The House got into a curious mess on Friday week
on a proposal by Mr. Bradlaugh to require the Speaker to call Members elected at by-elections to the table to take the oath, "unless the House otherwise resolve." His object was to render the calling of Members elected at by-elections to the table as much a matter of routine as the calling of Members elected at a General Election ; but the proviso to which he had assented,—namely, "unless the House otherwise provide,"— really let in the very admission of the right of the House to raise the question before the Speaker should call the Member to the table, which Mr. Bradlaugh specially wished to exclude. This was obviously a great blunder on his part, and though he carried his point so far as, with the help of the Govern- ment, to reject the motion for going into Committee of Supply by the bare majority of 5, he would have defeated his own end had not Sir Hem-y James and the First Lord of the Treasury between them managed to extricate him from his awkward position. Sir Henry James urged him to accept his (Sir Henry James's) amendment omitting the unfortunate proviso; and Mr. W. H. Smith, coming late into the House, virtually relieved him from his engagement to stick to the proviso, by declaring that it would be better for the House to veto the resolution altogether, which Mr. Bradlaugh regarded as breaking the engagement to accept the qualified resolution. He therefore agreed to accept Sir Henry James's amendment; and that having been accepted, the Attorney-General and Mr. W. H. Smith insisted that the resolution, with this proviso omitted, must be rejected, as otherwise the House would part with its power of interfering between a Member and the oath. And when the vote was taken, the amended resolution was rejected by the majority of 28. Mr. Bradlaugh, therefore, secured his liberty as a con- sequence of being thrown over by the Government, and there- fore also by the House. We should have thought him too clear-headed to place himself, even for a time, in so false a position.
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