THE LORDS AND THE PUBLIC.
WE have often had occasion to remark that there is nothing more difficult than to judge, from the tone of public meetings and the public Press, how far the mind of the conservative English people has gone in its desire for a particular reform. For example, there is at the present moment in the North of England a very deep and obvious impatience with the House of Lords. One might infer hastily from the provincial Press of that part of the island that there is little or no wish for any half-measures, that no Second Chamber at all is desired by a large number of Liberals, and certainly no Second Chamber of hereditary legislators, and that the moment is come for the simple abolition of the House of Lords. On the other hand, great assemblies,—which, to take them at the lowest reasonable computation, are at least half as large as those held under similar circumstances to assail the House of Lords,—rally to a strenuous support of the House of Lords. Independent Liberals of unsophisticated minds, like a correspondent whose letter we publish to-day, declare themselves convinced that the Lords have acted wisely, and are sincere in their wish for a complete Reform Bill ; and all over the kingdom displays of feeling which, though not representing the mind of the majority, assuredly represent the mind of a considerable minority, express something like enthusiasm for the House of Lords. Our own opinion on the subject is that, though there may be no essential reason why, with a people whose political mind is so essentially moderate, and moves so slowly as the English, a Legislature consisting of but one Chamber might not work perfectly well, there is no advantage, or rather great disadvantage, in making needless experiments on so fundamental a matter as the British Constitution, for which the whole nation is not fully prepared. We hold that, so far as may be possible in any great constitutional change, the aim should be, not only to satisfy the moderates among the party who desire change, but to dissatisfy as little as possible the moderates among the party who resist change. We are perfectly aware that, whatever change we may sooner or later make in the constitution or powers of the House of Lords, will be resisted by the Conservatives with complete un- animity. But that is no reason at all for not being care- ful to propose such a change as, when carried, may shock the Conservatives as little as possible. Nor, when we observe the temper of the most revolutionary of the meetings held to agitate against the Lords,—the temper, for instance, of the meeting at St. James's Hall, where Sir Wilfrid Lawson and Mr. Labouchere and Mr. Bradlaugh spoke last Saturday, —can we wonder that the Conservatives should say that it is not by such aid as theirs, nor by such champions as they are,
that a great change in the Constitution ought to be effected. A meeting that cheers the statement that the Lords have done more mischief in the last fifty years than all the dens of thieves and thieves' kitchens in London, is not to be regarded as the sort of meeting to which a reasonable man will attach political weight. The very violence of such statements shows that these are not the men to whom England will trust the guidance of any great Constitutional change, and that they are the men from whom sober-minded politicians will carefully separate themselves. Nor can it, we think, be doubted that, in all Constitutional agitations, the wise course is to make as little change as possible, so long as that change effects the essential reform for which sober men ask.
Now, what is the essential reform for which sober poli- ticians ask now f It is not, we think, in any considerable degree the deposition of the aristocracy as an aristocracy. It is almost entirely the reform of an Upper House which is wholly out of sympathy with the Lower House, and desires to thwart the Lower House whenever it can. If that be the case—and we can hardly imagine any serious dispute on the subject—we should be very sorry to see a change proposed which went beyond the change demanded, and which aimed at Republican ends under cover of political ends. So long as the order of the Peerage lasts at all, we should prefer to see it closely connected with our political institutions, and to get all the good out of it we can. A Peerage disconnected from our political life would, in our opinion, become a serious social mischief, because it would no longer be subjected to the influence of leaders who, like the statesmen in the Peers, command the social respect of all classes, and exert a healthy influence on the caste at the head of which they stand.
Now, it seems to us indisputable that a very sound and valuable revising Assembly might be made out of the House of Peers, on two conditions,—first, that it be greatly limited in numbers, so as to contain only selected Peers who had shown some sort of special fitness for political life ; and next, that it be in general sympathy with the Ministry of the day, so as not to block the path of Ministerial legislation. That these two conditions must be secured after some fashion or other, we are very sure ; but these two conditions once satis- fied, there seems to us no reason in the world why we should not have in a limited Upper House an extremely good revising Assembly, which might even, in cases where a considerable and growing portion of the party in power had shown their distrust of any measure, be relied on to give the nation a chance of reconsidering its provisions. The indignation against the Peers on the present occasion is excited by their having rejected a measure which the House of Commons passed by the largest majorities ever secured for a party measure, and which they passed after discussing elaborately and over and over again the very objections on the strength of which it was re- jected by the House of Lords. We do not think that the nation would object to a revising Assembly originally in full sympathy with the House of Commons, which had only drifted away from the House of Commons exactly as the majority in the House of Commons had itself dwindled, and. which, if it ever took upon itself to reject a measure passed by the House of Commons, should do so on the express ground that the majority in the Lower House and in the country appeared to be growing smaller and smaller and less and less confident in its position every day. Now, the House of Lords we propose—a House originally in sympathy with the Ministry of the day—though made up of elements of a perhaps rather more cautious kind, would only have the courage to reject a measure sent up to it by the Commons when it felt deeply convinced that it was really expressing the maturer mind of the party to which it belonged, as well as its own mind. If such an Assembly can be made out of the existing House of Lords, we think it ought to be made,—because in our opinion, a social Peerage divorced altogether from political leadership, would be a serious mischief ; and because we see no evidence of the growth of the kind of Republican feeling in England which could alone justify the abolition of the Peerage as a social caste. Let us beware of seizing on a mere excuse for the expression of a dislike to aristocracy which comparatively few Englishmen share, and which if it were to be gratified under the cloak of mere political indignation against the Lords, would probably result in a dangerous reaction, and a dangerous check to all that is healthiest in Republican sentiment. It seems to us that nothing can be more intrinsically reasonable than to minimize revolutions. That the steady growth of political annoyance at the action of the Lords justifies, and amply justifies, a grave attempt to remove that obstruction from the already suffi- ciently hampered path of legislative improvement, we cordially admit. But we do not admit that any strong vein of sympathy for social equality, any genuine dislike to hereditary rank, has gained for itself a potent voice in the crisis of to-day. If we are right, nothing would be more mischievous than to con-
trive a social revolution under cover of a political change. The time may come when a bitter impatience of aristocracy,
as aristocracy, will show itself. But the time has not come
yet•. Till it does, our object should be to make the least change in the Constitution which is really sufficient
for its purpose, and that change seems to us to be the reconstitution of the House of Lords as a competent political Assembly in sympathy with the House of Commons, and charged principally with the duty of legisla- tive revision only, though that need not exclude a suspensive veto, whenever such an Assembly might be emboldened to use
a suspensive veto. If there really were in the country a strong
desire to try the experiment of a single Legislative Chamber, we, for our parts, should not oppose it. But we can at present see no trace of this in the more moderate section of the Liberal Party ; while we see the greatest fear of it among the moderate Conservatives. Holding, as we do, that no great Constitutional change is desirable which would inspire dismay among the Moderates on either side, we shall be perfectly content with a change which seems to us at once enough for its purpose, and not enough to awaken the dread inspired by every re- volution deficient in calculable limits and a distinctly defined end.
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