In the rich fields of Strathmore the stately glossycoated Angus Doddie' has attained his fullest development, and the more rapidly maturing short-horn cross gives brighter colour to the scene, while numerous substantial steadings of dull coloured sandstone, well filled rick-yards, and comfortable cottages, brightened with well cared-for flowers, evidence an advanced agriculture to which judicious landlords' outlay and industrious tenants' energy have concurrently contributed. The mills of Strathdichty, of Brechin, Forfar, Arbroath, and Carnoustie, and the tall chimneys and ceaseless machinery of Dundee, testify to capable captains of industry and busy labour. The quays of a great commercial city have covered the old landing-place by the craig of St Nicholas. In Tiberim defluxit Orontes,' and the produce of the banks of the Hooghly has brought wealth and prosperity to those of the Tay. Monifieth and Carnoustie, with their mansions of merchant princes and innumerable villas, point to widely diffused comfort and well-doing, and the fisher folk of Auchmithie and Ferryden continue to reap the harvest of the North Sea. The links of Barry, where a kingdom was saved, form a trainingground for national defence, and, far out on the reef of the Inchcape Rock, an outpost of Angus looks towards Heligoland, and the first of Scottish rock lighthouses rises in the tall column of the Bell Rock, where constantly 'A ruddy gem of changeful light PE Art. 13.-THE APPEAL TO THE NATION. 6 1. The Lords' Debate on the Finance Bill, 1909. Reprinted from the Times' of November 23, 24, 25, 26, 29, and 30. 2. The People's Budget explained by the Rt Hon. D. Lloyd George, M.P. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1909. THE battle of the Budget is over. The campaign for the preservation of the constitution, and especially of the Union with Ireland, has begun. Hence many war-cries and controversies which for the last six months and more have distracted the country may be lightly passed over. It would, for example, be a waste of ink and paper to trouble our readers with a confutation of the silly assertion that the Lords have opposed the will of the British people. The charge is on the face of it groundless. What the Lords have done is nothing more than to insist that on a matter as to which there exist the widest differences of opinion, and which concerns the permanent and vital interests of the country, an appeal shall be made to the nation. In accordance with the substantial result of that appeal the Peers will regulate their conduct. The maddest of Roman emperors never dreamed that an appeal to Cæsar was a denial of Cæsar's authority. The electors, who, as things stand, are possessed of sovereign power, are not so dull as to imagine that to appeal from the majority of the House of Commons to the people is to offer defiance to the people. Few words again need be spent on the pretence that the Peers claim to regulate the national finances. They claim nothing of the kind. They have simply exercised the established right of rejecting a Bill which, under the pretence of being a mere money Bill, included permanent legislative changes, and therefore ought, like all other permanent legislation, to be submitted to the criticism and the vote of the Lords. The absolute rejection without any attempt to amend the Budget is enough of itself to negative the wild idea that the Peers wish to exercise a lasting control over matters of finance. It savours rather of folly than of partisanship to imagine that the Peers contemplate a custom of rejecting Budgets. Nor is it desirable to pay much attention to the merely academical disputes as to the right of the House of Lords to deal with money Bills. Such controversies are at best infected with unreality. Lord Morley of Blackburn intimated to the House of Lords that the rejection of the Budget involved a violation of the Septennial Act. When the debate was over a moment's reflection must have shown him that no vote of either House, though it might lead to a dissolution, could by any possibility contravene a statute the effect of which is that a parliament cannot last for more than seven years. Some vague recollection of an error of Burke's must have suggested to him the delusion that the Septennial Act ensures to a parliament the right to sit for seven years. In the same debate Lord Loreburn flattered the House of Lords by the assertion that to their House belonged supreme jurisdiction in the administration of justice. It does not take the learning of a Lord Chancellor for a man to know that this statement was either an unmeaning quibble or a patent absurdity. Supreme jurisdiction does not belong to the 425 peers, that is to the House of Lords whom the Chancellor was addressing. It belongs to a very different body, that is, to a limited number of eminent lawyers who, in common with his lordship, are peers. When men of as much eminence, honesty, and talent as the Secretary for India and the Lord Chancellor so confuse forms and facts as to fall into the emptiest cant of constitutionalism, ordinary persons may well wish to avoid, if it be possible, the unrealities of constitutional arguments. After all, the lengthy debates carried on inside and outside the walls of Parliament