I beg to give Notice that on Monday next, when the Prime Minister moves to postpone the Orders of the Day, for the purpose of bringing forward the Motion of which he has given Notice, I shall oppose that Motion.

reported Her Majesty's Answer to the Address as followeth:—

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been called to the severity of the sentences passed at the Surrey Quarter Sessions; whether, on a calendar of fifty-eight prisoners in January last (of whom nine were acquitted and one adjourned), the total sentences inflicted on the remaining forty-eight convicted amounted to one hundred and twenty-six years and ten months; whether, among the number so dealt with, John. Williams, alias Jinks, for housebreaking and larceny, after previous convictions, was sentenced to twenty years' penal servitude; John Donovan, for stealing a soldier's medal, after previous convictions, to twenty years' penal servitude; and John Connell, for the same offence, also after previous convictions, to twenty years' penal servitude; whether such severity is not exceptional, but is habitually practised and avowed by the chairman as, in his opinion, the mode by which crime should be kept down; and, whether these and former sentences by the same Court have been, or will be, subjected to inquiry by the Home Office with a view to their mitigation?

My hon. and learned Friend, by his Question, seems to invite me to pass a general sentence of approval or disapproval upon the conduct of a particular Judge. Now, I have often stated, and I repeat it again, that I have no authority to do anything of the kind. I am often asked to say that a Judge's general sentences are too severe. Now, the Secretary of State has no authority to do anything of the kind; if he did, he would entirely overbear the independence of the Judges, and assume to the Executive a power which it does not possess, and which would be contrary to Constitutional principles, and would be very disadvantageous in its effect. What I can do, and what it is my duty to do is, when a particular sentence is brought to my attention by any person who accepts the responsibility of saying he thinks it ought to be re-considered, then it is my duty to consider that sentence with the view of seeing whether it is a proper subject for the exercise of the prerogative. Beyond that, in my opinion, I ought not and cannot go.

asked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland (in the absence of the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland), If his attention 1ms been called to the following extract from the "Leinster Leader" of 20th January 1882:—

"On Monday last, Captain L'Estrange, R. M., attended at Casey's public house, Castlejordan, to make inquiries relating to the firing by the police on some men seen near there on Sunday night Deeming it necessary to swear a witness, he found he had no Testament, neither had the publican. So he directed a policeman to go to Mr. Boylan, teacher of the National School, close by, and ask him for the loan of one. The sub-constable delivered the message. Mr. Boylan said he had no Testament. In a few minutes Captain L'Estrange hastily entered the school-room, accompanied by three or four policemen, and called out loudly for the teacher. Mr. Boylan said—I am the teacher. Captain L'Estrange—Take off your hat, Sir. How dare you keep on your hat in my presence. Do you know, Sir, you are in the presence of a magistrate and a gentleman? I am Captain L'Estrange, R.M. Take off your hat. Mr. Boylan—I will not take off my hat. I do not know you at all, and I think it strange any person should enter my school-room during business hours, and order me to take off my hat. Captain L'Estrange—Policeman, pull off the fellow's hat. This the policeman did, and flung it on the ground. Mr. Boylan took it up, and again put it on, when Captain L'Estrange again ordered the policeman to pull it off. This having been done with greater violence than before, Mr. Bovlan asked him what did he mean by such conduct. Captain L'Estrange—I sent to you, Sir, for a Testament. How dare you refuse it? Mr. Boylan—I told the policeman that I had no such thing, and consequently could not give it. The Captain and his party then loft Mr. Boylan to continue the business of his school, as best he might; "

whether it is true, as reported, that a violent assault was committed by Captain L'Estrange and the policemen under his command upon Mr. Boylan; and, if so, whether he intends to take any notice of the matter?

From the information with which I have been furnished, it would appear that the newspaper account of this transaction was rather coloured. It seems that the magistrate wanted a Testament in order to take sworn evidence, and, as one was not at hand, he sent a civil message to Mr. Boylan, the neighbouring national schoolmaster, for the loan of one. Mr. Boylan refused, and the magistrate then went himself to the school, introduced himself to Mr. Boylan, saluting him with ordinary courtesy, removed his own hat, stated who he was, and requested Mr. Boylan to lend him a Testament, in order that he might take an information. Mr. Boylan kept his hat on, and. refused in what seems to have been a defiant and discourteous manner. The magistrate requested him to remove his hat during the interview, and on his refusal called on a constable to remove it, which was done. With reference to the last inquiry in the hon. Member's Question, I cannot say whether the Chief Secretary considers it necessary to take any notice of the matter.

said, the right hon. and learned Member had not answered whether a violent assault was committed on Mr. Boylan by Captain L'Estrange and the policemen under his control.

There is no information furnished to me further than the assault occasioned by the removal of Mr. Boylan's hat, and which might possibly amount in law to a technical battery.

asked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, in the absence of the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether the Government propose to take any legislation or other action with respect to the Arrears Clause of the Land Act, in view of the signally inoperative character of the Clause, as shown by the Parliamentary Paper distributed this week to honourable Members, which discloses the fact that only twenty-one applications have been made under the Clause, and only eighteen, representing a total sum of £500, have been granted?

asked that the Question might be postponed until the Chief Secretary was in his place.

asked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether it is true that the Emperor of China has sanctioned, upon the Petition of the Viceroy of Nankin, an increase of the opium import duty to the extent of 140 taels, equal to £40 per chest?

Her Majesty's Government have received no information to this effect.

asked the Vice President of the Council, If his attention has been directed to the delay in carrying out the scheme for the establishment of a middle school for boys in or near the parish of Tonbridge, which was approved by Her Majesty in Council in the year 1880; and, if he could explain the causes of such delay?

The Governors have had to consider the views of the inhabitants of two different towns in the locality, and the relative advantages of several sites offered to their notice; and they are now expecting a communication from the inhabitants of one of those towns with regard to a site before asking the Charity Commissioners' approval of the same. This will, as far as can be foreseen, be done within a few weeks' time.

asked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether the Government have received from Mr. Fairfield a Report on the financial condition of Cyprus, with a view to greater economy in the administration of that island; and, whether he will lay such Report, upon the Table of the House?

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether Her Majesty's Government will consider the desirability of bringing in a Bill to remove all bars, gates, posts, and obstructions situated on private property in the Metropolis, which now hinder the free traffic of vehicles in the streets of London?

said, that, before the Question was answered, he should like to ask whether, before any steps were taken such as those suggested, the Home Secretary would consider the great advisability of persons of studious habits and of quiet occupations being still allowed to live in streets undisturbed by vehicular traffic?

gave Notice that, on an early day, he would call attention to the bars and other obstructions in the streets of London, and move a Resolution.

I give Notice that I shall oppose the Motion.

asked the Secretary to the Admiralty, Whether the tables of "Ships British and Foreign" in Sir Thomas Brassey's work on the British Navy, represent the latest information in possession of the Admiralty?

Both the tables and text of the compilation to which the Question refers were reprinted from the ordinary sources of information—English and foreign—which are open to the general public. The tables, which have been in type for a considerable time, are incomplete, and do not enable a comparison to be drawn between the state of the English Navy and those of foreign nations.

asked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether any communications have passed, or are now passing, between Her Majesty's Government and Prince Bismarck on the subject of the acquisition of Heligoland by Germany?

No, Sir. No communications whatever.

IS that answer intended to cover the unofficial communications of the new school of diplomacy?

Yes, Sir; the answer covers everything.

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been directed to, and whether he is now in a position to come to a decision upon, the conflict of jurisdiction affecting places of public amusement, under which the Metropolitan theatres and certain patent houses in the provinces are compelled to close on Ash Wednesday, while the music halls on the Surrey side, and all theatres not subject to the jurisdiction of the Lord Chamberlain, are free from such disability; and, whether the Government will endeavour to remedy the injustice whereby some thousands of people are thus denied the opportunity of earning their livelihood, while all other trades and professions may be lawfully pursued?

asked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, Whether it is proposed to disestablish a large number of clerks in the Customs, or to change their rank and conditions of service, for the purpose of introducing an administrative reform connected with the warehousing system; and, if so, whether the Government will consider the justice of offering to those clerks terms of retirement as reasonable as the terms recently granted to the clerks of the War Office and the Admiralty under similar circumstances?

We hope to provide appropriate situations for the great majority of the clerks affected by the changes referred to in the Question of my hon. Friend. As regards any who may have to be retired, the very peculiar circumstances which warranted the exceptional terms given to the War Office and Admiralty, under a special Act of Parliament, do not exist in their case; but the Superannuation Act of 1859 provides for an addition to pension in cases of abolition, of office.

asked the Secretary of State for War, Whether his attention has been called to the letter from the Berlin Correspondent of the ''Standard,'' in that journal of yesterday, referring to an expression of opinion by Count von Moltke as to the proposed Channel Tunnel; and, whether he has ascertained that those opinions are correctly reported therein?

My hon. Friend will forgive my saying that among the very multifarious duties of my Office is not that of finding out whether the foreign Correspondents of The Standard newspaper accurately ascertain the opinions of distinguished persons; but the reports of The Standard are usually so correct that I presume that the officer whom the Correspondent describes as Europe's greatest strategist has expressed himself in the language attributed to him.

said: I feel it an act of courtesy, and even of justice, to hon. Gentlemen who belonged to the late Government that I should add one word to an answer I recently gave with respect to the Channel Tunnel. My answer was in the nature simply of a very brief recital, and it faithfully, though slightly, set forth everything that was then within my knowledge and recollection. The effect of it was that the Channel Tunnel had received some description of sanction from the late as well as from the present Parliament, and likewise from the late Government in its Executive capacity. It was not then within my recollection, but that recollection has since been refreshed, that the question of the Channel Tunnel was not only before the late Government, but before their Predecessors. I think on one occasion the promoters felt themselves to be so strong in public opinion that they applied to the Cabinet of that day—or the Chancellor of the Exchequer of that day—not only for approval, but for a public guarantee at the charge of the Exchequer. That was declined; but in 1872 the Foreign Office—the proper Department for expressing the views of the Government on such a question—made a communication to the promoters of the scheme equivalent, I think, exactly to what was afterwards made by the Government of the Gentlemen opposite—namely, a communication that in principle, and generally the Government saw no reason to object to the prosecution of the Tunnel. The House will feel it is only right that I should make this statement, to show that while the approval of the late Government was given, that was not the first approval given, and, indeed, I cannot say that there may not be previous approvals. If I find such I shall take an opportunity of mentioning it.

I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War, Whether it is intended to present to the House any Supplementary Army Estimates; and, if so, when?

In reply to my right hon. Friend, I have to say that we have no Supplementary Estimates to present, nor do I anticipate that we shall have any occasion to come to Parliament for any Supplementary Vote on account of Army Services.

I beg to ask when it is proposed to make a Statement with regard to the Navy Estimates?

The question of the Navy Estimates, and the time for bringing them forward, is really dependent upon the general state of the Business of the House. It is impossible, until we see our way more distinctly with regard to that general state, to fix any day for a Statement on that subject. Of course, due Notice will be given, so that no one shall be taken by surprise.

I wish to ask leave of the House to make a correction. Last night I stated that I would look again into what I said about the question of closing power in the Colonial Assemblies, and I am sorry to say that I made a mistake, which was due to infirmity of sight. I believe the case to be that there is a closing power in the Legislative Assemblies of the Cape, South Australia, and Victoria, and that there is no closing power in the central Assembly of the Dominion of Canada, Tasmania, or New Zealand.

asked the indulgence of the House to make a personal explanation. He was not in the House on Thursday last when the Attorney General for Ireland was making his speech; but his attention had been directed to an assertion of the right hon. and learned Gentleman in support of the charge of treasonable practices with which he assailed a number of the political opponents of the Government. The right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland said that, in October last, he (Mr. O'Donnell) stated that nobody minded the Government of Mr. Gladstone, and that that expression was made against the Government of the Queen. That charge was as gross as it was unfounded. He had always, both in Ireland and in this country, undeviatingly supported the advice of Mr. Paraell, for which his distinguished Colleague had been arrested, that "the Irish contest should be maintained within the lines of the Constitution." He had never in any way spoken against the authority and Government of Her Gracious Majesty; but he had condemned the Government of Mr. Gladstone, as he had a right to do, in the country as in his place in Parliament. He had, like scores of English speakers, described Mr. Gladstone's Government as entirely devoid of influence in Ireland, and as being without any moral force behind him. He had never in any way confounded the Government of the Member for Mid Lothian with the permanent Constitution of the Queen's Government. On the contrary, he had repeatedly, both in Ireland and England, spoken of the right hon. Gentleman's Government as being—[Cries of "Oh, oh!" and "Order!"]

This House is always indulgent to a Member who desires to make a personal explanation; but it appears to me the hon. Member is going beyond the bounds of personal explanation.

said, at another time he could have afforded to treat with silent contempt the baseless and imaginary assertion of the Attorney General for Ireland; but in presence of the manner in which not only personal reputation, but liberty itself, was assailed upon such trumped-up stories, he had felt obliged to take this much notice of the reckless licence of a salaried tongue.

said, he would venture to submit to the consideration of the House a slight Amendment to the Motion of the hon. Member for Northampton. The Amendment might appear to be a merely verbal one; but it contained, as he thought he should be able to show, an important difference. The Motion of the hon. Member stated that Mr. Bradlaugh had been prevented by Resolution of the House from taking and subscribing the Oath prescribed by law. Now, he proposed to leave out that part of the Motion and to make it read that a new Writ be issued for the borough of Northampton in the room of Mr. Charles Bradlaugh, who was disqualified by law from taking his seat in this House. The wording of the Motion of the hon. Member, the particular words he made use of, "by Resolution of this House," implied two things—first, that the House had acted in an arbitrary manner; that by a vote agreed to, perhaps after insufficient consideration with regard to the law, the House had resolved that Mr. Bradlaugh was not to take the Oath. That was altogether in opposition to the views which had been taken on that (the Opposition) side of the House. The Motion also seemed to imply that the disqualification of Mr. Bradlaugh was or might be a temporary disqualification, which might be reversed at any moment. He did not think that was the view of hon. Members who voted against Mr. Bradlaugh. They did not admit either that the House had acted in an arbitrary manner or without consideration as to the law, or that Mr. Bradlaugh's disqualification was in any way temporary. They asserted, on the contrary, that the House had merely interpreted the law of the land, and that Mr. Bradlaugh was ipso facto disqualified from taking the Oath prescribed by law. Mr. Bradlaugh came to the Table of the House early in 1880, and claimed to make an Affirmation; and it was that claim, and nothing else, that instructed the House as to his peculiar religious opinions. It was not his letter in The Times. The House appointed a Committee, which reported that he could not legally affirm, and that Report was confirmed by a large majority of the House. A second Committee was appointed to inquire whether he could take the Oath—because he claimed to do so. That Committee reported that he could not take the Oath; and the House confirmed that decision. That decision rested on the broad ground that Atheists, by the law of England as laid down by Judges of the highest authority were incapable of taking an oath. The Evidence Amendment Act, passed to enable Atheists to give evidence in Courts of Justice, had never been held to apply to a promissory Oath. The result of the debates in the House was not arrived at after heated, tumultuous, or Party discussions, but after calm investigation in Committees and in the House; and those who opposed Mr. Bradlaugh's claim maintained that the decision which had been come to had been guided by nothing but the strict law of England. If that were so, then there were only two courses now open to the House. The one was to alter the law, and he had never been able to understand why the Government, having brought in a Bill through the Attorney General last (Session, had apparently abandoned that Bill. He did not know whether they had altogether abandoned that measure; but in the absence of any intention on their part to introduce it, the only other alternative was for the House to issue the Writ. The only other course for the House to adopt was to introduce a Bill dealing with the subject. He would refer to what happened in the case of Mr. O'Donovan Rossa. He—Mr. O'DonovanRossa—was declared by the House to be incapable of taking his seat. Certainly that was for a different reason; but he was declared to be absolutely disqualified, and a new Writ was immediately issued. If Mr. Bradlaugh, then, was disqualified by law from sitting and taking the Oath, they must follow the precedent he had mentioned and issue a new Writ for the borough of Northampton. He moved his Amendment, that those who supported these views might not be supposed to support the contention that Mr. Bradlaugh was prevented by the House from taking the Oath, whereas he was prevented from doing so by the law of the land.

