with itself. The French, the Swiss, and all nations who
breathe the full atmosphere of the nineteenth century,
think so too. The material necessities of this age require
a strong executive; a nation destitute of it cannot be
clean, or healthy, or vigorous, like a nation possessing it.
By definition, a nation calling itself free should have no
jealousy of the executive, for freedom means that the
nation, the political part of the nation, wields the execu-
tive. But our history has reversed the English feeling:
ITS HISTORY. 287
our freedom is the result of centuries of resistance, more
or less legal, or more or less illegal, more or less audacious,
or more or less timid, to the executive government. We
have, accordingly, inherited the traditions of conflict,
and preserve them in the fulness of victory. We look on
State action, not as our own action, but as alien action ;
as an imposed tyranny from without, not as the consum-
mated result of our own organised wishes. I remember
at the Census of 1851 hearing a very sensible old lady
say that the " liberties of England were at an end ; " if
Government might be thus inquisitorial, if they might
ask who slept in your house, or what your age was, what,
she argued, might they not ask and what might they not
do?
The natural impulse of the English people is to resist
authority. The introduction of effectual policemen was
not liked ; I know people, old people I admit, who to this
day consider them an infringement of freedom, and an
imitation of the gendarmes of France. If the original
policemen had been started with the present helmets, the
result might have been dubious ; there might have been
a cry of military tyranny, and the inbred insubordination
of the English people might have prevailed over the very
modern love of perfect peace and order. The old notion
that the Government is an extrinsic agency still rules our
imaginations, though it is no longer true, and though in
calm and intellectual moments we well know it is not.
Nor is it merely our history which produces this effect ;
we might get over that ; but the results of that history
co-operate. Our double Government so acts : when we
288 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
want to point the antipathy to the executive, we refer to
the jealousy of the Crown, so deeply imbedded in the very
substance of constitutional authority ; so many people are
loth to admit the Queen, in spite of law and fact, to be
the people's appointee and agent, that it is a good rhe-
torical emphasis to speak of her prerogative as something
wow-popular, and therefore to be distrusted. By the very
nature of our Government our executive cannot be liked
and trusted as the Swiss or the American is liked and
trusted.
Out of the same history and the same results proceed
our tolerance of those " local authorities " which so puzzle
many foreigners. In the struggle with the Crown these
local centres served as props and fulcrums. In the early
parliaments it was the local bodies who sent members to
parliament, the counties, and the boroughs ; and in that
way, and because of their free life, the parliament was
free too. If active real bodies had not sent the represen-
tatives, they would have been powerless. This is very
much the reason why our old rights of suffrage were so
various ; the Government let whatever people happened
to be the strongest in each town choose the members.
They applied to the electing bodies the test of " natural
selection;" whatever set of people were locally strong
enough to elect, did so. Afterwards in the civil war,
many of the corporations, like that of London, were im-
portant bases of resistance. The case of London is typical
and remarkable. Probably, if there is any body more
than another which an educated Englishman nowadays
regards with little favour, it is the Corporation of London,
ITS IIISTORY. 289
He connects it with hereditary abuses perfectly preserved,
with large revenues imperfectly accounted for, with a
system which stops the principal city government at an
old archway, with the perpetuation of a hundred detest-
able parishes, with the maintenance of a horde of luxu-
rious and useless bodies. For the want of all which
makes Paris nice and splendid we justly reproach the
Corporation of London; for the existence of much of
what makes London mean and squalid we justly reproach
it too. Yet the Corporation of London was for centuries
a bulwark of English liberty. The conscious support of
the near and organised capital gave the Long Parliament
a vigour and vitality which they could have found no-
where else. Their leading patriots took refuge in the
City, and the nearest approach to an English " sitting in
permanence" is the committee at Guildhall, where all
members "that came were to have voices." Down to
George III.'s time the City was a useful centre of popular
judgment. Here, as elsewhere, we have built into our
polity pieces of the scaffolding by which it was erected.
De Tocqueville indeed used to maintain that in this
matter the English were not merely historically excusable
but likewise politically judicious. He founded what may
be called the culU of corporations. And it was natural,
that in France, where there is scarcely any power of self-
organisation in the people, where the prefet must be
asked upon every subject, and take the initiative in every
movement, a solitary thinker should bo repelled from the
exaggerations of which he knew the evil, to the contrary
u
290 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
exaggeration of which he did not. But in a country like
England where business is in the air, where we can
organize a vigilance committee on every abuse and an
executive committee for every remedy as a matter of
political instruction, which was De Tocqueville's point
we need not care how much power is delegated to out-
lying bodies, and how much is kept for the central body.
We have had the instruction municipalities could give us :
we have been through all that. Now we are quite grown
up, and can put away childish things.
The same causes account for the innumerable anomalies
of our polity. I own that I do not entirely sympathise
with the horror of these anomalies which haunts some of
our best critics. It is natural that those who by special
and admirable culture have come to look at all things
upon the artistic side, should start back from these queer
peculiarities. But it is natural also that persons used
to analyse political institutions should look at these
anomalies with a little tenderness and a little interest.
They may have something to teach us. Political philo-
sophy is still more imperfect ; it has been framed from
observations taken upon regular specimens of politics and
States ; as to these its teaching is most valuable. But we
must ever remember that its data are imperfect. The
lessons are good where its primitive assumptions hold,
but may be false where those assumptions fail. A philoso-
phical politician regards a political anomaly as a scientific
physician regards a rare disease it is to him an " interest-
ing case." There may still be instruction here, though
ITS HISTORY. 291
we have worked out the lessons of common cases. I can-
not, therefore, join in the full cry against anomalies ; in
my judgment it may quickly overrun the scent, and so
miss what we should be glad to find.
Subject to this saving remark, however, I not only
admit, but maintain, that our constitution is full of curious
oddities, which are impeding and mischievous, and ought
to be struck out. Our law very often reminds one of
those outskirts of cities where you cannot for a long time
tell how the streets come to wind about in so capricious
and serpent-like a manner. At last it strikes you that
they grew up, house by house, on the devious tracks of
the old green lanes ; and if you follow on to the existing
fields, you may often find the change half complete. Just
so the lines of our constitution were framed in old eras of
sparse population, few wants, and simple habits ; and we
adhere in seeming to their shape, though civilisation has
come with its dangers, complications, and enjoyments.
TLese anomalies, in a hundred instances, mark the old
boundaries of a constitutional struggle. The casual line
was traced according to the strength of deceased com-
batants; succeeding generations fought elsewhere; and
the hesitating line cf a half-drawn battle was left to
stand for a perpetual limit.
I do not count as an anomaly the existence of our
double government, with all its infinite accidents, though
hah the superficial peculiarities that are often complained
of arise out of it. The co-existence of a Queen's seeming
prerogative and a Downing Street's real government is
292 THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION.
just suited to such a country as this, in such an age as
ours." *
* So well is our real Government concealed, that if yon tell a cabman
to drive to " Downing Street," he most likely will never have heard of it,
and will not in the least know where to take you. It is only a " disguised
republic " which is suited to such a being as the Englishman in such a
century as the nineteenth.
THE END.
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.
MAY
30
DC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY
A 000 692 705 7