TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE PROROGATION OF 18,56.
Pkitra-txr..sr sat for six months, to witness the conclusion of peace and to enable Dr. Blomfield and Dr. Maltby to retire. There were indeed a number of smaller measures carried or discussed, and a few of some importance ; but all that succeeded were of the nature of continuance-bills or amendments upon previous statutes, and they bear no proportion to the conspicuous measures which were brought forward as the staple legislative business of the session, and lost. It is too late in the day to "review the session" as it affects the peace ; nor would it be profitable to mourn over again the family of " innocents " which have this year been buried individually, instead of being massacred in a body. We leave to Mr. Disraeli to announce for the last time this season, after everybody else, that Ministers have" abandoned" the greater number of their measures, and that those measures were more important in design than in result. The particulars are set forth in our tabular review of the sessional statistics. If here we look back at all to the history of the session, it is rather for the purpose of ascertaining how we stand now, and how we may stand next year,-questions by no means easy to answer.
The session naturally divides itself into two parts-the war portion, and the peace portion. When the Queen opened Par- liament, the negotiations for peace had begun, but she an- nounced from the throne that the preparations for war would con- tinue. We were therefore engaged in heaping up military re- sources, with the consciousness that they might be rendered supererogatory: by the proceedings of the gentlemen who were sitting in Paris ; and the public were not disposed to be very ex- acting in regard to legislative productions. Tat season, 'how- ever, terminated with the month of March, and Easter pretty well divided the war part of the session from the peace part. Just as Parliament-is separating, we have the report of the General Officers, designed to soften the disasters of the Crimea camp, but really reminding us of the worst faults of the old Horse Guards regime. An opportunity offered itself this session of modifying that system from top to bottom, by reconstructing the Horse Guards department • but there was an opportunity also of providing for a distinguished member of the Royal Family, who had long been wanting a niche in the edifice of the state ; and that opportunity was accounted, by our resent Ministers, more important than the opportunity of reforming our military, system; • so the Horse Guards were retained unreformed as the official abode of the Queen's cousin. Just as Parliament is separating, too, it learns from our Foreign Minister that Russia has not surrendered the fortress of Ismail but has dismantled it, has chaffered over the frontier to be surrendered, and still retains possession of Kars ; suspicious augury of the faith to be observed under that treaty of peace which was the boasted product of the Paris Conference. Possibly,, before Parliament is again summoned to meet, we may learn a few more facts respecting the peace and its guarantees.
If the session divides itself naturally into two parts, so does the legislative portion subdivide itself into two. At the commence- ment, the Queen invited "attentive consideration" for four classes of internal improvements which were to be introduced notwithstanding the war,-an assimilation of the commercial laws of the United Kingdom, improvement of the laws relating to partnership, relief from local dues and passing tolls on shippmg, and "important measures for improving the law in Great Britain and Ireland." Besides these classes, other measures were actually introduced, of which the most conspicuous were the reform of London Corporation and the institution of agricultural statistics. We need not repeat the long list of bills abandoned,-the Part- nership, Divorce, Wills, London Corporation, Scotch Educa- tion,-the very names are but too familiar, and recall the fate of the host. Some of these measures were really important, some displayed considerable ability in the construction, several of them were novel and ingenious even when they were open to question. The partnership improvements, for example, did mark progress in a decided change of our commercial policy; the ec- clesiastical measures had one remarkable tendency-to assimilate our ecclesiastical establishments in certain respects to the ordi- nary secular departments of the state ; the High Court of Appeal was a novelty after the newest fashion resting upon one of our, oldest antiques, like a state ball in which the last fashions and court antiquarianism are vivaciously blended. This latest was, in fact, two measures in one -a new Appeal Court, based on the old judicial authority of the Barons, with a new life Peer, reviving an ancient and much-contested prerogative of the Crown. Beginning with a dispute between the House of Lords and the Executive, the measure was arranged as a compromise between the Crown and the Peers : it came down to the Commons late in the session, with the joint authority of Sovereign, Lords, and Ministers ; was hard fought through several stages ; is laid asleep in a Select Committee, and virtually expires with the ses- sion. It represents a large and important class of measures to which the "attentive consideration" of Parliament was invited.