said, he was unwilling to enter into a discussion upon the matter, which did not affect one side of the House more than the other; but he trusted the House would allow him to place before it a few conside- rations, which might serve to guide them in their determination of the subject. The Motion of his hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, as he understood the view which he had presented to the House, proceeded upon the assumption that, inasmuch as Mr. Brad-laugh had been prevented by a vote of the House from taking the Oath prescribed by the Statute, the House should proceed by Resolution to expel him. Of course, the House would not take that step without, to some extent, considering whether there was any precedent for that course. Hon. Members would recollect, in respect to Oaths in former times, that there were three Oaths which had to be taken before a Member could enter the House—namely, the Oath of Supremacy, the Oath of Allegiance, under the Statute of 30 Charles II., and the Oath of Abjuration. As to the two former Oaths, they were imposed as tests of loyalty and religious opinion; and as to the two former, the practice of the House was not to wait until Members came to take the Oath, but to send for them, and, if they did not appear at the Table to prove their loyalty and adherence to the Protestant religion, they were summoned to the Bar, and then compelled to take the Oath, or told they were not fit to be Members of that House. When a Member was expelled for not taking an Oath, which he was bound to take, he was even liable to be sent to the Tower for this neglect. He was sure the House would see that precedents of such a nature were not binding upon them—the feelings which then existed having long since passed away. In the case of Mr. Archdale, in 1693, being a Quaker, he wrote to the House, saying that he could not take the Oath; whereupon, without explanation, and apparently without debate, a new Writ was immediately issued for the borough he represented. But that was in accordance with the spirit of that time, which was very different from that which now existed. In the case of Mr. Pease, in 1833, that Gentleman was allowed to make an Affirmation, and a new Writ was consequently not issued. Then, again, there was the case of Mr. O'Connell, in the year 1829, who had been elected before the passing of the Roman Catholic Disabilities Removal Act. After the passing of that Act he presented himself to the House, and sought to take the new Oath created by it; but the majority of the House resolved that he could not take advantage of that Act, inasmuch as he was elected before it came into operation. When called upon to take the Oath of Supremacy he refused to do so, stating that, to his knowledge, it asserted one thing that was false, and another that was not true. A new Writ was issued for County Clare, apparently without much objection, for Mr. O'Connell would have incurred a penalty of £500 for every time he sat and voted in the House. He was willing to go back to his constituents, and they elected him again. But Mr. Brougham protested that the House had no power to issue a new Writ unless a Member sat and voted without taking the Oath. The House would recollect that before the year 1850 Baron Rothschild was elected for the City of London. He appeared at the Table of the House, and took the Oaths of Supremacy and Allegiance, those Oaths not containing the words "upon the true faith of a Christian." But when he came to the Oath of Abjuration, he refused to use these words, and the question then arose whether he could be said to have taken "the Oath" as prescribed by the Statute. Immediately after his refusal, Sir Frederick Thesiger moved that a new Writ should be issued for the City of London. Sir John Romilly doubted whether that was the proper course, and after some debate time was given to the Law Officers for the consideration of the question; and after five days had elapsed the Attorney General expressed most strongly his certain conviction that the House had no power to issue a new Writ and declare the seat vacant. Sir John Romilly acquiesced in this, and Sir Frederick Thesiger's Motion was withdrawn, and there was no new Writ issued. Legislation on this question was never attempted to be carried out until 1858. He must confess that he could not distinguish between the case of Baron Rothschild and Mr. Bradlaugh, except in one particular, which seemed to strengthen the argument against this Motion. Baron Rothschild refused to take the Oath because it contained the words "upon the true faith of a Christian." Mr. Bradlaugh had done no such thing; he was willing to take the Oath. Therefore, the result of the proposal of the hon. Member for Northampton was that Mr. Bradlaugh having come to that Table, and having said that he was willing to take the Oath, the House was about to expel him. Before that course was adopted, good cause ought to be shown for expulsion. In the case of Mr. Wilkes, the expulsion was carried out for reasons which seemed to satisfy the majority of the House. If it were thought that Mr. Bradlaugh ought not to take his seat in that House, let the matter be decided according to legal principles and by a legal tribunal. If hon. Members asserted that he could not legally sit and vote, what could be easier than to let Mr. Bradlaugh sit in that House, and so raise the question of his legal right so to do? Of course, he would not, by sitting, be relieved of the penalties imposed by the Act of 1866. If the noble Lord was right Mr. Bradlaugh never could be elected. If the electors of Northampton were wrong in electing Mr. Bradlaugh, that was a matter which should be tried on legal principles and by a legal tribunal. He had heard in the course of that debate that that was the result of the House refusing to allow Mr. Bradlaugh to take the Oath, and that the constituency should have an opportunity of re-electing Mr. Bradlaugh, or of electing a fresh Member. But he would remind the House that the constituency had made no sign in this matter. They, with knowledge of the difficulty that had arisen, had elected him a second time. If there was any question between Mr. Bradlaugh and his constituents, there was the course that was pursued by Baron Rothschild in applying for the Chiltern Hundreds, so as to give his constituents an opportunity of re-electing or rejecting him. The House could take no notice of the fact that the Motion was made by Mr. Bradlaugh's Colleague. They must treat it in the same way as if it were a hostile Motion emanating from an ordinary Member. He hoped the House would not allow this matter to be entangled with the position of Mr. Bradlaugh. This was a precedent which would have to be considered; and he hoped that it would not be said that for the sake of a man's religion—for that was the object of the noble Lord—the House had proceeded to expel a duly elected Member. That disability, if it existed, ought to be declared much more distinctly, and ought to be a matter of legal decision. He had himself kept away from any consideration affecting the question of Mr. Bradlaugh's position; and he trusted that they would follow the example set in 1850, acting not in a narrow, bigoted spirit, and not punishing a man for his religious opinion or want of it. He hoped the House would come to the conclusion that neither the Motion nor the Amendment of the noble Lord ought to be adopted.

said, bethought before coming to a vote on this question the House should be informed whether the Motion was made with the assent and consent of Mr. Bradlaugh himself. He could hardly imagine that the Motion was put forward for mere purpose of discussion. If it was not by his desire, he should be disposed to move that Mr. Bradlaugh should be entitled to be heard at the Bar by himself or counsel at his option before the House came to any determination on the subject; but if they did not have that information—if they were not informed that it was made with the consent of Mr. Bradlaugh himself—he should like to learn whether the Motion was seriously made, and intended to be pressed to a division with the object of carrying it, or whether it was simply made with the object of raising—he would not say a counterfeit debate, for that expression might not be strictly Parliamentary—but an unreal debate, and not for the purpose of deciding the question before them. He confessed he did not follow all the observations made by the Attorney General. He thought the hon. and learned Gentleman had slightly misstated the effect of the Rothschild precedent, because in that case. Sir Frederick Thesiger urged to the last that the proper course in the event of a Member refusing to take the Oath was to issue a new Writ; and he would challenge the Attorney General to show anything to the contrary. Ultimately the House in that case agreed to a Resolution pledging it, at the earliest opportunity in the following Session,

"To take into serious consideration the form of the Oath of Allegiance, with a view to the relief of those of Her Majesty's subjects professing the Jewish religion."

The hon. and learned Gentleman had said more than once that Mr. Bradlaugh had not refused to take the Oath. That involved this fallacy—that the Attorney General appeared to assume that the act of repeating certain words was taking the Oath. What happened in Baron Rothschild's case was this—that he did not refuse to take the Oath, and upon that turned the whole debate; but when he came to the words—"On the true faith of a Christian," instead of refusing to utter those words, he substituted the words "So help me God;" and what was maintained was that the substance and meaning of the Oath had been taken, and that the omitted words were not of the essence of the Oath, and that, therefore, Baron Rothschild was not affected, because he had, in effect, taken the Oath. In Mr. Bradlaugh's case what they had to consider was whether the mere repeating of certain words could properly be considered an Oath, which, according to the universally-accepted dictum of Lord Hardwicke, involved an appeal to the Supreme Being. Mr. Bradlaugh, on coming forward, said virtually—"I am an Atheist, and I seek to take the Oath provided for Atheists in Courts of Justice;" and from that hour he had never departed from that position. He said, though not in so many words—"Although I am an Atheist, I will repeat the words of the Oath which appeal to a Supreme Being." There was a difference between incapacity to sit and vote and incapacity to be elected. It was so in the previous cases. There was no disqualification; but the House had called upon them to show whether they were competent to sit and vote. Mr. Bradlaugh was originally competent to be elected; he had been elected; but then came the question what the Legislature had provided. Before he could sit and vote the Legislature had said—in perfectly unmistakable terms—that no person without religious belief should sit and vote in that House; and it had said, with respect to one class of persons who objected to the Oath on religious grounds, that they should make an Affirmation. If they were to understand that the Motion was made with Mr. Bradlaugh's assent, and at his desire, he should vote for the Amendment of his noble Friend. If, on the other hand, they were to understand that the Motion was adverse to Mr. Bradlaugh, he would invite the House not to come to any determination of the question until Mr. Bradlaugh had been heard at the Bar either in person or through counsel.

said, the Motion was not only made with the sanction of Mr. Bradlaugh, but at his desire. Mr. Bradlaugh had considered, rightly or wrongly, that it was a duty to his constituents, so long as he remained their Member, and so long as the constituency was not fully represented in the House, to ask the House to do what this Motion proposed. He (Mr. Labouchere) confessed that when this course was proposed to him he was rather 1oth to take it, as it appeared to be somewhat of a reflection upon Mr. Bradlaugh; but as it was a personal matter regarding his Colleague, he (Mr. Labouchere) thought it would be better to do what was asked of him. With regard to the Amendment of the noble Lord the Member for Woodstock, he need not say that he could not accept it. The noble Lord had said that his (Mr. Labouchere's) Resolution implied that the House had acted in an arbitrary manner towards Mr. Bradlaugh. Now, the Resolution implied nothing of the sort. It simply set forth the Resolutions which had been passed by that House, and did not imply that the House had acted in an unfair or an arbitrary manner. With respect to what had been said by the Attorney General, he could only point out that the effect of his argument was a reductio ad absurdum. Supposing in the next Parliament 40 Gentlemen were to come down to the House and take the Oath, they would constitute a House, and they might pass a Resolution stating that no other Member should be allowed to take his seat in the House; they might carry on the Business of Parliament and vote for or against any measures they liked. He did not wish to raise a Bradlaugh debate, and had, therefore, limited himself to the facts as they had occurred. He simply contended that the Constitutional doctrine was that although the House might disqualify a Member, and had disqualified a Member, it was bound, as soon as possible, to fill up his place by the issue of a new Writ.

said, he should support neither the Motion nor the Amendment. He did not infer from any of the Resolutions that had been passed by the House that the seat had been vacated; and it did not, therefore, seem to him to be Constitutional to issue a new Writ. If it were intended to expel Mr. Bradlaugh, that must be done by a direct Motion.

said, he should, if necessary, vote against the original Motion of the hon. Member for Northampton, and against the Amendment of the noble Lord. The original Motion practically amounted to an expulsion of Mr. Bradlaugh. He could not agree that there was any grievance in the matter, because if Mr. Bradlaugh were aggrieved by his present position, he could accept the Chiltern Hundreds, and if the borough of Northampton were aggrieved, they could petition that House to issue a new Writ. He, for one, could not give up the hope that there would be legislation on this matter. He could never understand why Her Majesty's Government had taken the line they had done when Mr. Bradlaugh came to the Table to take the Oath. It would have been very much better had Her Majesty's Government left this matter of controversy outside their conscience, and had dealt with it by Bill. There was a considerable number of Members in that House, who, while they objected to what they regarded as the profanation of the Oath by its being taken by Mr. Bradlaugh, would willingly consent to pass a measure to enable hon. Members to either take the Oath or make an Affirmation at their option. He believed that the proper course for Mr. Bradlaugh to take was to remain in the House while a hope of such legislation being carried was entertained, and that he ought to sit under the Gallery, as he was then doing, and ought not to attempt to come up to the Table to take the Oath, because he had ascertained that there was a strong feeling in the House against that course. He suggested to the Government that they should pass some general measure on the subject. Unless the Government met this matter boldly, they would be only leading the House from one difficulty into another. It was idle to say they had no time for it, for they were continually losing time on this question which would be saved if they disposed of it once and for ever.

said, there were only two cases in which the House could declare the seat vacant—when the House held the Member disqualified by Statute or by Law of Parliament, and when the Member had himself petitioned on the ground of disqualification. Neither of these things had happened; and it was, therefore, not in the power of the House to issue a new Writ.

said, that he would never consent to the expulsion of a Member because of the views which he entertained with regard to religion. He thought that the House committed an error when Mr. Bradlaugh came back, after his second election, in interposing between him and the Oath. There was a Member who was not legally disqualified, and yet they refused to allow him to go through the form incumbent upon him by law before taking his seat. This was unfair to the constituency, as well as the Member, and some steps ought to be taken to relieve that constituency from the position in which it was placed. The House did not take upon itself to declare the seat vacant in the case of Baron Rothschild, because it had no right to do so, and à fortiori it had no right to do so in the present case, when the Member had come forward and claimed to take the Oath. The House had taken a false position in the matter, and he could not, therefore, support the Motion of the hon. Gentleman.

, on a point of Order, asked the Speaker whether there was anything in the Resolutions quoted by the hon. Member which created a vacancy in the representation of Northampton; and, if not, whether it was possible to move for a new Writ?

The hon. Member asks me my opinion upon a point which seems to me to be rather a matter for the House than for the Chair to decide.

said, that, in his opinion, the Motion proposed by the hon. Member for Northampton had for its object the defeat of the course which the House had by Resolution adopted for testing the legality of Mr. Bradlaugh's sitting and voting in the House. The House had by Resolution referred this matter to the Courts of Law. The case under which Mr. Bradlaugh was being sued for penalties was still before the Courts of Law, and the House had intimated that it would be bound by the decision of the Courts of Law. He understood that the Courts of Law had declared that Mr. Bradlaugh's sitting and voting in the House was illegal; but no penalty had yet been recovered. He believed, however, that a penalty would be recovered the following day, unless Mr. Bradlaugh pursued his vexatious and collusive course of litigation still further, for the purpose of delay, by appealing to the House of Lords. But if Mr. Bradlaugh came and sat and voted in the House, he would expose himself on every occasion that he did so to a fresh penalty. The difficulty which had been encountered by those who endeavoured to exact the penalties would be found in an attempt to defeat the penalty by collusion, for Mr. Bradlaugh had admitted that many of the penalties for which he was sued were sought by a friend of his, a Mr. Swaagman, whose action was collusive. In fact, the Courts of Law were delayed by collusive litigation on the part of Mr. Bradlaugh; but if he came afresh to this House there were those, he (Mr. Newdegate) had no doubt, who would make it very difficult for Mr. Bradlaugh any longer to delay the decision of the Courts of Law by means of collusive actions. The Motion now made was clearly an attempt to defeat the Resolution of the House, which had referred the case of Mr. Bradlaugh to the Courts of Law. He (Mr. Newdegate) had not the slightest doubt of the illegality of Mr. Bradlaugh's attempt to take the Oath; and what had been stated by the hon. and learned Gentleman the late Solicitor General (Sir Hardinge Giffard) was to his mind conclusive, to the effect that Mr. Bradlaugh was legally disqualified from sitting and voting in the House. That was his (Mr. Newdegate's) clear conviction; but he should be guided by the course which his hon. and learned Friend described, although he ventured to express a hope that the House would not allow itself to be entrapped into the adoption of the now proposed Resolution, which seemed to him futile in every sense, except that it was expressly intended to extract a decision from the House, which would be directly contradictory to the course the House had adopted as a means for referring the case of Mr. Bradlaugh to the Courts of Law.

said, that the hon. Member for Northampton must be aware that the Motion would not be carried by the majority. He must know that the chances of a return of a Conservative for the borough were exceedingly favourable if the seat were declared vacant; and, as every vote was important at the present time, of course the Resolution. could not be accepted. He suggested to the hon. Member that he would consult the convenience of the House, and would only be acting up to his own previous declarations, if he desisted from the course he was pursuing, and considering the penalties in store for taking unnecessary divisions, decide to go no further.

