Mr Balfour's Poodle(58)

Despite the fact that no real sacrifice of power by the union  ist Party was therefore envisaged, the bill was not greeted with acclaim by many of its members. ‘These proposals,’ Lord Newton has written, ‘which really amounted almost to a sentence of death upon the most ancient Legislative Chamber in the world, were received by a crowded and attentive House in a dignified if frigid silence, and the pallid and wasted appearance of the speaker, who had but lately recovered from a severe illness, seemed to accentuate the general gloom,’ j The Morning Post took up an attitude of clear-cut hostility. But neither this lead nor widespread grumbling amongst what were coming to be called the ‘backwoods’ peers produced any revolt which was both widespread and determined. Lansdowne was able to proceed to a second reading a week later. On this occasion a number of union  ist peers, including the Dukes of Somerset and Marlborough and Lords Bathurst, Willoughby de Broke, Raglan, Saltoun, and Killanin opposed the bill in their speeches, but, except for Bathurst, did not continue their opposition when the question was put; and even he did not persist to the extent of causing a division to be called. Haldane was able fairly to sum up the tone of the debate as ‘sombre acquiescence punctuated every now and then by cries of pain’.k

The tension had been taken out of the debate by an earlier Government speaker. Morley had declared on the first day that the Parliament Bill would apply to a reformed House of Lords as to the existing one, and that declaration made Lansdowne’s manoeuvre purposeless. There was no point in trimming the privileges of the hereditary peers if a less emasculated Second Chamber was not to be the result. When, therefore, the second reading was secured—with Government supporters proclaiming their indifference by walking out of the House—it was the end of the road. Nothing further was heard of the bill.

During the spring the Parliament Bill had completed its progress through the Commons. It had been a keenly contested progress, with more than 900 amendments tabled. Seventy of them were in the names of Government backbenchers, and the remainder from the Opposition. After a number of late sittings and a free use of the ‘kangaroo closure’, the committee stage was disposed of in ten days. The Government made a few minor concessions, accepting amongst others amendments to exclude all private bills from the category of money bills and to postpone the start of the two-year period necessary before a measure could pass over the veto of the Lords from the date of the introduction of the bill to the date of second reading; but the great majority of amendments were resisted and the bill retained substantially its original form. Government majorities were adequate throughout, although Sir Henry Dalziel led 137 dissidents into the lobby in favour of reducing the period of delay from three sessions to two, and the Labour Party voted against the preamble on the ground that abolition or a further curtailment of powers was preferable to reform.

The union  ist amendments mostly followed well-worn lines of argument, although some of them showed a startling willingness to embrace any constitutional novelty which would serve the interests of the party. Sir Frederick Banbury1 proposed that the Royal Assent should no longer be automatically given upon the advice of the Government, but that the whole Privy Council should be empowered to advise the Crown on such matters; and J. F. Hope2 wished a special tribunal, composed of judges and former colonial Governors, to be interposed between the King and his Ministers for this purpose. Sir Alfred Cripps3 proposed that only measures passed by both Houses should be referred to as Acts of Parliament and that those passing under the new procedure should be given some different, inferior title. Arthur Griffith-Boscawen1 and Lord Hugh Cecil wished the House ot Commons to introduce secret voting on the third reading ot money bills in order to safeguard members against what they regarded as the illicit pressure of the party caucus. It was not very clear whether he regarded this pressure as equally undesirable on both sides, and whether Arthur Balfour felt himself to some extent under fire. In any event, although Balfour had supported the other innovations, he found this one a little too novel for his taste and left its support in the lobby to an unofficial band of union  ists.

Proceedings on the report stage were governed by a timetable resolution which limited the number of days available to three. The course taken by the debates on these days made it seem unlikely that many undeployed arguments were cut out by the restriction.

Third reading, limited to one day, took place on May 15. F. E. Smith moved the rejection, and Asquith made the early speech for the Government. He replied to the suggestion that a constitutional revolution was being forced through against the will of the people by remarking that ‘I am unable to discover a murmur of protest or tittle of remonstrance, though I am made conscious occasionally of a yawn of weariness over the unduly prolonged discussion.…’l Mr. Churchill wound up for the Government and was in an aggressively radical, post-Tonypandy mood. He pronounced himself ‘almost aghast at the Government’s moderation. The powers left to the House of Lords,’ he thought, ‘would be formidable and even menacing.… The Bill made a moderate but definite advance towards political equality. It was territory conquered by the masses from the classes; and when they had placed it on the statute book, without condition or alteration, it would be time to discuss the further steps to be taken.’m Fortified by this somewhat truculent benediction, the bill completed its passage through the Commons with a vote of 362 to 241 and passed on to the less friendly atmosphere of the House of Lords.