make it at once tedious and futile to quibble over the relation between the two Houses in regard to money Bills or Budgets. We all of us by this time know how things really stand. It is easy enough to summarise the points in favour of and against the rejection of the Budget by the Peers. The legal right of the House of Lords to reject any Bill laid before them is past denial. Their constitutional disability to reject a money Bill has never been admitted by themselves, and has never been directly asserted by the House of Commons. Some of the leaders of that House, even when opposed to the action of the Peers, have conceded to them the constitutional right of rejection and have even admitted that it is a power which may, for the advantage of the nation, though rarely exercised, be maintained. A Budget again is after all nothing but what might be a set of money Bills reduced to the form of one Bill. When Lord Loreburn, on the 25th of March, 1908, used the words: As to the question of throwing out money Bills, your lordships have the most ample powers,' he gave up, as was detected by the acuteness of Lord Salisbury, the contention that the rejection of a Budget lies beyond the constitutional competence of the Peers. All this tells in favour of the action of the Lords, but the rejection of a Budget is open to one strong prima facie objection. It is the unprecedented exercise of a real but latent power. To a latent power so used the well-known words of Burke precisely apply: Its repose may be the preservation of its existence, and its existence may be the means of saving the constitution itself on an occasion worthy of bringing it forth.' This language raises us at once from the realm of words to that of facts, from indecisive precedents to a real principle. The Lords have used a latent power. The true question in debate is whether the worthy occasion for such use has arisen. Our first aim in this article is to show that the objects for which all Unionists are contending are of vital importance to the nation, and that in fact the power of rejecting the Budget has been used for the sake of saving the constitution. Our second and subordinate aim is to point out the means by which, and the reasons for which, Unionists may hope for success in the conflict into which they have been driven. Let it be noted, to save all misunderstanding, that we dwell upon the objects common to all Unionists. With the matters on which they are divided, such as Free-trade and Tariff Reform, we have nothing to do except to insist with Lord Cromer that they are for the moment of subordinate importance. I. The main object of every Unionist must of necessity be to repel the impending attack on the Union between Great Britain and Ireland. The existence of the Union is, if the Government obtains a majority, in deadly peril. Listen to the words of the Premier, applauded by his audience of separatists: 6 'The solution of the [Irish] problem can be found only in one way' (cries of 'Home Rule,' and cheers), 'by a policy which, while explicitly safeguarding the supreme and indefeasible authority of the Imperial Parliament, will set up in Ireland a system of full self-government' (loud cheers) in regard to purely Irish affairs' (cheers). There is not, and there cannot be, any question of separation' (cheers). There is not, and there cannot be, any question of rival or competing supremacies. But subject to those conditions, that is the Liberal policy' (cheers). For reasons which I believe to be adequate, the present Parliament was disabled in advance from proposing any such solution. But in the new House of Commons the hands of the Liberal Government and the Liberal majority will be in this matter entirely free' (cheers).* Mr Asquith, it may be, hesitates at the name of Home Rule. Let Unionists, if they doubt what the Premier means, weigh the terms-and especially the words we have italicised-in which his proposal is accepted by Mr Redmond: 'We are now in the midst of one of the greatest constitutional crises that has arisen in the history of the British Empire for over two hundred years, and what concerns us here more nearly we have before us to-day the best chance which Ireland has ever had for the last century of tearing up and trampling under foot that infamous Act of Union which has made our country impoverished, depopulated, and unhappy. I rejoice with all my heart that this great meeting-and not half those who desired to enter this hall have been let into it; more are outside than have been able to come in-I rejoice with all my heart that this great meeting of the citizens of the capital of Ireland proves they are awake to the magnitude of the issues that are at stake.'† The day of ambiguities and equivocation is at an end. Let us in the name of common-sense and common honesty hear no more of 'devolution,' 'extended self-government,' and the like cant. What the Cabinet mean to introduce is Home Rule, as understood by Mr Gladstone, and as accepted by Mr Redmond. It is nothing less than the practical repeal of the Union and the creation for the government of Ireland of an Irish executive responsible * Mr Asquith at the Albert Hall. + Mr John Redmond at Dublin. 'Times,' December 11, 1909. 'Irish Times,' December 16, 1909, p. 5. |