said, he felt that the House was placed in a certain difficulty with regard to this Motion. With regard to the particular question which was before them-namely, whether, if the Motion was to be made and entertained by the House, it should rest the issue of a Writ on the grounds stated in the original Motion of the hon. Member for Northampton, or whether it should rest the case for the issue of a Writ on the words suggested by his noble Friend the Member for Woodstock, he felt no doubt whatever. His opinion was that, if a Writ was to be issued, it should be done in the words suggested by his noble Friend; because he was entirely of opinion that, as matters now stood, Mr. Bradlaugh was disqualified by law from sitting and voting in the House, and it was upon that ground alone that the Writ should be issued. At the same time, he would point out that although it might be the case that Mr. Bradlaugh was at this moment disqualified by law from sitting in the House, it had been admitted that he was not disqualified by law from being elected. There was no question about that; and, therefore, it rested with the House whether it would at the present time, and under the present circumstances, and upon the application of the hon. Member, proceed to issue a Writ for filling up the vacancy. He apprehended, although the case had been argued by the lawyers on both sides, that the House would be within its rights in issuing a Writ under the circumstances, although considerable doubt had been thrown by the Attorney General on the legal position of the case. But it did not, of course, follow because the House had the right to issue a new Writ that it was necessary they should do so. The course that had been taken with regard to Mr. Bradlaugh had been one of a very simple and decisive character. They had stood upon this ground—When the hon. Gen- tleman came to the Table and asked to affirm a Committee was appointed which came to the conclusion that he ought not to be allowed to affirm. That Committee assented to the position which Mr. Bradlaugh claimed to have—namely, that he was not a person upon whose conscience an Oath would be binding; but, while admitting that, they did not admit that he was covered by the Statute which had been passed for enabling persons in that position to substitute a declaration for an Oath. Subsequently the Courts of Law confirmed that judgment, and said he was not a proper person to come within the benefit of the Statute, although they admitted that he was a person of such opinions that he was not capable of taking an Oath. That being the case, the question again came before the House in respect to Mr. Bradlaugh having, by his own confession or statement, shown that he was a person not competent to take the Oath when he came to the House and proposed to go through the form of taking the Oath. The House thereupon took the position which was perfectly simple and intelligible, and he was perfectly satisfied that it had done right—that it would not permit the form of the Oath to be gone through by a person who could not conscientiously take an Oath. It was upon that that they took their stand, and they went no further. As he understood the question, a new Writ might, of course, have been moved for, and Mr. Bradlaugh would, under those circumstances, have been naturally called to the Bar, and have been allowed an opportunity of stating his reasons against the proposal. The House would then have decided whether or not they would do that which they supposed it was within their discretion to do—to issue a Writ. Mr. Bradlaugh had not done that; but, instead, had taken the course of requesting his Colleague to come there and on his behalf, and, he supposed, on that of the constituency also, to move that a now Writ might be issued. The obvious remark that occurred to one in such a matter was, that that was a very strange proceeding to take. If the constituency of Northampton desired that a new Writ should be issued, he should have thought that there would have been some Petitions to the House on the subject; and if Mr. Bradlaugh, on his part, desired to be relieved from the position in which he at present stood, there was nothing in the world to prevent his accepting the Chiltern Hundreds, and in that way vacating his seat. He felt very much at a loss to understand upon what ground it was that the present step was taken, or what was the object of the hon. Member for Northampton in the step he had taken. He confessed that, coming from the quarter which it did, and considering the views which the hon. Gentleman had always expressed with regard to Mr. Bradlaugh, he looked upon the move with some suspicion. The hon. Member, he believed, had given Notice of his intention to introduce a Bill which, in all probability, from what they had heard, would, if it was passed into law, remove the difficulty altogether; and he could not understand why at the present moment the hon. Member was disposed to press on this particular solution of the question in the form he now proposed it. Of course there had been private intimations, and statements had been made in newspapers that it was likely that the Motion would he made; but the Motion being now brought forward without Notice, the House was to a great extent taken by surprise.

I could not give Notice of the Motion without losing its priority as a question of Privilege.

said, he did not for a moment mean to blame the hon. Member for not having given Notice; all he intended to say was that the House, in its corporate character, had been taken by surprise. Under the circumstances, therefore, he did not think that they should, without further explanation of the grounds on which Mr. Bradlaugh took this step, instead of himself either taking the Chiltern Hundreds, or instead of his constituency coming forward and presenting a Petition on the subject, exercise their discretion in the sense of issuing a Writ at the present time. As far as he could make out, it was a matter upon which the House had a perfect right to exercise its discretion, and he did not see sufficient grounds for issuing a Writ at the present time.

I must point out that the House has negatived the latter part of the Resolution of the hon. Member for Northampton, and also the Amendment of the noble Lord the Member for Woodstock. The words of the Resolution which is now before the House are these—

"That Mr. Speaker do issue his Warrant to the Clerk of the Crown to make out a new Writ for the Election of a Member to serve in this present Parliament, in the room of Charles Bradlaugh, esquire, who."

Might I be allowed to add the words, "who has been twice prevented from taking the Oath prescribed by law?"

Does the hon. Member propose that the Question should be put to the House?

Yes, Sir, without the word "who."

The only course that I can adopt is to put the Question to the House as it stands. The House can say "Aye" or "No."

I have to remind the hon. Member of the Resolution of this House of the 7th of February, and in pursuance of that Resolution, I have now to order the hon. Member to withdraw below the Bar.

I obey your direction, Sir, and withdraw below the Bar; but I have now taken the Oath, and shall now take my seat.

The hon. Member has not carried out my directions, which were that he should withdraw below the Bar.

I did obey your directions, Sir; and now, having, in pursuance of the law, taken and subscribed the Oath, according to law, I have taken my seat.

In pursuance of the Order of the House of the 7th of February, I must call upon the hon. Member now to withdraw below the Bar, and to remain there.

I obey your directions, Sir, having taken my seat according to law and claiming my right to take it.

On a Question of Privilege, Sir, I beg to submit to the House that the seat for Northampton has now been vacated. The hon. Member for Northampton having taken his seat in this House without having taken and subscribed the Oath provided by law in the manner and in accordance with the Statute, his seat has been vacated, in the words of the Statute, "as if he were dead." I therefore, Sir, beg to move—

"That Mr. Speaker do issue his Warrant to the Clerk of the Crown to make out a new Writ for the election of a Member to serve in this present Parliament for the Borough of Northampton, in the room of Charles Bradlaugh, esquire, who, since his election, has sat in the House without having taken and subscribed the Oath according to Law."

I am sure the House will fully understand the importance of this question, and enter with deliberation into it, and not hastily, under the excitement produced by the hon. Member for Northampton having taken the course he has done. I have to ask the House whether it will not take time for further consideration. I am not overstating it at this present moment; but I think the House will see that a very grave matter indeed has to be considered before going forward with this Motion. The House will not, perhaps, bear in mind the exact words of the Statute on which alone the noble Lord can found his Motion, and perhaps they will forgive me if I read them. It first deals with the case of the House of Lords—

"If any Member of the House of Peers votes by himself or his Proxy in the House of Peers, or sits as a Peer during any debate in the said House, without having made and subscribed the Oath hereby appointed, he shall for every such offence he subject to a Penalty of Five hundred Pounds."

The section then proceeds to the Members of the House of Commons—

"And if any Member of the House of Commons votes as such in the said House, or sits during any debate after the Speaker has been chosen, without having made and subscribed the Oath hereby appointed, he shall be subject to a like Penalty for every such offence, and in addition to such Penalty his Seat shall be vacated in the same manner as if he were dead."

The words to which I would draw attention are—"Or sits during any debate after the Speaker has been chosen"—[Cries of "Finish!"]—and "in addition to such penalty his seat shall be vacated." Of course, I thought the House was aware of that. The noble Lord has drawn the Motion, which he has put into the Speaker's hands, omitting the words "or sits during any debate." There are several questions before this House. There is, first, the question, on which I have expressed no opinion whatever, whether what the hon. Member has done has been a taking of the Oath at all. The House has prescribed 110 manner in which the Oath shall be taken, except that it should be taken at the Table. ["Oh, oh!"] I say that I express no opinion upon that point, especially in face of the Resolution arrived at that he should not take it. I do not commit myself to saying that is a taking of the Oath. But I do say that if the hon. Member has been advised to take this course, and has been advised that thereby he has fulfilled the necessity imposed upon him by the 3rd section of the Act, this House ought not to deprive him by immediate Resolution of taking the course of trying the validity of his claim. If he be wrong in what he is doing, he has subjected himself to a penalty of £500, which can be recovered in a Court of Law, and he can be prevented sitting again, and his seat will become vacant. But there is another very grave question involved. Has the hon. Member "sat" in this House during any debate? On that point also I must not express any opinion; but the impression on my mind is that the hon. Member has not sat during any debate. There was no Question before the House; and I ask you, Sir, whether it can be said—I am not cavilling with technicalities—there was any Question before the House, or that he can be said to have "sat" during any debate? I admit this is a new point; but is the House now about to act upon the construction of the Statute upon the spur of the moment, and without consideration? If the hon. Member has sat during the debate, that legal question can be tested in a Court of Law, and he can be made to suffer the penalty of £500; and in. consequence of that the seat will become vacant. I appeal to the House whether they think it right, these grave questions being involved, to accept off-hand the Motion of the noble Lord, and to set aside a judicial question which can be decided most properly in a Court of Law.

I wish, Sir, to make a suggestion. The question can be referred to a judicial tribunal if any person takes action against Mr. Bradlaugh. We may assume that someone who agrees with the noble Lord the Member for Woodstock that Mr. Brad-laugh has sat in this House and taken the Oath will do so. I have just been to Mr. Bradlaugh to ask him whether he agrees to this. ["Oh, oh!"] Hon. Members say "Oh, oh!" but surely this is a judicial question, and I must ask hon. Gentlemen on the other side of the House to look at it fairly. The allegation of the noble Lord on the other side is that Mr. Bradlaugh has sat in this House without taking the Oath prescribed by law. Mr. Brad-laugh's contention, on the other hand is that he has taken the Oath as prescribed by law, and, consequently, that he has a legal right to sit. I suggested to Mr. Bradlaugh just now that the question might be at once decided by a Court of Law if any Gentleman will—and I presume that course will be taken at once—take action against Mr. Bradlaugh. It might be decided in 10 or 12 days. At the same time, as the point has been raised whether Mr. Bradlaugh did sit during the debate, Mr. Bradlaugh agrees that he will not raise that point, but will accept the view of the noble Lord that he has sat, and during those 10 or 12 days, or any reasonable time that may be necessary, Mr. Bradlaugh will not sit and vote in this House, but will keep outside the Bar. I think that is a fair and reasonable proposal to make; and I appeal to the hon. Gentle- men opposite whether it is not one that ought to be accepted?

I venture to suggest, in reply to the observations of the hon. and learned Attorney General and of the hon. Member for Northampton, that the House has only one course to pursue. Mr. Bradlaugh has deliberately, with intention, and, I may almost say, of malice aforethought, offered a wanton insult to the House of Commons. This is not the first time that the House of Commons has been deliberately insulted by Mr. Bradlaugh. We have not forgotten the disgraceful scenes that took place last Session—the riot stimulated in the Lobby by Mr. Bradlaugh endeavouring to force his way into the House by sheer muscular force. There will not be any Member of the House who does not severely blame Mr. Bradlaugh for the course and conduct he adopted that day. ["No, no!"] An hon. Member dissents; but I venture to think that they are in a very small minority, and a minority not worthy of very high consideration, who are of opinion that Mr. Bradlaugh's conduct on that occasion was not deserving of the utmost censure. Well, the House of Commons, after a deliberate discussion—a discussion without the slightest passion on one side or the other—arrived at the conclusion that Mr. Bradlaugh was incapable of taking the Oath. [Cries of "Order" and "Spoke!"] I think I have the right to reply. This Resolution of the House Mr. Bradlaugh has deliberately contemned, and in a manner, perhaps, the most insulting that could be imagined. He, an avowed Atheist, advances to this Table, pulls out of his pocket a Testament, or what purports to be a Testament—for we have not the slightest guarantee that it was not The Fruits of Philosophy——

Mr. Speaker, I rise to a point of Order. The noble Lord has moved a Resolution; but, as I understand, no Amendment has been moved since. Has the noble Lord a right to address the House?

The noble Lord has submitted to the House a substantive Motion, and he is entitled to reply.

I was saying that the House has no guarantee whatever that the book which Mr. Bradlaugh produced was a New Testament. I was not in the House at the time; but I understand that Mr. Bradlaugh went to the Table and signed a piece of paper, which he found at the Table, or which he produced out of his pocket. And he has the extraordinary—what shall I say?—the insanity to imagine that such a course of conduct as that—such a pretence of complying with a most sacred and solemn form, is not the most deliberate insult which could be offered to the House. May I point out what is the conduct of the Government under these circumstances? The Attorney General—the learned Attorney General—gets up in his place, and contends that legally that may have been a taking of the Oath prescribed by law. He carefully guarded himself from saying it was not so. This book—this piece of paper—the learned Attorney General will not affirm did not constitute a legal taking of the Oath. Really, I do submit to the House that we have tolerated enough of the insults and violence and threats of force from Mr. Bradlaugh. It is high time that the House should assert its dignity, and the only way in which it can do so is by taking prompt and decisive action. The words of the Statute declare that a Member having sat in the House without having taken the Oath prescribed by law vacates his seat as if he were dead. [Mr. LABOUCHERE: In a Court of Law.] These matters have nothing to do with a Court of Law. It is matter within the competence of the House itself; and I do not think hon. Gentlemen on this side of the House will care to relegate the question to the decision of the Courts of Law. I therefore implore the House to act promptly in this matter, and take instant notice of the insulting action that Mr. Bradlaugh, in defiance of your orders, Mr. Speaker, to him, has taken, and to declare instantly that the seat for Northampton is vacant.

I shall endeavour to discuss the matter which is before us in the spirit of calmness in which my hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General has approached it, and in which, so far as I can judge, it will be approached, if approached at all, by the great majority of the more responsible Members of this House. I make this observation on the speech of the noble Lord (Lord Randolph Churchill)— that it is hardly relevant, so far as I can understand, to the Motion which he has submitted to the House. ["Oh!"] I am sorry to hear an observation from the hon. Member for Eye (Mr. Ashmead-Bartlett). He should restrain the enthusiasm of his soul. This is a matter which, it appears to me, we ought to argue in the driest possible manner, and with an absolute determination to restrain every excess of feeling which might possibly divert us from the strict path of duty. Now, the inconsistency which I perceived in the speech of the noble Lord is this—that it was entirely addressed to the point that Mr. Bradlaugh had deliberately insulted the House of Commons. That, I consider, might very properly be made a subject of a Motion to that effect; and if made the subject of a Motion to that effect, and the House of Commons adopts that judgment, then unquestionably I, for one, am not prepared for an instant to contest the proposition that the House of Commons is competent—morally as well as Constitutionally—to punish by expulsion a Member so insulting the House. But that is not the Motion of the noble Lord. The Motion of the noble Lord purported to be based on a purely legal foundation; and when I heard the first speech of the noble Lord, what I regretted was that his exposition of his case was insufficient. I did not feel the slightest disposition to treat his argument as one obviously idle and futile; but I did feel that that argument had no development given to it so as to enable us to judge whether it was one on which we ought immediately to act. Thereupon my hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General rose and suggested to the House that the case was an exceedingly novel one. We very often hear of the House being taken by surprise; but I do not imagine that there has ever been, in the matter of delicacy and difficulty, a case of a surprise so complete. [Mr. O'DONNELL: There was no surprise at all.] I do not speak of what may have happened to the hon. Member, who, as usual, salutes me with communications of his opinions while I am endeavouring to impart my own; and, so far as I am myself concerned, and so far as those sitting near me are concerned, we had not the emotest idea of the course Mr. Bradlaugh was about to take, either before he began to march up the floor, or even when he arrived at the Table and produced from his pocket the paper he has since deposited in its place. Now, that being the ease, what has my hon. and learned Friend done? He has not asked the House to produce an opinion; he has not endeavoured to renew the proposal made at the beginning of the Session. The House having determined to seize itself the jurisdiction in this matter, we were disposed, in perfect good faith, to conform to that judgment as far as we consistently can, and we do not dream at this moment of proposing or asking anything that is inconsistent with it. What my hon. and learned Friend has felt—and I confess I entirely share his feeling, and so do those who sit near me—is, that the points raised are points of great nicety. The question before us is not the question whether Mr. Bradlaugh ought to be punished for insult offered' to the House. That question, if it be' thought fit, should be discussed and decided on its own merits. The question is, whether by the act he has done he has now deliberately vacated his seat. Now, my hon. and learned Friend has adverted to two points; there is the question whether, under the terms of the Statute, this proceeding through which Mr. Bradlaugh has passed is a taking of the Oath or not. My hon. and learned Friend carefully guarded himself against the asserting or even implying that those proceedings were the taking of the Oath. He only mentioned that as a point to be raised. He has adverted to another point as a point of very great nicety, upon which he is most reluctant to be committed either to an affirmative or a negative, and that is that the point arising under the words of the Statute would subject a Member who is to be brought under liability to penalty, under the punishment also of vacating his seat should he sit in this House during a debate. The question arises—Has Mr. Bradlaugh sat in the House "during a debate?" It is plain that by the mere attempt, or, if you like, the pretence of taking the Oath, he would not be held to have vacated his seat. But he has also disobeyed the ruling of the Chair. The House, then, may proceed in consequence of that disobedience to the punishment of Mr. Bradlaugh. But let the House con-eider its course. The circumstances are entirely novel. Primâ facie I venture to say that it appears to me that Mr. Bradlaugh has not sat during a debate. At the time when Mr. Bradlaugh appeared before us—came to this Table and tittered the words in the Act which he has thought fit to do—the act of the House which had immediately preceded those acts of his was the determination of the question of a division on which you made an announcement from the Chair, and no new Question had been put, for there was no new point before the House, and therefore there was neither debate, nor the possibility of a debate. Now, Sir, having said this, I sit down, and I really submit it with great confidence to the House. I think I have spoken of this matter in a manner without prejudice, which might have been used with perfect consistency by any Gentleman who had taken the opposite view of this case at the early stages. All I ask the House is, let us have the advantage of taking a little time to consider our course. It will be free to the noble Lord to raise the question of Mr. Bradlaugh's disobedience in any form he pleases. That is not the question now. What I am speaking of is that we should not, with a haste altogether unnecessary, run the risk of committing ourselves to steps of which we might have afterwards to repent. At the same time, although I am inclined with my hon. and learned Friend to ask for time, I would suggest that the time should be as brief as possible, and therefore I will propose to move the adjournment of the debate, and if the Motion is agreed to I will suggest that the debate be taken at the Sitting of to-morrow. I move that this debate be now adjourned.