The second part of the legislative half of the session is not less
fairly represented by the bill for the retirement of the Bishops of London and Durham. There had long been a whisper of some such measure, though nobody knew exactly what it was to be : it suddenly burst forth in the light of a special bill, almost like a private bill, and so challenging no close consideration, yet involving a formidable precedent—a precedent calculated to change the very constitution of the Church of England. That bill is carried through successive stages, by the help of an official cohort perti- naciously supporting it, while the sections of the Commons that might have secured at least a chance of defeating it were away, anticipating the holiday.. If we consider, therefore, the- character of these two portions of the legislative session, they appear to be what heralds would call peculiarly " countercharged." In the former portion, there is a number of measures to which Ministers invite the "attentive con- sideration" of Parliament, and which are not carried ; in the latter portion, there are a few measures, scarcely less important in their consequences, which Parliament is invited to carry with- out consideration, and they are carried. In the former period, Ministers treated themselves as if they were legislatively of no importance, and " bombarded " the House of Commons, as if in sport, with "measures for rejection." In the latter portion, Ministers present measures to be carried in a Cromwellian spirit, or in the spirit in which measures are presented to the Corps Legislatif of a neighbouring country., not to be discussed but registered. If Ministers were accused of not standing by their proposals, they might point to this latter bill, which was un- questionably defended and advanced with military decision. On the other hand, Lord Palmerston explains the abandonment of measures as natural in a country where there is "free discussion." He holds that all propositions must be presented several times before they can be successful ; and supposes that a Government, as well as private Members, may harmlessly incur defeat in the House of Commons. This is dangerous doctrine. Its application in the past session has done much to remove any shadow that re- mained of Ministerial responsibility. It implies that Ministers need no more be answerable for their conduct in legislation than private Members are ; that they are not bound to take up anything, nor bound to sustain it when taken up. It in fact has separated Ministers from their acts. Now, a Government is under no obliga- tion to put forward any measures but such as it interprets to be pe- remptorily demanded by those whom the members of the Govern- ment represent: by such measures, however, every Ministry has been held honourably bound to stand. But Lord Palmerston has enunciated and dramatically enforced the contrary rule, that Ministers are free to take up or lay down any measures that they please. If therefore the present Government has not been suc- cessful in carrying its mass of bills, it has been successful in establishing that new rule for the tenure of office. Is this " con- stitutional" ? Does it meet with the acquiescence of the country? Lord Palmerston's Government came into power for the purpose of carrying on the war : when the war terminated the Ministry remained in office, the special purpose for which it had been ori- ginally formed having ceased ; and no peculiar purpose has since been found for it. At this moment it only presents a party of gen- tlemen, each of whom is free to carry on what course of legislation he may please, and to succeed if he can. Mr. Lowe is a gentleman whose personal ability induced the Premier to offer him a seat; and he has been permitted to fulfil a " call " for attempting a series of reforms in the commercial law, with a fate as independent of the rest of the Ministry as if he were playing a game of billiards in another room. Sir Benjamin Hall is a gentleman of large pro- perty and large Liberal professions ; he has been sent into some of the newer departments to administrate in matters of health, or to take up new contrivances in public works ; and he exercises a very free and. independent discretion, as if Llanover or Maryle- bone had comparatively little to do with Tiverton or Westmin- ster. Somebody must look after the law reforms, and Lord Cran- worth had a right to that amusement ex officio ; so the law re- forms were mentioned in the Queen's opening speech, but did. not exist for corresponding mention in the closing speech. How- ever, that is the business of the Lord Chancellor, not of the Lord Premier. The one bond of union which holds the Ministry together is the fact that they preoccupy the seats of office. That is "the principle" which distinguishes the existing Government.
At last Ministers have got over "the difficulties of the session," and, they are handed on to the difficulties of the recess. It is true that during the recess our Premier is reputed to have his forte in the immunity from interference : but the immunity itself may have its dangers. The results of the session are not favourable for the administration of the recess. They present no raw mate- rial for constructive repute, to be used up in the period of retire- ment. Lord Palmerston was enabled to boast in the reply to Mr. Disraeli, that on the four or five occasions when a pitched battle took place, the Premier was able to command a clear majority rising from 100 to 194: but on none of those occasions was there any important question of improvement or legislation in dispute. The one question presented to the public was, whether Lord Palmerston should be continued as Premier; and the Com- mons answered that question in the affirmative. But this is a very meagre principle for Members to go back to their constituents with. We have supported. the Premiership of Palmerston, but we cannot accept it as an all-guiding principle for the Parliament or the country. Yet it is for Members the one clear political re- sult of the session. As the Cabinet can say, "We are because we are," so Members must say, "The one principle by which we have stood is Palmerston."
The strength of Lord Palmerston's Ministry is shown by this review of the session to be comparative, and yet in the comparison it is gigantic. Politically, the Ministry has no raison d'etre except the fact that it exists ; but when we look around to other definable parties in the House of Commons, we find that they have no raison d'etre in office except that they do not exist there,—a far poorer claim to possession than Palmerston's. Mr. Disraeli, for example, taunts the Premier with having no ma- jority: but where is Disraeli's majority P—If it exists anywhere it is in some romance of the future, and is, like the man himself, only "coming." Where is the facile princeps of the Whigs ?- Gone to Italy. He might within the last few months have given Parliamentary voice to convictions out of doors respecting the most important principles of our foreign policy—our treatment of America or of Italy ; but he is off before Parliament closes, before those questions have received the slightest explanation from Min- isters. Mr. Disraeli himself repeated the words "Russia," "Aus- tria," "Italy," "America," to convey the gratuitous information that the Tory party would abide by a policy which is no longer possible, unless our clever Premier should render it so. But our clever Premier threw not a glimmering of light upon the sub-. ject. We turn to the Manchester party, rusticating in Sussex or catching salmon in Scotland. We turn to the new party out of doors, and its recently-adopted chief in Parliament, the independent Administrative Reform party, which stands forth at the close of the session as the champion of—General Beatson ! If the record of the session for the Ministers is meagre, for other parties it is absolutely bare. Parliament, prorogued, leaves the country without a political principle, without a prospect, but not without a Premier.
It is hardly expected that the present Parliament will survive next year. For the general election, looming at no remote dis- tance, the long autumn vacation will furnish large opportunities of stirring and perhaps irritating canvass. In that electioneering season the recent failures may be turned to troublesome account, and neither candidates nor constituents are likely to see their way distinctly through disappointed hopes and questions dormant but/ not settled.
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