PARLIAMENTARY TYRANNY.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.") SIR,—Disraeli in 1840, in answer to a legal member who enlarged on the tyranny of the courts in the time of Charles I., gave "a vivid account of the tyranny of Parliament in the same troubled age, and showed that the tyranny of the courts was nothing in comparison. He ended with a declaration which has not lost its significance, that there was a difference between the law of Parliament and the law of the House of Commons, and that 'he for one would never consent to see the country subjected to the law of the latter.' "—" Life," ii. 90.
In the present day the position would be still worse were the Government to revoke at its own hand, when it pleased, for its own purposes, a vote of the House of Commons. Nor should the serious effect of such an example upon Boards throughout the country at present guided by Standing Orders more or less modelled on those of the House of Commons be lost sight of. If the United Kingdom has for the time being lost the benefit of the legislative check of the Second Chamber, we must be all the more particular about the exercise of the House of Commons' powers.—I am, Sir, &c.,
WILLIAM GEORGE BLACK.
Barnoyle, Dowanhill Gardens, Glasgow.
Previous page