Sir, I think the course suggested by the Prime Minister is one well worthy of the acceptance of the House. It is obvious that there are many topics which require and demand consideration before we can come to any vote on the question. I am not surprised at the vigour and warmth with which my noble Friend the Member for Woodstock (Lord Randolph Churchill) has spoken; and I will venture to say that if this serious incident had taken place before, instead of after, the Motion on which we recently divided, the result might have been largely affected. What has taken place this evening? Mr. Bradlaugh walks down strongly and resolutely to the Bar of the House, and past the Bar of the House, and defiantly and knowingly violates the Rules and Orders made in this House, and before he can be stopped, and before the House can well know what he is doing, gabbles through a form from a book, and then lays the book upon the Table and hands some paper to the Officer. Is that a course of conduct calculated to commend the hon. Member for Northampton to the favourable notice or sympathy of the House? I venture to say that whatever may be the decision of the House to-morrow, or at some later time, that proceeding was an outrage and a scandal to the House. And I think we might have at least expected this from the Attorney General, when he rose to speak, that he would say something to indicate that he dissented from the mode of action adopted by the hon. Member for Northampton—that he would express his strong censure of the course adopted by the hon. Member for Northampton. Instead of that, the Attorney General most unquestionably indicated that he thought that the action which I call an outrage might very well be submitted to a Court of Law. That was the sole criticism made by the Attorney General on the acts of the hon. Member for Northampton, and therefore I am gratified that the Prime Minister has been enabled to state distinctly and authoritatively to the House that the action of the hon. Member for Northampton had neither been foreseen nor anticipated by anyone on the Government Bench. Another question which was raised by the Motion of my noble Friend the Member for Woodstock was whether the sitting of the hon. Member for Northampton on those Benches in the House meant a sitting during a debate. That is another question to be decided upon somewhat different considerations. Of course, we shall have to be guided very largely by the Leader of the House as to when the adjourned debate should be resumed. I think it is desirable in the interests of discussion that the debate should be adjourned, and I am glad that the Prime Minister has made the Motion for adjournment.

said, he had witnessed with surprise and horror the approach of Mr. Bradlaugh to the Table of the House, and he considered that by what he had done the hon. Member had distinctly broken his parole. He was admitted to take a seat below the Bar on the honourable understanding that he would not take any steps to put himself at that Table to do what he could only call snatching the Oath. For when he has previously obtruded himself upon the House, he was by special Resolution excluded from its precincts. He had no hesitation in saying that the action of the hon. Member for Northampton was a scandalous outrage on the House. Though what the hon. Member had done was not in any strict and moral sense the taking of the Oath, yet it possibly might be held to be a legal fulfilment of the Statute, and if that was the case the noble Lord's position would be upset. He therefore gave Notice that, as an Amendment to the Motion of the noble Lord the Member for Woodstock, he would move—

"That Charles Bradlaugh, in tendering himself to take an Oath which he declared to include words to him of an idle and meaningless character, was guilty of profanation; and that he be and is hereby declared incapable of sitting in this Parliament; and that he be forthwith discharged from further attendance thereon."

Sir, I entirely agree with the Prime Minister that this is a question on which we should speak and act with care and consideration, and with as much preservation of our tempers as is possible; but, at the same time, I wish to point out that it is a matter on which a grave insult has been offered to the House. I earnestly trust the House will not allow its command of itself to go so far as in any way to make light of or pass by that insult. There are two distinct questions—one is whether the hon. Member, by taking a seat for a moment on that Bench, has or has not vacated the seat under the terms of the Statute? That is the question raised by my noble Friend the Member for Woodstock, and it is one well worthy of consideration. But the other, and, as it seems to me, the more important question, is what we have to do in respect of the insult which the hon. Gentleman has certainly offered to the House. I do not go so far as to say he has broken any parole, because I do not understand that he gave any parole. But I wish to point out that three times over this House has adopted, by considerable majorities, a Resolution that the hon. Gentleman shall not be permitted to take the Oath, and that the hon. Member, in defiance of these repeated orders, and in defiance of the precautions given to him by the Speaker in the Chair to withdraw below the Bar, has done the very thing which the House ordered should not be done. Under these circumstances, the dignity of the House is greatly concerned. I quite see the point which is raised by the Attorney General with regard to the construction of the Statute. It may be, but I would not pronounce any opinion on such a matter myself, that we might come to the conclusion that he has not come exactly within the terms of the Statute; but it would be unfortunate that we should, in considering that question, allow the grave offence, of which there is no doubt whatever, to pass unchallenged and untouched. Now, I want to know, and this is principally my object in rising, whether it is the intention of the Government to make any proposal with regard to the insult that has been offered to the House? I think, myself, it is the duty of those who are responsible for the dignity of this House to take some stop or other—and I am far from asking anything to be done in any hot haste, or in an unseemly way—but I wish to know whether the Government will be prepared, when this debate is resumed, or when the House next meets, to submit any proposal to the House upon the subject? I think it cannot be left as it is, and it is so grave that I am unwilling to specify at the present moment, or to ask anyone else to specify, the precise measure that ought to be taken. All I ask is—Will the Government, between this time and to-morrow, if the debate be adjourned till to-morrow, decide on taking some step to vindicate the outrage on the House? If that cannot be done to-morrow, it would be necessary to ask for an adjournment till Thursday. But I am quite sure that when the House is insulted it ought to act with as much promptitude as is consistent with the Rules of the House.

said, he thought it would suggest itself to every Member of the House that the book or books, paper or papers, which the hon. Member for Northampton had deposited under the Table of the House should not by any means be allowed to pass into the custody of the responsible Officers of the House, because the House did not know what further legal quibble might be raised in such an event. They did not at present know whether the book which, he believed, had temporarily passed into the possession of the Prime Minister, was a pocket-book or a copy of Secular Songs and Ceremonies, once favourably referred to by an eminent personage; and it was not the business of the House to inquire. He was, as he believed hon. Members from Ireland around him were, quite in favour of the Motion for adjourning the consideration of this most important question. In his opinion, Mr. Bradlaugh was at that moment just in the same position as he was two hours ago. He had really committed a most grave and shocking offence against the House, and against the conscience and honour of all honourable men. Therefore, though it was very probable that the House, interpreting most conscientiously the words "sitting during a debate," might consider that the condition of disqualification had not been entirely fulfilled, he was quite satisfied with regard to the point raised by the hon. Member for the City of Dublin (Dr. Lyons) and the Resolution referred to by the right hon. Gentleman (Sir Stafford Northcote). He could not exaggerate the enormity of the offence which the House had just witnessed. He was sure he need only conclude by expressing his sorrow and regret that those who were responsible for the maintenance of the order of the House, and those who proposed special Rules for the maintenance of order and decorum in the House, had not felt it incumbent upon them to utter a single word of honest regret at the outrage that had been perpetrated upon Parliament.

said, he must express his regret that the Government was inefficiently served by its Whips—that it was not communicated to the Prime Minister that this pre-arranged outrage was about to take place. As he (Mr. Callan) was about to leave the House after the last division, he was informed that Mr. Bradlaugh was to take the Oath and his seat, and he came back to see if that was the case. He could hardly believe that if an outrage of that sort was known beforehand to Members who did not belong to Mr. Bradlaugh's peculiar sect, it could have been kept from the ears of some Members of Her Majesty's Government. He could only express the hope that the House would not adjourn the debate till Thursday. To-morrow was the most fitting day for the discussion of this subject. They would be in a better spirit to enter into it. Last night they had the humiliation of hearing the introduction of a measure to gag them. To-morrow, being Ash Wednesday, was a day, according to the Christion religion, for putting on sackcloth and ashes, and the House could not be more fittingly engaged on that day than in discussing, in such humiliating garb, the insult offered to it by a blasphemous infidel.

said, he rose to express his assent to the Motion for the adjournment of the debate, and further to ask the Prime Minister whether he would not give some answer to the appeal that had been made to him by the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition. There were two questions now before the House. One was the Motion of the noble Lord the Member for Woodstock (Lord Randolph Churchill) as to whether the hon. Member for Northampton had, by his recent action, vacated his seat, which was reserved for discussion to-morrow; and the other was the far more important question raised by the right hon. Gentleman, which brooked no delay, and which should, when the House sat to-morrow, be the first Business brought before it—whether the Prime Minister was prepared to recommend to the House some means by which the House could assert its own dignity and punish the gross insult which had just been offered to it. He hoped that before the Motion for the adjournment of the debate was agreed to, the House would have some assurance from the Prime Minister on these points.

said, that undoubtedly it was the intention of the Government to utilize the time, if any should be left at their disposal, between the present moment and the meeting of the House to-morrow, for the purpose of considering what course it would be their duty to take with reference to the whole matter.

gave Notice that tomorrow he should move the following Amendment to the Motion of the noble Lord the Member for Woodstock:—

"That the conduct of Charles Bradlaugh in pretending to take and to subscribe to the Oath is a wanton insult to the House and a defiance of the Resolution of the 7th of February, 1882, and that for such conduct he be committed to the custody of the Serjeant-at-Arms."

Sir, I beg to move, in accordance with the terms of my Notice, that the House on its rising do adjourn until to-morrow (Ash Wednesday) at 2 o'clock. This course was not taken last year in consequence of the urgency of the Business before the House; but this year we deem it advisable to revert to the usual practice.

asked at what time the consideration of the Rules of Procedure would be resumed to-night?

Not after half-past 10 o'clock.

in rising to move—

"That it is desirable that the practice of this House should be so amended that the consideration of Bills which have passed a Second Reading but have not become law shall be resumed in the succeeding Session of the same Parliament at the stage of Committee,"

said, it was hardly possible to expect that, after the exciting scenes of the last hour and a-half, the House would readily address itself to the Motion he had put on the Paper. He would venture to say that a great deal of what he would have to urge on the House in justification of the present Motion had been rendered unnecessary, because on the previous evening the House had been addressing itself to another part of the great question to which the present Motion was directed, and had already had the advantage of the Prime Minister's powerful arguments bearing upon the subject—arguments based upon half-a-contury's experience of the House. The question was one of such importance to the public interests that it was the duty of all Parties, whether Liberal or Conservative, to endeavour to effect some remedy for the difficulties that beset the House at the present time. The Prime Minister had dwelt on only one of the evils that beset Public Business; he spoke of the manner in which the progress of legislation was being impeded. He said that many Bills of great importance, after having been carried forward several stages, were ultimately lost on account of the pressure on the time at the disposal of the House. But there was another point of almost equal importance. It was a great misfortune for the country that many measures that had been fully debated and thoroughly well considered wore ultimately thrown away on account of the impossibility of finding time to proceed with them. Then there was another matter of importance. The mode in which the work of the House was done frequently caused measures to be passed in so hurried and haphazard a manner that Acts were left on the Statute Book which had not only been insufficiently considered, but were badly expressed. He had heard it said that the House of Commons ought not to do much in the way of legislation. It was sometimes cynically remarked that the less the number of Bills that were passed the better it would be for the country, and it had been suggested that no change should be made that would lead to excessive legislation. But in the present system of elaborate social relations there must be change, such change as would be consistent with the existing state of things. It was his firm belief that many a measure which while in progress produced Radical agitation, when it once became law constituted an element of Conservative strength, because it engendered a feeling of relief that the particular questions dealt with by it had at last become settled. Mis- chiefs existed that had to be removed. There were very few men in the House of Commons who had a thorough acquaintance with—say—a particular trade or profession, or with a particular portion of society, and, therefore, they did not consider themselves called upon to interest themselves in measures dealing with such subjects, but they made a reservation in favour of the one measure affecting a subject with which they were themselves connected. There was a mischief which irritated people, and impeded legislation—a feeling was prevalent that Parliament was unable to do its work. Of this he would give instances. Look at the present state of the Bankruptcy Laws; lie did not know any Act that was so much wanted as a new Bankruptcy Act. All persons conversant with the Bankruptcy Laws were at one as to the necessity for an amendment of the law, yet year by year a Minister of the Grown had come forward and introduced a Bankruptcy Bill, the necessity for which had been recognized in Her Majesty's Gracious Speech, and then when the end of the Session had come he gave Notice that the Bill would not be further proceeded with; he put it in his despatch-box, and preserved it carefully for the next Session, when the same farce was repeated. Then he would give another instance. Last Session the hon. Baronet the Member for the University of London (Sir John Lubbock) brought in a Bill, which was intended to consolidate the Law on Bills of Exchange. It was a thoroughly commercial question, and a question that had been fully considered by the various Chambers of Commerce throughout the country. He had read the Bill himself, and had found it was drawn in almost the exact words of a judgment of one of the superior Courts of Law. But what took place with regard to that Bill? The hon. Baronet moved the second reading, and the second reading was allowed on the understanding that the Bill should not be carried further, the hon. Baronet being congratulated on its having advanced so far. So the House went through the solemn farce of reading the Bill a second time, without any intention of passing it, and knowing that the same steps would have to be gone all over again the following Session. All this was calculated to wear out the patience of the public. The Conveyancing Bill of Lord Cairns, which was passed last Session, was a very important measure. It contained over 70 clauses; it came down to the House towards the end of the Session, and there was, he might say, a conspiracy of silence on the part of Members in order to make it possible that the Bill should pass. He was entreated not to read the Bill, because, if he read it and any discussion arose, a single night's debate in the House of Commons would make it impossible for it to get through the House that Session. The measure only got through by the sacrifice of certain clauses comprising somewhat debateable matter, and which, he thought, were introduced last night in a separate Bill in "another place." However, that Bill passed, and he did not think that 20 Members of the House ever read it before it became law. It was, he believed, a good Bill; but it was not satisfactory that even a good Bill should pass without the knowledge and discussion and approval of the Representatives sent there by the constituencies to discuss those matters. Again, there was the Registration of Voters Bill of 1878, which in its practical result had been of much importance. It had largely increased a great many of the constituencies of the country. His own constituency, which was last year 5,600 in number, was now, since last year's revision, 13,600, showing a greater increase than that made by the Reform Act of 1867. In 1878 the Bill had been before a Committee, and it came for Report before the House. Sections 1 to 21 were gone through without any opposition or comment. Sir William Charley, then a Member of the House, objected that the Bill had only just been printed, and asked that there might be some delay before its discussion was continued. Sir William Charley interposed exactly at the right point, for Sections 22 and 23 were those which had since given such difficulty to the Courts in construing, and had so materially affected the constituencies. The then Member for Cambridge (Mr. Marten) on the one side, and the hon. Baronet the Member for Chelsea (Sir Charles W. Dilke) on the other, assured Sir William Charley that no considerable change was made by the provisions of the Bill. That appeal was listened to; the whole of the sections were gone through that evening; the third reading was taken on the following night; the Bill went up to the House of Lord, where, as it dealt with the registration of voters for Members of the House of Commons, no great amount of attention was paid to it; and the result had been an entirely unexpected extension of the franchise, which, whatever its merits, ought not to have been made in that way, but, if made at all, should have been made deliberately by Parliament, with a full consciousness of what it was doing. But there was another, and a very serious mischief, and that was the tremendous strain that was thrown upon the Members of the House themselves. A great many Members of the House were actively engaged in commercial and professional life, and to them, of course, the strain of the long hours the House was kept sitting, night after night, was enormous. But, that was almost insignificant, compared with the mischief of the burden upon Ministers of the Crown. Was it not a remarkable thing that Her Majesty's Ministers, who were expected to perform the responsible duties of their Offices during the day, should be expected to attend the House from 4 o'clock in the afternoon until 3 or 4 in the morning? The marvel was that they were endowed with vitality and energy sufficient to enable them to continue for years in this splendid slavery. One of the great advantages which would be likely to follow from the adoption by the House of the Resolution he was offering to its acceptance was that, so far as one could see, there would be no necessity, if the Resolution were adopted, for the House to continue sitting after 12 or half-past 12 at night, which would be a reasonable time for the limit of their debates. Moreover, not only did their present late hours heavily tax the endurance of Ministers and private Members, but they caused Business to be done badly and in a manner that was not creditable to a Legislative Assembly. At 2 or 3 in the morning there was no pretence of adequate discussion of the questions that came before the House; and, worse than all, their debates were almost wholly unreported. Practically, the proceedings of the House could not now be reported after 1 in the morning, and within the last few days, as they had seen, it was only owing to the enter-prize of one great newspaper that they were able to have a full report a day later of the speech delivered by the Leader of the Opposition, and the reply of the noble Marquess the Secretary of State for India at the close of the debate on the Address. Now, his proposal would deal practically with all the mischief that he had indicated. The real difficulty of the House was that they were all, whether Ministers or private Members, competing just to get past a certain point. If that point was passed, the Bill in which they were interested would become law. If they came short of that point, the whole of their labour had to begin over again. There was one very indefensible species of obstruction to which the Prime Minister had not adverted on the previous evening—namely, the persistent discussion of matters which nobody cared about, in order to prevent other matters which it was desired to impede from coming on. Valuable time was deliberately and purposely wasted in order to keep up a debate until a quarter to 6 on a Wednesday, when no decision could be come to, or till half-past 12, when some opposed measure could not come on; and speakers went on repeating themselves again and again, until the magic hour of half-past 12 arrived, when nothing fresh could be entered upon. They should put an end to that kind of obstruction by doing away with the temptation to practise it. If they once provided that the House should be free to deal with such a Bill in the following February when Parliament met again, it would have an excellent effect in silencing the kind of opposition which endeavoured to prevent such measures being discussed. He could see no defence to the action of those who deliberately wasted the time of the House for the purpose of preventing Parliament passing any measure at all. These were reasons for adopting a substantial reform in such cases. He would also call the attention of the House to the fact that every Parliament proceeded by jerks; that it was cut up into separate Sessions, as though when they had finished their work in July they had done with the whole matter. So long as the machinery of legislation went on in that spasmodic, jerky way, a very great waste of time was inevitable. He would take, by way of example, the Bankruptcy Law, of which the country had for a long time past required some amendment. There was the Bankruptcy Bill, which the President of the Board of Trade thought he would introduce last Session, and which they expected this Session. There was no security that his present Bill would be introduced this year in the form which it took last, and he would point out this inconvenient result. Some two or three months ago, the Associated Chambers of Commerce held their meeting, and one of the subjects they discussed was the Bankruptcy Bill. Did the House know that they would have the same Bill before them as in the previous year, the Associated Chambers of Commerce would, no doubt, have discussed the measure and proposed amendments, which would have been of great service to them in framing that enactment. But the President of the Board of Trade said that he knew the Bill going to be introduced would differ in some respects from the last one, and thus the whole of what he might call the consultative power of the country was thrown away. That was the case with the Associated Chambers of Commerce. But let them take another instance—the Rivers Conservancy Bill. That was a measure of very great interest to the Chambers of Agriculture, and county Members of that House going back in the autumn to their places in the country would have the advantage of hearing the opinion of their neighbours on the subject; but although he believed that the proposed Bill was to be the same, they had no assurance of that, and so long as there was no assurance they never could obtain that advantage. He thought it would be a very good thing if a Bill were brought in in one Session and passed in the next, for then hon. Members would have an opportunity of conferring with their constituents, and then in the following Session they would be enabled to bring their ripened opinion—their completed knowledge to the discussion of that measure. The proposal that Bills should not require to be introduced afresh each Session was not a new one, or one for which he was originally responsible. In 1848, and again in 1861, this question came before the House and before a Committee of the House of Commons, as well as before the House of Lords. And here he would venture for a moment to digress in order to say that it was of the greatest moment to the country that the position of the House of Lords should be properly appreciated as an integral part of the Legislative Body. He could not understand the jealousy which existed between the two Houses, or why there should be jealousy at all. It was perfectly well-known that the House of Lords contained men who had served their apprenticeship in the House of Commons; but the House of Lords was discouraged, systematically discouraged, by the action of the House of Commons towards it. Take the course pursued by the Government with respect to the Rivers Conservancy Bill, upon which the other House bestowed a great deal of trouble. This complaint had been made and repeated over and over again, and the other House was deterred from beginning legislation because it was probable that in the helter-skelter of July their labours would be sacrificed; while, on the other hand, in July, Bills were sent up to them by dozens when it was impossible for them to give them proper attention. Well, in 1848, a Bill was introduced in terms somewhat similar to his own Resolutions, enabling Bills discussed in one Session to be proceeded with in the next by the other House, subject always to this restriction—that when a measure had passed both Chambers it should be sent back to that from which it originated, so that if opinion respecting it had changed in the meantime that Chamber might have an opportunity of recording that change. That Bill received the support of the late Lord Derby; on the 5th of July, 1848, it was read a second time in the House of Commons, and Lord John Russell, who was then the Leader of the Liberal Party in that House, suggested that the Bill should only be a temporary one, because in case it did not prove effectual for the purpose desired it would otherwise be impossible to rescind the Rule without the assent of both Houses of Parliament. The Committee reported as late as the 11th of August that they did not advise the acceptance of that Bill; but they put their advice upon this ground—that it would introduce a material change, and, as the Session was drawing to a close, they had not time to consider the effect of material changes in the procedure of the House. Again, in 1869, a proposal on the subject was made in "another place." On that occasion the Marquess of Salisbury said—

"Owing to a rule of the Constitution—the origin of which nobody can discover, and of which it is impossible to say more than that we find it here—if when August comes your labours have not advanced beyond a certain point, those labours must be abandoned as far as legislation is concerned. All that you have done goes for nothing. If a Bill has been considered in great detail by a Select Committee, the Committee must sit and go through the details again; if it had to face a powerful opposition, all that opposition must be faced again. All the works, all the debates, all the enormous labour which attends the passing of any change, however small, in the laws which govern us must be gone through again, in order to reach the goal which you had nearly reached when the Prorogation arrived. Now is there in the nature of things any reason for this practice? Does it commend itself to any man's common sense r Do we act in this manner in any other department of life? Supposing you made it a rule to give up writing letters at a certain hour, would you throw all unfinished ones into the fire, or begin next morning at the point where you left off? Is there any body of men, in any kind of business, that adopt what I must call this senseless practice, that whatever you have not finished by a certain time you must begin again next year? I have never heard any reason for such a rule. There is nothing but the bare inert weight of unmeaning custom to justify a principle which wastes so much of the labour and utility of Parliament."—[3 Hansard, exciv. 589–90.]

The plan which he put before the House was already in operation in France. It was subject to certain conditions there, and perhaps limitations might also be required here, though he confessed he did not perceive any necessity for them. His plan was that a Parliament should be treated in all its Sessions as one Parliament, and not as a series of separate Parliaments, as if the Sessions were water-tight compartments, designed to prevent Bills getting from one to the other. The Bills which the House had to deal with might be divided in three classes—first, there were the political Bills; secondly, the Departmental Bills; and, thirdly, private Members' Bills. Political Bills—like the Irish Church Bill, for example—were usually introduced by a Government with a strong majority at their back, and, consequently, such measures could be forced through Parliament in the course of a single Session. His proposal would, therefore, not affect in the least degree measures with which the existence of the Government of the day was identified. Departmental Bills were for the most part independent of Party considerations; and they were, in point of fact, practically prepared for the most part by the permanent officials of the various Departments. These Bills would be assisted most substantially by the adoption of his proposal. At present they were reduced to the necessity of putting on the Statute Book a series of fragmentary Acts of Parliament. They were obliged to do so, because if the Minister were to consolidate the laws on any subject into a new Statute he would have a Bill so considerable in its dimensions and giving rise to so much debate that there would be very little chance of squeezing it through in a single Session. As an instance of this, he might advert to the Criminal Code, although that could not properly be styled a Departmental measure. The late Attorney General (Sir John Holker) took a great interest in it; three of the best lawyers in England were for a long time engaged in getting it into shape; but it was almost hopeless to expect that any measure of that importance and magnitude could be passed through the House of Commons unless there were a power of continuing legislation from Session to Session. With regard to the Bills of private Members, no doubt many of them were trivial, and ought never to be entertained by the House. He hoped, therefore, that if this proposal were adopted the House would revert to the old practice of considering very carefully whether leave should be given to a private Member to introduce a Bill. There would be no hardship in requiring a Member to explain the provisions of his Bill in the first instance. One objection urged against his plan was that it would cause a great number of Bills to be introduced, and that there would be a great deal too much legislation. His answer to that objection was that he did not think there need be any fear of that occurring. The English people were not likely to submit to too much legislation. They had had a remarkable instance, which changed for a time the position of political Parties, in 1873. It was the impatience of legislation which actually destroyed, sapped, and undermined the power of a Government which came into Office with so great a majority in 1868. He did not think that anyone had suggested that there was any real reason for the withdrawal of the confi- dence of the country in that Government except the rapidity with which it had proceeded with legislation. The legislation really required by the country was most Conservative in its tendency; but, as matters now stood, people were irritated at the defective machinery which delayed legislation on questions that ought to have been dealt with long ago. He would not particularize any Bills which had been so delayed, because it would divert the discussion from the general issue. But of this he was certain, that there were at least half-a-dozen Bills which had been accepted by the House in principle over and over again, and which some day must become law, but the delay in the passing of which caused great irritation to the country, and was a source of weakness to the Conservative Party. It would be desirable, as well in the interest of political Parties as in that of the country, that those Bills should be passed, and come into operation with the least possible delay. It so happened that he submitted his proposal immediately after the discussion of other Resolutions with regard to Procedure. He believed that if his Resolution were adopted it would make the more stringent measures proposed needless. Experience of the régime he proposed—namely, carrying on Bills from Session to Session—would, in his opinion, satisfy hon. Members of its expediency, and tend greatly to relieve their present labours. Private Bill legislation was included within the terms of his Motion, but he was aware that there were difficulties with regard to it. His experience of Private Bill legislation was that it was extremely well done, and that the tribunals which dealt with Private Bills were quite competent and decided with great promptitude. But instances were constantly occurring in which promoters were obliged to submit to clauses, and make compromises enormously expensive, and which seriously interfered with the benefit of the works proposed, in consequence of the knowledge that a few days' delay would destroy the benefit of all the work done during the Session. But, for the moment, he wished to rest his proposition on the larger issue, that it would be of benefit to public legislation. One great merit of his proposal was its simplicity. If it should become necessary to fight the question of Parliamentary Procedure before the constituencies, there was no question upon which he would more gladly challenge their judgment than upon the merits of the proposal he now made. It possessed the great advantage of neither disturbing nor interfering with the traditions of the House. It would not require that the Government, or any other authority, should be intrusted with any extreme or exceptional powers; and, above all, it had that merit which could not justly be attributed to the other proposals which had been submitted to the House, that it was preeminently simple and intelligible. The hon. and learned Member concluded by moving the Resolution of which he had given Notice.

said, he agreed in the opinion expressed by the hon. and learned Member for Plymouth that, after the exciting scene that the House had witnessed, the minds of hon. Members could hardly be attuned to the consideration of the subject now before them. The House being engaged in examining the question of its Procedure, under the legitimate guidance of its Leader, his hon. and learned Friend, exercising his full right as a private Member, had invited them to consider a supplementary proposal of a still more revolutionary character than that of the First Lord of the Treasury. He (Mr. Beresford Hope) did not think it would be seemly for the House to deal with such a subject, when it was sandwiched in between the debate which, begun last night, would end at some future period of the world's history and the subject of Irish Land. He could praise his hon. and learned Friend's courage, but not his discretion. The Rules proposed by the Government were not enough for the hon. and learned Member, who characterized his own proposal as a simple one. Well, there were various notions of simplicity. Hon. Members would remember a case in which a person, desirous of making himself famous, had hit upon the simple expedient of setting fire to the Temple of Ephesus. The scheme of the hon. and learned Member involved such complex and extensive issues that no man in that House could have any real idea of how it would work. One thing only could they make sure of—namely, that it would revolutionize the whole system of Parliamentary Procedure. Were they, he asked, at the present moment, when other questions of such great public interest were awaiting their consideration—were they competent to pronounce judgment on this proposal? He contended that they were not. Of course, everyone who cherished any pet scheme pictured it in rose colour. No equestrian at Hengler's Circus had ever shown more dexterity in riding two horses at once than the hon. and learned Member had displayed in his speech. He recommended the innovation because it would do so much and because it would do so little. The hon. and learned Member dazzled them with an Arcadian picture of primitive simplicity. If Bills were carried on from one Session to another, then there would be no necessity for the clôture, and Members would all go to bed, innocent and healthy, punctually at 12 o'clock. It would be a transformation scene such as no pantomime had ever equalled. He was not, however, prepared to accept this agreeable forecast simply on the ipse dixit of the hon. and learned Member. He hoped the hon. and learned Member would not give them the trouble of dividing, but that he would be satisfied with having placed his views before the House, and be willing to leave them to fructify in the country. The hon. and learned Member was very impressive in urging on the House that it would be well if every measure of great importance should be considered in two Sessions before becoming law. Let him, then, himself, set an example in accordance with his own doctrine. Let him not attempt to get the House to adopt his proposal until next Session. He begged, in conclusion, to move the Previous Question.

said, if there was an Eratostratus in the House his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Plymouth (Mr. Edward Clarke) was not the man. The right hon. Gentleman who had just sat down took exception to the proposal of his hon. and learned Friend, on the ground that the hon. and learned Member was not satisfied with the Rules proposed by the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government. But his hon. and learned Friend brought forward this as a counter-proposition, and he was very glad that he had the opportunity of doing so, because it vindicated the Conservative Party from the charge that in opposing the Resolutions of the Government they were actuated by an obstructive spirit. Although the whole Conservative Party would feel it their duty to oppose the 1st Resolution, they would have a distinct alternative to submit to the House if they accepted this proposal. The Resolution now before the House was of a constructive and not of an obstructive character. It was a proposal the principle of which had been approved and accepted by Lords Lansdowne, Grey, Russell, Granville, Salisbury, Selborne, Derby, Cairns, and the Duke of Richmond. The proposal was one intended for the promotion of Public Business, and it was not brought forward as a Party move. Looking over the records of last Session, he noticed that something like 40 Bills which had passed the second reading, or reached even further stages in the House of Commons, had been abandoned. He thought that was a matter which well deserved consideration. The proposal of his hon. and learned Friend was objected to on two grounds. One objection was that the proposal, if adopted, would lead to too much legislation. At the present moment he thought there was not the smallest fear of that; on the contrary, he thought there was a very great risk that they would have too little legislation. The next point was as to the quality of the legislation, and here there was an arguable objection. He was not prepossessed in favour of the legislation likely to be brought forward from the Ministerial Benches. There was no keener opponent of the Government than he was; but he admitted the doctrine that the majority must rule and legislate. But, while admitting that, all they asked was that the majority should not tyrannize. He wished to say one word on the purely Party aspect of the question. He was sorry to find that the Resolution did not commend itself to Gentlemen on that side of the House. He believed honestly that if this proposal, or something of the same kind, were not carried, it was inevitable that drastic Rules would be passed by the House. He believed, further, that the clôture was, in their hearts, detested by nine-tenths of the Members, and he felt that he was doing a good service in supporting the Resolution of his hon. and learned Friend.

said, he did not think the Resolution was at all fairly met by the ridicule attempted to be thrown upon it by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. Beresford Hope). The hon. and learned Member for Plymouth, on the contrary, deserved the thanks of the House for bringing forward this proposal. He did not agree with the right hon. Gentleman that the proposal was more revolutionary than the clôture. At all events, he knew which of the two he considered most revolutionary and objectionable. He thought there was a great deal to be said in favour of the proposal, or something similar to it. He gathered from his hon. and learned Friend's speech that he really meant to go further than the words of his Resolution appeared to bear, because he spoke of making Sessions continuous. The words of the Resolution would not have that effect. The Resolution appeared to be rather narrow, because it only appeared that a Bill which had had a second reading would come back in the following Session to the period of Committee. A Bill might have gone through Committee and Report, and be waiting only for third reading; but under the Resolution, as worded, the Bill would not be taken up the next Session at the stage it left off, but would be brought back again to the stage of Committee. Therefore, the Resolution was not exactly consistent with itself if, as the hon. and learned Member said, he wanted to make the Sessions continuous. The hon. and learned Member had referred to previous proposals on this question; but if he had continued his inquiries, he would have found that he (Mr. Anderson) had proposed a somewhat similar Resolution—namely, that a Bill which had been completely finished in one House in one Session should be taken up by the other House at the beginning of the next Session. There might be some difficulty in carrying out the proposal of the hon. and learned Member. For instance, a Bill might be half-way through Committee. It would be difficult to take it up at that point in the following Session. But his (Mr. Anderson's) proposal would enable the House of Lords, which wasted a great deal of time at the beginning of each Session, to proceed to business at once on Bills which had passed the House of Commons. There would also be a great saving of time to this House by the adoption of some such proposal as he had spoken of. Important Bills which had passed that House had often been rejected by the Lords simply for want of time to consider them. That was done in the case of a Ballot Bill, and also of a Scotch Education Bill, on which the House of Commons had bestowed a great deal of labour. The result was that that House had, week after week, and month after month, to go through the same amount of patient labour as they had already bestowed on the particular measures. All that would be saved by some rule of this kind, or some modification of this rule. The present might not be the best form the proposal could take, but something of the kind was needed, and he thought it well, therefore, that the House should take this proposal into consideration, with a view to the amendment of its procedure.

said, that everyone must approve the spirit which actuated his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Plymouth in bringing forward this Motion for the improvement of their procedure. But the speech to which they had just listened showed a great deal of haziness of ideas as to the mode in which that was to be done. It might be very well, by some arrangement between the two Houses, if one House could take up in one Session some measure which had been elaborately considered and decided on in the other House in the previous Session. But his hon. and learned Friend's proposal was different; it was that they should be able to take up a Bill in the same House on the strength of its having passed a second reading in the former Session. That proposition was based on the fallacy that whenever a Bill had passed a second reading the House had pronounced authoritatively on its principles. But the fact was a vast number of Bills passed a second reading in that House sub silentio, or through the carelessness or good nature of hon. Members. If they were to allow these Bills to be brought forward again as now proposed, they would assume a great deal more than the facts of the case really warranted. Something more could be said in favour of the Resolution if it were confined to Bills which had passed through Committee, or through a later stage, for then the House might be taken to have expressed some real opinion upon them. The practice was for Members to introduce their Bills at an early period of the Session, and to get them read a second time early in the morning, after a late Sitting, without obtaining the real mind of the House with respect to them. As his right hon. Friend the Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. Beresford Hope) had pointed out, a great many Bills were altered in consequence of the consideration given to them during the Recess. For instance, the Bill for the Conservancy of Rivers and Prevention of Hoods, which had been read a second time last night, had in that way received material modifications and alterations, and it would not have been possible to have represented it as a re-introduction of the measure of last year. On the whole, though the object of his hon. and learned Friend was most commendable, the House ought not to adopt the proposal in the interest of Public Business.

said, he was not sure how the Mover of the Resolution intended to apply it—whether it was that measures which had passed one House in one Session might, if they had reached a certain stage in another House, be taken up in that House at that stage the next Session and passed into law, or that a Bill which had advanced to a certain stage in one House might, so far as that House only was concerned, be taken up at the point at which it had stopped, or that both arrangements might be carried through. If the intention was that a Bill which had passed one House in one Session, and in the same Session had passed a certain stage in the second House, should be taken up at the same stage in the second House and passed into law, it was clear that, as a Prorogation put an end to all the proceedings of a Session, what the hon. and learned Mem- ber proposed could not be done without an Act of Parliament. But if the Resolution only came to this—that a Bill which had been introduced, and had got to a certain stage in that House, might be taken up at the same stage the following Session, the advantage to be gained would be very small, because if the Bill was one which had commended itself to the House in the first Session it was quite certain that in the second its earlier stages would be allowed to pass without any difficulty, and it would at once be practically taken up at the stage it had reached before. The hon. and learned Gentleman thought his proposal would be of great advantage, because it would prevent hasty and careless legislation. He (Mr. Dodson) ventured to think that its operation would be quite the reverse. Bills would be brought in one Session, and Members would be told, or would satisfy themselves, that there was no intention of passing them, but only of getting them a second reading, and then the next Session it would be said that the House had in the former Session read the Bills a second time with practical unanimity. A greater number of Bills, too, would be introduced and be printed, and thus the cost to the country would be increased. If the argument of his hon. and learned Friend was good for continuing Bills from one Session to another, it was good for continuing them through successive Sessions. Why might not a Bill be read a first time one Session, a second time in another Session, committed in a third, considered and read a third time in a fourth? And in that case what chance would the House have of being practically cognizant of the measures it passed? Of course, if the House adopted such a step as this they could not expect that the other House would not adopt a corresponding step. He ventured to think that it would not be for the advantage of the House—certainly not from the Liberal point of view—that when it had passed a great and considerable measure to which great interest was attached, it should be in the power of the other House to avoid coming to a straight decision upon it in that year; but that they should be able, as it were, to evade an issue by simply postponing the Bill to another year. That was no visionary fear, as all would admit who called to mind the measures that might have been and probably would have been treated in that manner by the other House, if such a Rule had been in operation. It was true that more than one eminent authority had expressed himself favourable to the scheme, but the House had, on consideration, always rejected it. The hon. and learned Member had referred to two Committees, and to the debate of 1869, but not to the Committee appointed in that year. That Committee had been composed jointly of Members of the two Houses, and had consisted of the late Lord Derby, Lords Granville, Salisbury, Eversley, Halifax, and Redesdale; Sir George Grey, Mr. Disraeli, Mr. Bouverie, Mr. Walpole, Colonel Wilson Patten, and himself (Mr. Dodson), who came to a conclusion unfavourable to the proposal. He believed that the House was still of their opinion, and that the hon. and learned Member's views, however taking in the abstract, could not conveniently be adopted.

said, that he had no wish to prolong the discussion; but the position of his hon. and learned Friend in the ranks of the Conservative Party, and the fact that his Resolution had been seconded by the hon. Member for Exeter (Mr. Northcote), induced him to say a few words in support of what had been said by the President of the Local Government Board. Those who were familiar with the method of conducting Business knew that it was the commonest thing for a Member to be allowed to pass a Bill through certain stages on condition that it was not pressed further, and there was nothing that could be described as "dishonourable" in that.

explained that he did not suggest that there would be anything dishonourable, unless a Member who had got a measure formally read a second time on an understanding that it should proceed no further attempted to mislead the House next Session by citing the formal passing of the stage as a sign of the approval of the House.

accepted the explanation, and withdrew his objection to the use of the word "dishonourable." Still, the adoption of the Motion would open the door to a most dangerous state of affairs. It would be legislation by piecemeal; and, whatever intentions were entertained by individuals, measures introduced not to be proceeded with would come to be regarded as having received a qualified sanction, and finally might get passed without discussion. The hanging-up of Bills between the two Houses from Session to Session was, if possible, a still more objectionable proposal. The work of each Session should be kept distinct if Parliament was to be responsible for legislation. As this particular proposal had been condemned by several Committees, and received with less favour than almost any other proposal in succeeding Parliaments, and was almost unanimously condemned by the House, he trusted the House had heard the last of it, and that there would be no response to the invitation to recur to the subject on a future occasion. If the hon. and learned Gentleman, instead of withdrawing the Motion, would allow a division to be taken, it would be found that the feeling of the House had been rightly interpreted by both Front Benches, and that personal regard for the hon. and learned Member who had brought the subject forward largely accounted for any apparent disposition on the part of the House to entertain it.

in rising to call attention to the incidence of local taxation; and to move—

"That, in the opinion of this House, the injustice of the present incidence of local taxation on owners and occupiers of real property should, without further delay, he remedied by an adequate increase of contributions from general taxation,"

said, he did not approach this matter from any point of Party politics, as it was essentially a national question. It had been his fortune a short time ago to introduce to the Prime Minister a deputation from the Central Chamber of Agriculture on the subject, composed of a friendly alliance of owners and occupiers of land, who had combined to endeavour to obtain redress from their grievances, which had become well nigh insupportable. He was quite sure the right hon. Gentleman would admit that the deputation had formulated its demand with precision, had pressed it with moderation, and had exhibited a remarkable unanimity. That deputation claimed release from the burdens placed upon them, which they asserted were financially unjust. The tenant's complaint was that since he had entered into his farm fresh rates had been imposed upon him, and old rates increased by the direct action of Parliament. Of the new rates, that for education was the one which pressed with exceptional severity upon him, it being, in many instances, no less than 7d. in the pound. Then the abolition of turnpikes had brought about a large increase in the highway rate for the maintenance of roads, which, he contended, ought to be a national and not a local charge. On all points, he thought, the tenant's case for relief was unanswerable, and that nothing could justify a continuance of the existing system. The landlord's case was somewhat different. He complained that, from time to time, his property was burdened with new charges for services of an Imperial nature, the cost of which ought to be borne by the community at large. He pointed to the vast amount of personalty of which the wealth of the country was mainly composed, and which was constantly increasing, while the value of real property was stationary or deteriorating. What was the amount of this burden of which the landlord complained? Taking the whole amount raised by rates at £26,000,000, there was, as nearly as possible, £18,000,000 applied to the services for the suppression of crime, for the maintenance of main roads in town and country, for sanitary purposes, and for education. This amount was thrown absolutely upon real property, the average rate being not less than 2s. 8d. in the pound, or something like 13 per cent, so that £1,000 a-year derived from land had to pay no less than £133 a-year in taxation, whilst the same amount derived from securities or other moneys paid absolutely nothing at all. It was contended that the services provided out of this £18,000,000 a-year were of an Imperial character, and ought therefore to be supported at the general charge. The Imperial nature of those services was, indeed, recognized by the State, which not only insisted on having official control over them, but also contributed towards all of them, except the main roads, to which he contended the State ought to contribute. One of the arguments against the redress for which he pleaded was that these local burdens were hereditary burdens. The land was said to be held subject to charges imposed by the State; those charges were sometimes assumed to be in the nature of a rent-charge, from which the owner had no right to attempt to free himself. That was the argument which was frequently employed. But which of those rates was hereditary? Was the education rate hereditary? Nobody had ever dreamt of such a rate till 1870. Was the sanitary rate hereditary? That was as recent as the education rate. Nor had the highway rate, imposed in substitution of the old turnpike charges, any better title to be termed hereditary. All these rates were but of yesterday. If the hereditary argument was worth anything, it proved that there were no charges whatever upon land, and rate after rate might be added and the whole income produced by the land eaten up by these "hereditary burdens," and yet the land would have no charges upon it, these rates being the "property" of the State. The absurdity of the reasoning to which he was referring was thus clearly shown. Why should not the income tax be called "hereditary?" It had been in existence for a generation; stocks and shares had been bought, sold, and inherited subject to it—and yet no one had dreamt of calling it an hereditary tax on personal property. But the land tax, he might be told, was certainly hereditary. If the land tax, why not the house tax? Both were imposed originally in the same year—1696—in conjunction with the window tax. But both these taxes had been freely dealt with by the State. The house tax was repealed in 1834, only to be some years afterwards re-imposed in substitution of the window tax. But in that re-imposition modifications were introduced, and whereas the old tax attached to a £5 rental the substituted tax did not apply to rentals under £20. He claimed that the State had on at least five separate occasions repudiated the hereditary principle and dealt with charges on land solely with regard to public policy. Some of those occasions were the Poor Law Act of 1834, the Union Chargeability Act of 1855, the Eating Act of 1874, and the Highway Act of 1878. On the same public grounds he asked for a re-adjustment of these burdens. It might be that in some matters land escaped easily, as in the succession duty; but that slight advantage was more than compensated by the unfair assessment of income tax. A far larger income was taxed than ever reached the pockets of the landowner. It would only be fair that the net, and not the gross, income should be taxed. On that subject he could quote no better authority than the Prime Minister, who in 1853, in introducing his Budget, said that the method of income tax assessment on land made a tax of 7d. in the pound gross equivalent to a tax of 9d. in the pound net. "Why should not personalty bear some of the local burdens which now fell exclusively on real estate? Frequent reference was made to the Statute of the 43rd of Elizabeth; but that statute was founded on just principles and rated every £100 of income to the same extent, from whatever source it was derived. He did not think the principles of the philosophical Radical school, which drew a distinction between landed property, which it asserted to be held merely in trust for the nation, and personal property would commend themselves to the House. Surely no one would venture to assert that the State had a right to confiscate the improvements of a landlord. It was solely by the expenditure of money that land was reclaimed. No sooner was an improvement effected upon land than down came the taxing officer to lay a burden on the annual value. This law applied specially to England. In Ireland the case was very different. You had there a fixed valuation; and he believed that in Scotland no change was made in the rating during the term of a lease. But in England you could not build a house without the Assessment Committee pouncing down upon you as soon as it was occupied. This system of rating was a direct hindrance to the improvement of land. What, then, was the remedy? The remedy, he ventured to suggest, was this—that there should be an increase of contributions from Imperial taxation. He used the word contributions advisedly. It did not specify how aid was to be given. Under the term contributions might be included carriage tax, dog and gun taxes, the fees for licences, or whatever the Chancellor of the Exchequer might choose to hand over. To the deputation which he had the honour of introducing to the Premier the other day, the right hon. Gentleman said—"Do you ask that if I have no surplus I should impose fresh taxation for the purpose of giving relief to local taxpayers? "And his (Mr. R. H. Paget's) reply was the only one that could have been given. The income tax was voted from year to year at so many pence in the pound. Suppose the Chancellor of the Exchequer had a surplus, and was able to do with a fourpenny instead of a fivepenny income tax, but he chose to keep on the fivepenny tax. That would be held not to involve any increase of taxation. Was there a shadow of difference between the retention of a penny of the income tax and the imposition of an additional penny? He sincerely trusted that the right hon. Gentleman would not have to encounter the difficulty of a deficit, but would have a surplus to deal with. There were plenty of precedents for what he asked; the change of the malt duty into a tax on beer was one. He thought that his suggestion that one-half the cost of the in-door poor should be defrayed by a State subvention offered a prospect of considerable reform, not only in local administration, but in local finance, and he trusted Her Majesty's Government would see their way to adopt it. If he might make another suggestion, it would be that these reforms should be effected by two separate Bills instead of one—that the Government should not overweight their County Government Bill with financial reforms, but should deal with these two subjects separately. He would most strongly urge upon the Government that the case he had been putting forward was as much that of the occupiers as the owners. In speaking of owners he wished to call special attention to a class, the interests of which he did not think were considered so much as they ought to be, but which had been called the mainstay and the backbone of England—he meant the yeomen farmers. A mere division of the rate would give no relief whatever to yeomen farmers occupying their own land, and would be a mockery and a delusion. The rate would be divided, and they would be asked to pay both halves. The yeomen farmers were a class deserving of their utmost sympathy. They had suffered bitterly from the agricultural depression, and had borne their sufferings nobly. It seemed to be thought that those who would be affected by this change were enormously wealthy men. That was not so. The last Domesday Book showed that there were 200,000 owners of land owning under 10 acres, and that there were only 60,000 landlords owning over 100 acres. The class of yeomen was still numerous, although it was unfortunately dying out under the pressure of these local burdens. He asked the House and the Government to show these sturdy citizens that their right to what they claimed was recognized. He had no objection in principle to a divided rate, if it were accompanied by complete financial redress. If a new rate were imposed, which God forbid, by no means let it be put upon the occupier alone. Let the landlord bear his share; but he protested against the notion that a divided rate would settle this question. If the House agreed to his Resolution—which he hoped would be the case—it would have the effect of granting remission from a grievous burden which now directly increased the cost of production and hindered the improvement of the land, and which was felt as a great wrong by millions of Her Majesty's most loyal subjects. He begged, in conclusion, to move the Resolution of which he had given Notice.

in seconding the Resolution, said, that this subject had been brought forward for many years past. It had been repeatedly advanced against the proposed change that the Poor Law had been much more severe previous to the new Poor Law Act than it now was. That he readily admitted; but the system in those days was altogether different, and he rejoiced that the poor were no longer being pauperized by the laws of their country. He maintained that the introduction of a Free Trade policy, while it had advanced the interests of this country, had made a re-adjustment of the burdens necessary. Previous to that change it might have been right to place heavy burdens upon the land; but he thought that a fair and equitable re-adjustment of local burdens was now imperatively required. To explain the present condition of the farmers they must go back to the Crimean War and the wars that followed. The effect of those wars was to create a false value for land. Notwithstanding the great improvements that had taken place in agriculture, all the efforts of the farmers had been baffled by the disastrous seasons through which they had passed, and by the heavy burden of local taxation they had to bear. There were the rates for the police, highway rates, education, and several other minor impositions. In his own parish the highway rates had increased fivefold since 1862. Then the rates for building lunatic asylums and Union houses were thrown upon the tenants. If it was considered right that real property should have those burdens, they should be borne by the landlord, and not by the tenant. The rate for education had been alluded to by the hon. Member. He himself was paying a rate of 8d. in the pound for the education of the poor. Now, 8d. in the pound rate upon a farm meant 16d. in the pound income tax. The tenant farmers had also numerous additions in the shape of registration and other fees for the general benefit of the public. A very high authority had said that the police should be made a national force rather than a local one, and that the efficiency of the force would thereby be greatly enhanced. As had been already remarked by the previous speaker, the tenant farmers had to pay for improvements in the cultivation of the soil. And now they were threatened with a further and, he feared, a very serious additional burden upon the passing of the Floods Prevention Bill. They looked to the Prime Minister to afford them relief from the taxation which they had so long and patiently borne; and he would remind the right hon. Gentleman of the sentiments he had expressed the preceding Session in favour of some measure of relief for the ratepayers. He trusted the Government would give this important subject the attention which they felt it deserved.

wished to say a few words in support of the Motion of his hon. Friend, than whom no one, as Chairman of the Central Chamber of Agriculture, could be more entitled to bring that question forward, and who had brought it forward in an able and comprehensive manner. The Motion was, he thought, well-timed and most opportune, because at no period had the agricultural interest been so depressed, and it would place the grievances of the ratepayers before the Government, who would, he hoped, have an opportunity of redressing those grievances. His hon. Friend would not be told, as he himself had been told on a former occasion, when he made an almost similar Motion, that he was too late, that the surplus had already been appropriated, and the financial arrangements of the year complete. That was a question not of Party or of politics, but rather of political economy; and the grievances complained of might be summed up in a very few words. Real property bore nearly all the burdens of local taxation, while personal property almost entirely escaped. When the present system of rating originated, there was no other property in the country that could be assessed than land. Then personal property was infinitesimal and comparatively insignificant. Since then it had wonderfully increased in value, and the income from it now was more than seven times the amount which was derived from the income of land. Again, previous to the year 1846, land enjoyed great privileges and immunities. It had, for the good of the community, since been deprived of those privileges and of protection. He did not complain of that; but he said they ought also to have removed the exceptional taxation that was imposed on land because it had those privileges. Instead, however, of carrying out the recommendations of Sir Robert Peel and Lord John Russell in 1846, when they told them that if they took away Protection they ought injustice to remove the exceptional burdens on land, Parliament had, from time to time, been accumulating fresh burdens upon it. They were in a much worse position now than they were eight years ago, when he made a similar Motion to this one in the House, and when, by a considerable majority, it was decided that it was only just and necessary to relieve the ratepayers from exceptional taxation. It was true that the late Government gave them some State subventions. Applying only to England and Wales, those subventions amounted last year to £l,580,000; and, he said, a great deal more taxation than they had thus been relieved from had been placed on ratepayers and on real property within the last 10 years. The education rate which had been imposed on them amounted last year to £1,600,000, and besides that they had added £600,000, which was paid last year for highways; so that they were in a much worse position than when the House, in 1872, passed a Resolution that it was only just to relieve ratepayers from some of their burdens. The sanitary rate was also a considerable imposition on them; and, therefore, their case was stronger than when he brought it before the House. Now, he did not ask the House of Commons to rate personal property. He considered that it would be impolitic, impossible, and even undesirable to attempt it. He asked for some equivalent in lieu of the privileges and exemptions which this property enjoyed towards admittedly national burdens. Neither did he ask the Government to make any difference between land and houses. They were not asking for any class legislation, or advocating any class interests. He did not ask for the re-imposition of Protection. It would be undesirable to ask the House to impose any taxation on food. There were, however, several modes by which the Government might redress their grievances. They might develop further the policy and principle of State subventions. He was afraid the Prime Minister was opposed to that course; but it was a just and defensible one—there was a great Constitutional relation between contribution and control. But there was another mode. The Government might transfer the whole expense of certain local but national institutions to the Imperial Exchequer. He alluded more especially to the police and lunatics. The Government might also hand over to local authorities licences which were locally raised, such as the carriage tax, the dog and game licence, and also public-house licences. He thought the principle was sound that taxes locally raised should be handed over to local authorities to expend. He believed that principle prevailed in France and Germany, and was found to work well. As to the injustice of the present system of taxation, why, he asked, was the tenant farmer to be rated on different principles from the ordinary householder, from the shopkeeper, or the professional man? Their basis of assessment was the value of the house they occupied. Land was simply a raw material. It was valueless unless capital, skill, industry, and labour were expended on it, and they might as justly rate and tax the goods in a shopkeeper's window, or even the raw material in the warehouse of the manufacturer, as tax the land, which was the only means by which the tenant farmer could make his profits. The profits of the farmer were far more precarious than those derived from any other business. He was dependent upon the seasons, which of late years had been very adverse to him Beyond that, he said that those taxes were taxed indirectly on the necessaries of life for the people; they tended to enhance the price of the necessaries of life. These burdens gave an unfair bonus and premium to the unrated products of the foreigner. The system really amounted to this—that the foreigner was protected and the value of his produce enhanced, while, on the other hand, before the English farmer could bring his produce into the market he was compelled to pay from 10 to 20 per cent upon its value. At a recent deputation to the Prime Minister it had been conclusively shown by a tenant farmer to what extent in some locality he was rated differently as connected with land from those who were unconnected with land; and the result of his figures showed that while every other class paid a tax amounting to 4s. 10d. upon every £100 of income, the tenant farmer, upon the same income, paid no less than £5. That was the case of the education rate; but the same proportion of payment was equally applied to every other besides the education rate. The Prime Minister had promised to introduce measures dealing with the local government of the counties and other matters, but they did not expect to get any large relief from those reforms. Again, they were told that the division of rates was to be the great panacea and specific for their troubles; but there had been a division of rates in Scotland and Ireland, and the system in force there had not allayed their grievances, which were just as pressing there as in this country. What relief would division of rates be to the yeomen, who were the backbone of the country, whose numbers were diminishing under the pressure? The clergy also suffered from the present distribution of taxation, having to pay taxes even upon their professional income. They would experience no relief. The incidence of taxation would be precisely the same. Meanwhile personal property escaped scot free. The noble Marquess (the Marquess of Hartington), the other day, told them that any re-adjustment of burdens would be a very inadequate relief; but they were grateful for small mercies, and any small boon in the shape of relief would be appreciated by the ratepayers generally. The farmers were reproached with not putting sufficient capital into their land; but where was the capital to come from? There was a golden opportunity at the present moment for any hon. Member to invest some capital of his own, and give practical effect to the theory that land might produce double what it did. It was not owing to the prevalence of entailed estates that capital was not forthcoming; not one tenant in 30 knew whether the farm he held was entailed or not. What capital desired was confidence and security. Capital was very coy, and without that security it would not be attracted. The Prime Minister, at Leeds, had explained the reason why such an undue amount of taxation fell upon the land. He had said that—

"The collection of Imperial taxation was always a matter of serious difficulty, while the collection of local taxation was always comparatively easy."

They had found out, indeed, that there was a fatal facility in the collection of rates, and hence their imposition. The Prime Minister also pointed out that the rates in towns had also increased with great rapidity. But in towns they possessed such luxuries as gas, water, markets, recreation grounds, washhouses, free libraries, and various other advantages, which the country people must pay for if they wanted them. He was not drawing any invidious distinction between town and country. What he asked for was relief for ratepayers generally, and he did not make the appeal to the House on their behalf ad misericordiam, but as a matter of simple justice; and if it was not granted a glaring injustice would be done, and a grievous anomaly perpetuated.

said, he desired to take part in the debate as a Member representing a town and not a county constituency. In the first place, he ventured to set the hon. Gentleman who spoke last right when he asserted that those who lived in the towns had the luxuries of gas and water included in their rates. He could assure the hon. Member that in the towns there was a special rent for these articles, and that they formed items entirely distinct from the rates. Personally, he did not think the question ought to be discussed as a question either of town or of county. Bearing in mind the composition of the House of Commons in the past, it was almost impossible to put forward any view which should not be that of the owners of land. Unfortunately, the landowners in the House of Commons had used their privileges of taxation in the past almost exclusively in their own favour, and they were not slow now to press them upon the attention of the House and of the country. In the first place, he wished to point out that, speaking roundly, about one-half of the rates of the country was paid by the towns, and it was therefore only fair that, whatever relief was given or proposed to be given, an expression of opinion should be afforded to the towns. It was absolutely necessary that there should be some principle of justice both in the remission of rates and in the increase of rates; but, at the same time, it must be remembered that it was not the towns which had pressed this question upon the Government, but that it was entirely the landed interest that was asking for relief. He deeply sympathized with the sufferings which both the farmers and the landlords had been passing through during the. last five years; but it was a great mistake to suppose that it was only the agriculturists who had been suffering. He represented a large manufacturing and commercial constituency, in which the assessment of the municipal borough amounted to something like £1,000,000 per annum, and, therefore, the interests of that great community were equal in point of assessment and importance to those of many of the counties of this country. Having an intimate knowledge of the condition of things in the North of England during the last few years, he did not hesitate to say that the manufacturing and commercial interests had been almost as sorely depressed and distressed as those of the farmers and the landed proprietors. The great difference was that the former had borne in silence what they had had to bear, whereas in regard to the latter there was an evil habit on the part of agricultural Members, on both sides of the House, of making the House ring with their complaints. He was reminded of the story told of the Irish officer who was lying wounded on the battle field with an English soldier lying sorely hurt beside him and making a great noise. The Irish officer at length called out—"Shure, can't you be quiet; do you think nobody's killed beside yourself." Hon. Members on the other side were per- petually raising the question of agricultural distress, and he could not help remarking that it was precisely the same class of Representatives who, seven or eight years ago, when the country was in a state of great agricultural and commercial prosperity, and when the Government possessed an overflowing Exchequer, supported a spirited foreign policy which involved the country in a largely increased expenditure. He ventured to point out to hon. Members opposite that he was the true friend of the agricultural interest who pressed on his friends the necessity of observing rigid economy in the public expenditure when the country was in a state of prosperity, in order that on proper occasions relief might be given to all classes of the community from the burdens of taxation which all alike were compelled to bear. Hon. Gentlemen argued as though the agricultural interest was called upon to pay much more than its share towards the general revenues of the country. Exactly the contrary was the case. Hon. Gentlemen knew quite well that if, as representing the land, they paid their full share towards the local taxation of the country, it was notorious that the humbler classes paid far more than their share of the Imperial burdens of the country. It came, therefore, with indifferent grace from those who were already in a better position than their neighbours that they should seek to throw additional burdens upon the working classes of the community. He believed it was a great mistake to suppose that the farmers had suffered since the time referred to by his hon. Friend the Member for Herefordshire (Mr. Duckham)—the time of the repeal of the Corn Laws. So far as one important item was concerned, of which they had heard a good deal lately, namely—the growth and sale of wool, although the price was, no doubt, a little depressed now, it was well known that since the repeal of the Corn Laws the average price of wool had been from 25 to 30 per cent higher than in the corresponding period before the repeal of the Corn Laws; and it was not the only item in which the produce of the farmers had ranged higher since that period than in a similar period antecedent to it. That was quite true of meat, butter, and various other items, and it was altogether a delusion to suppose that the agricultural interest had been heavily weighted by the change which had been effected in our national policy. He ventured to put before the House this general consideration, that no substantial relief—at any rate, no relief to the full extent the farmers thought they were entitled to—would come to them from the re-adjustment of local burdens. If the money was not raised locally it must be raised from Imperial funds, and he believed that it would be more economically administered if raised locally. Therefore, he was an advocate for local taxation and local administration as a question of national policy. Take the case of the police. It would not be denied for one moment that since the local authorities had been in the receipt of a considerable grant from the Exchequer in aid of the police force there had been no less money spent, but the result had been that three men had been employed where formerly only two were. [Cries of "No!"] He thought the fact was far too well known to require that he should answer any challenge of it in that House. He had been a member of a large Corporation, and he knew very well that when money came from a foreign source, the tendency altogether was not to treat it as money raised on the spot, and for which the locality was responsible would be treated. He therefore strongly objected to the principle of subvention; but, at the same time, he believed there were questions in regard to which money might be profitably handed over from the Imperial funds and applied to local uses. It was important that the money raised locally and Imperially should be distributed among all classes of the community; and he warned hon. Members who represented the wealthy classes in the House of Commons that they were not advocating a wise policy when they sought to throw an increased share of the burden of taxation upon the humbler classes. Above all things, they ought to support a wise and peaceful policy on the part of Her Majesty's Government, seeing that the prosperity of the agricultural interest must depend, in a large measure, upon the prosperity of commerce and the towns, and that manufactures and commerce could never thrive amid wars and rumours of wars. It was only by avoiding the risk and danger of foreign embroilments that it was possible for both town and country to prosper. From long and painful experience he was fully prepared to say that nothing was so disastrous to the manufacturing interest of the country as continual threats of war, and the state of uncertainty which arose out of them. Such a condition of affairs put an end to all enterprize, and led to suffering and depression. If time allowed he could read to the House accounts, which were simply appalling, of honourable and upright men who had been brought to ruin and bankruptcy through no fault of their own, but by the caprice of fashion or the state of uncertainty which apprehended hostilities in Europe produced. Many of these men had become hopelessly bankrupt, and had been cast out upon the world in a state of absolute pauperism. In the towns there was a deep feeling of sympathy for those who had suffered from agricultural depression; but it must by no means be believed that the misfortune and suffering had befallen the farmers alone, or that it was confined to one class of the community.

said, he hoped the Government would see their way to support the Motion of the hon. Member for Somersetshire (Mr. R. H. Paget). As an Irish Member he should rejoice to see something done to relieve the burdens now imposed upon the ratepayers in regard to local taxation, and he was sorry to find that the debate was being diverted to the question of taxation as between the towns and the country. He thought that that was not at all the question before the House. The question before the House was the present incidence of local taxation. As a member of a Board of Guardians for more than 20 years, he found that the local authorities bitterly complained of the taxation imposed on them from time to time by the Imperial Government. He would take, as an instance, the case of the registration of births, marriages, and deaths. The Poor Law Guardians were called upon to pay all the expenses connected with the registration of births, deaths, and marriages, while the Returns themselves were of no use whatever to the ratepayers. It was a Return required for Imperial purposes, and should be met by an Imperial tax. He certainly failed to see why the Returns should not be paid for by the Government which required them, and the local ratepayers relieved from the burden of paying for what they did not want and what was of no interest to them If the Government could not go so far as to accept the Motion of the hon. Gentleman the Member for Somersetshire (Mr. R. H. Paget), he hoped they would closely investigate, as they had promised to do, the question of the taxation which ought to be paid out of the Imperial Exchequer, instead of being placed as a burden upon the shoulders of the local ratepayers. He understood that that was what the Government were asked to do now, and he believed they had already expressed their willingness to consider the question with the view of affording some relief. Then, again, there was the question of the Returns which the Poor Law Unions were required to send from time to time to both Houses of Parliament. In Ireland there were no less than 163 Unions, which were required to send in these Returns, and the Returns themselves were supplied entirely for Government purposes. Although many applications had been made by the Unions to the Government to pay the expense of collecting and making the Returns, he had never known of any occasion, with one exception, in which the Government came forward to repay the money expended. The practice was to place it upon the ordinary expenditure of the locality to which it was really of no benefit whatever, nor would the Returns have been required or asked for if the Poor Law Guardians had been left to themselves. One matter, which had already been referred to by the hon. Member who brought forward the Motion, was the charge for income tax on land in Ireland. He could not agree with the hon. Member in his views on that matter. He thought the charge was far more fairly imposed upon the land than it would be upon the industrious classes, because land, as a general rule, brought from 40 to 50 per cent more than Griffith's valuation for rent; whereas the income tax was only levied upon Griffith's valuation. [A laugh.] Hon. Members might laugh, but the facts were precisely as he had stated them; and the landlord who got 40 or 50 per cent above the fair rental value of his land could well afford to pay the income tax. He could not, therefore, at all agree with the hon. Member for Somersetshire in regard to the imposition of the income tax upon the landlords in Ireland.

said, he had confined Ms remarks in reference to the income tax to England, where the income tax was levied on the gross rental in an entirely different way from that in which it was levied in Ireland.

said, there was another point in which he thought the taxation levied in Ireland was unfair to the taxpayers—namely, the charge for lunatics. Some relief had been given by the late Government in this respect; but he failed to see why the Government did not relieve the ratepayers from this charge for lunatics altogether. There were many of them retained in the Union-houses in Ireland which were altogether unfit for them, and there were no lunatic asylums proper to which they could be sent. All the expense was thrown on the ratepayers and the owners of property in Ireland, and they obtained no relief from the Imperial Exchequer, although he believed that it was formerly the intention of Parliament to grant such relief. As to Poor Law taxation in Ireland, they all knew it was a matter which every man ought to bear his fair share of; but, unfortunately, in Ireland nobody paid it except the owners of real property. This was a great injustice to the owners of property, and he certainly could not see why the owners of bank stock, railway shareholders, and others should not pay their share of the relief of the poor as well as the owners of real property. These were matters affecting the incidence of local taxation which he asked Her Majesty's Government to take into their consideration. There were various rates, such as that for the support of pauper lunatics, which ought to be borne entirely by Imperial taxation, and there were others to which the funds of the State ought reasonably to be required to contribute.

said, he should like to say a few words before the debate closed. There were a good many hon. Members on that (the Liberal) side of the House who felt deeply on the question of local taxation, and he knew that the county he had the honour to represent (Norfolk) had suffered as severely as Somersetshire or Devonshire. He had listened to speeches ad nauseam at Boards of Guardians, Chambers of Agriculture, and public meetings, resolutions passed at Quarter Sessions, and opinions which had been expressed everywhere with great unanimity in favour of some relief being granted by the State. He thanked his hon. Friend opposite (Mr. R. H. Paget) for having brought the subject forward, because he believed that it was only by continually knocking at the door that they were likely to obtain a redress of their grievances. He thought they had a better chance of getting these grievances attended to now than they had had for some time. The right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government had already acknowledged the state of depression under which the agricultural interest had been suffering for some time. Without giving up the right of the farmers to grumble, he would willingly admit that last year had not been as bad as the year before, and equally that 1880 had not been as bad as the year 1879; but, nevertheless, there had been very little money in the country, either in the hands of the farmers or of the landlords, and therefore it was only right that they should ask for a little relief. He did not think that the remission of local burdens would do all that was required to cure the grievances complained of. Although entire unanimity had been expressed at all the meetings as to the burdens they had to suffer, there had not been the same unanimity as to the way in which they wished to have them remedied. Those whom he represented entirely endorsed the opinions so well expressed by the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir Massey Lopes), and he hoped the Government would be able to see their way to relieving the owners of real property in the counties from some of the burdens which they looked upon as Imperial and not local at all. This opinion was certainly strongly felt in regard to lunatics and education, and he hoped the Government would consent to allow burdens partly local and partly Imperial to be administered by local bodies, by that means avoiding centralization. If the Government could see their way towards granting the relief suggested by the hon. Baronet, and would give to the localities a great part of the money now contributed to Imperial purposes from local taxation, they would earn the gratitude of the people, and confer immense advantages upon the country.

said, that at that late hour of the night (12.15) it was almost impossible to do justice to the subject they had before them, and therefore he only desired to make a very few observations before they heard what his right hon. Friend the President of the Local Government Board had to say upon this important matter. His hon. Friend the Member for Somersetshire was to be congratulated upon the statement he had laid before the House, although he was unfortunate in having been compelled to delay it until so late a period of the evening, when full justice could scarcely be done to it. The subject was not only important in itself, but it had attracted a considerable amount of attention on the part of the public out-of-doors for many years past. In one sense it was true that the case of the owners and occupiers of land and the owners and occupiers of house property was to be regarded as one. Although the difference between the taxes placed on land and those placed on houses was very great, it was impossible to draw any practical distinction in dealing with them. No doubt it was true, as had been pointed out by the hon. Member for Bradford opposite (Mr. Illingworth), that the cry for redress had come almost exclusively from the occupiers of land. The hon. Member for Cambridge (Mr. W. Fowler), in speaking of the depression of the landed interest the other day, pooh-poohed the notion of any remission of local taxation being of advantage to the farmer, because he said at the outside it could not amount to more than 1s. 6d. in the pound. But a remission of taxation to the extent of 1s. 6d. in the pound would be a remission of one-half of the local taxation which the farmer had to pay, and he ventured to say that the remission of 1s. 6d. would be regarded by him as a very great relief indeed. The great objection which the Chancellor of the Exchequer had taken to relief of this kind was that it was not relief to the farmer, but to the owner of the property. He could not agree with the right hon. Gentleman in that opinion, because he knew sufficient to induce him to believe that such a proposition was entirely fallacious. At the present time, or, indeed, at any time during the last few years, it was monstrous to suppose that any landowner would add any remission granted in local taxation to the rent of his tenant. He put that idea aside as being absolutely out of the question, and he was prepared to say that any remission which might be made of local rates throughout the country would be gratefully received by the farmers in the present day. Why was it that the occupiers of land had this keen sense of injustice with regard to local taxation? In the first place, it was a ready-money payment out of pocket which he could not avoid and which fell upon him at a time when it was inconvenient to make it. He was nevertheless obliged to pay it, however inconvenient it might be, and this was one reason why the education rate, as a charge upon the owners and occupiers of land, had been regarded as a flagrant injustice. Take the case of a large landed estate in a neighbourhood where it had been found necessary to institute a school board. All of a sudden, without any anticipated arrangement between the landlord and tenant, a school board was set up for the benefit of a town population in the centre of a large parish. The landlords and the owners were rated for their houses and gardens, while the rates, which were paid almost entirely by the occupiers of land in the parish, were paid exclusively for the benefit of the children belonging to a neighbouring town. That was a great injustice, and in his opinion the Legislature had made a mistake in allowing the burden to be so imposed. If the education rate were uniformly imposed throughout the country he believed the grievance would become so strong that the Government would be compelled to remove it. The reason why the demand for a more equitable adjustment of taxation in respect of school boards had not been much more general than it was arose from the fact that the grievance was only felt in the neighbourhood of the large towns and populous places. He now came to the reason why the cry for remission proceeded from the occupiers of land and not from the occupiers of houses. In towns and populous places the burden of the rates was quite as heavy as in the country districts, and yet the complaint was not so great. Why was this? It was because every man felt that the house in which he lived was, in a certain rough way, the measure of his ability to pay. A large population packed in a town found different houses at their disposal rented in proportion to their real value, and the occupier in selecting one chose it as the measure of his capacity to pay both rent and rates. The consequence was, that whether the rates amounted to 3s., 4s., or 5s. in the pound, the burden was determined with a certain degree of fairness in reference to the means of the occupier. It was said that the proper way to deal with the question would be by handing over the administration of certain taxes to the local authorities. Unless he was very much mistaken, the effect of that undoubtedly would be that an undue proportion of the relief would find its way into the pockets of the wealthy residents of populous places, whose cry for redress had not been, up to the present moment, very conspicuous. For his own part he would like very much to see another kind of relief coming to the ratepayers—a relief following from a reduction of the general expenditure of the country. The question of how the taxes for this purpose were to paid would not then arise, because there would be a surplus revenue of the country from which the Government would be able not only to remit taxation, but to assist the local rates. He much wished that some reduction would take place on the enormous amount of taxation prevailing throughout the country during the last four or five years, and that by means of this reduction some judicious remissions might be made for the benefit of all classes. There was one tax which bore upon land with extraordinary severity—namely, the property tax under Schedules A and B. The amounts extracted from the pockets of the ratepayers under these Schedules represented frequently sums which had never been received. He gave every credit to the Treasury for the readiness with which they had permitted claims for abatement to be made; but it was well known that money once paid out of pocket was generally recovered with exceeding difficulty, and this was the case with the claims to which he referred. There could be little doubt that the operation of Schedule A at the present time, and for some years past, had been to extract a very undue amount of contribution from the owners and occupiers of land. In con- clusion, he would express a hope that Her Majesty's Government would make some statement of an encouraging kind with reference to this question.

Sir, the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down has spoken of a principle which is an extremely sound one. He wishes that it were in the power of Parliament to give relief to particular classes, not by burdening the general community, but by some reduction of expenditure which would place new funds at the disposal of the Government without levying additional burdens on the country. No doubt, that is a very sound principle, and it is one which, for my own part, I should be glad to see take effect; nor, so far as the efforts of the Government are concerned, can I say that we have been slack in this respect. But the right hon. Gentleman knows that the tendency of this House, which is intended by the Constitution for controlling public expenditure, has become an agency for continually stimulating its increase. I think that is a practice most unhappy and most unfortunate for the House itself, and one which, if it continues, must lead to great changes. We cannot carry much further the system under which the responsibility for expenditure nominally rests with the Executive Government, while the irresistible pressure for augmentation of expenditure is continually proceeding from the House of Commons. It is a change which has now been in operation for about 25 or 30 years, and which must lead to the most unfortunate consequences, and, perhaps, to some very large alterations for the real protection of the public, so that if the House of Commons is to become the agent, not for diminishing charges, but increasing them, the House and its Members shall assume the responsibility of that augmentation in the face of the country, and not cover themselves under the responsibility of this or that Administration. But that is a subject upon which I shall not now enter. I have referred to it only because of the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman who has just spoken, and because I am glad to hear anyone introduce protestations, if they be only of a general character, against the tendency alluded to. The right hon. Gentleman says that he hopes there will be some assurance given by the Government on this subject, or, if not, that the hon. Member who made the present Motion would press it to a division. I cannot be surprised at his expressing a desire that the sense of the House should be taken on the Motion, if no assurance of any kind came from the Government; but what I am surprised at is that it should appear to have escaped him that the Government have already, in the most solemn and formal manner - in a manner more solemn and formal than I could supply by any declaration at this Table - pledged themselves to open the whole question. We have advised Her Majesty to acquaint the House that they will be invited to deal with proposals for the establishment in the English and Welsh counties of local self-government. Parliament has been told that this measure will enlarge the powers of administration-that is, of local administration- and promote the diminution, so far as we can supply it, of powers of unnecessary centralization. Further financial changes will be proposed which will give the House the opportunity of considering both as to town and country, what may be the proper extent and the most equitable form of contribution of Imperial taxes to the relief of local burdens. Now, I think that the hon. Member behind me who seconded this Motion will perceive that it would be the height of rashness on the part of any Government, to advise those words on the part of the Crown, unless they had made up their minds seriously to open this question. Sir, I do not wish to meet the speeches which have been made this evening in any hostile or captious spirit. On the other hand, I do not say that I subscribe to everything put forward in them. For instance, I cannot subscribe to the historical reminiscences of the hon. Baronet the Member for South Devonshire (Sir Massey Lopes), who says that at the time of the repeal of the Corn Laws, Sir Robert Peel and Lord John Russell pointed out, in connection with the removal of Protection, that Parliament ought to enter into a revision of local burdens. I know not whence he has drawn that. I was an active participator in those proceedings, and I say that, unwittingly, he has precisely inverted the declaration and doctrines of Sir Robert Peel and Lord John Russell, because they most vehemently each op- posed themselves to an inquiry in this House into the burdens upon agriculture for the purpose of seeing whether they were open to Imperial compensation. [Sir MASSEY LOPES: They gave certain sums.] That is quite true. Sir Robert Peel gave certain sums in 1846; but to point to them as prospective of their intention to give compensation in connection with the abolition of Protection, is an entire mistake on the part of the hon. Baronet; and I have good reason to recollect it, because, whether wisely or unwisely-perhaps I was misled on that occasion-I gave a vote for the Committee to inquire into the pressure of local burdens on agriculture, and I gave it against Sir Robert Peel and Lord John Russell. I do not say that I attempt to enter into all the points that have been raised in this most complex question. It is impossible that we can discuss them in a satisfactory manner upon this Motion. Moreover, it is quite impossible to afford this pledge considering the advice we have given to Her Majesty, as indicated in the Speech from the Throne. It is quite impossible for Her Majesty's Government to shrink from the responsibility for the initiative to which they have pledged themselves. We are constantly pressed, and justly so, to take up one question or another; but I venture to remind the House that when the Government has pledged itself to take up a question it is usual to allow them an opportunity of laying their proposals before the House, and it is not usual, before they have had an opportunity of opening their proposals, to pledge themselves to the propositions of independent Members. As I perceive, there is one great allegation which lies at the root of the principal part of the speech of the hon. Baronet the Member for Devonshire. It is that there is no reason why personal property should not be made to contribute to local burdens in a degree either equal to, or, if not equal to, yet more nearly approaching to the manner in which real property is made to contribute to those burdens. That is a proposition of great breadth and sweep. At the same time, it is one which we have undoubtedly pledged ourselves to open by the advice we have given to Her Majesty as indicated by the Speech from the Throne. It is impossible for us to open that proposition except in connection with the finance of the year, nor can we place ourselves under promises which are large and indefinite in their terms before we know what measures can be adopted in redemption of those pledges. We believe we have gone as far as any Government can go to meet the wishes of those who say that the present system of local taxation—especially since the introduction of new rates—has borne with great severity upon the occupiers of land. The whole view of that question we have pledged ourselves to open with a view to remove this grievance. The question as to the mode in which relief can be given on principles of equity to the different districts of the country, town and rural, the question of how to carry such reforms into effect without abandoning or impairing the ancient principles of local self-government in this country, are questions of the greatest depth an complexity. It will certainly tax the best of our energies to place before the House schemes which we can hope will be deemed satisfactory. But, Sir, I plead for that liberty which is usually, and something more than usually, given to a Government when about to introduce a plan of the kind to allow it to produce that plan as a whole, and unfettered by abstract Resolutions to which no one is able to assign any clear, definite, or positive meaning. It is by no means an uncommon thing in this House, when a Chancellor of the Exchequer has his Budget in prospect, and the Government has given no pledge on the subject, to press the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and even to endeavour to bind him by a pledge. But I must say that I do not recollect any single occasion in my experience on which an attempt has been made—I do not say the hon. Member means to make it, evidently he thinks it ought not to be made—to bind the Government by a Resolution of the House upon a subject which they have, in the most solemn manner, pledged themselves to open. Her Majesty's Government can be no parties to any such Resolution. But there is no difficulty whatever with respect to the general principles upon which a measure of this kind should stand, because we have allowed spontaneously, and in the most formal manner, that there is a case which requires to be opened, and a grievance which requires to be met. We cannot, however, consent to relieve ourselves of responsi- bility by taking refuge in generalities which go no way in acquittal of our duty. It is our duty to submit proposals which must enter into the finance of the year, and it is only in connection therewith that we are able to submit them. I have frankly admitted to the hon. Gentleman, as I before admitted to the deputation which waited on me, that the question whether personal property should be made to contribute more largely to the local expenses of the country was one which it was fair to open, and upon which we should have proposals to submit to Parliament, especially with a view to the relief of the occupiers of the soil. I hope that will be deemed to be no unconciliatory language. I do not attempt to discuss all the large and difficult points involved in the question, or to add to the promises we have already made, because they cannot be properly expounded till the time comes for considering them in connection with some definite financial plan, when hon. Members will be able to judge whether we are honestly or adequately redeeming our pledges. I should be very sorry, however, to be placed in conflict with the hon. Gentleman; but I hope he will not think it his duty to bring us to a declaration at the present moment, but that he will rather leave us a free initiative in the matter. As we do not desire to meet this Resolution with a negative, we shall adopt the regular course of moving the Previous Question; though we do not admit that it is in accordance with expediency or good policy that we should accede to indefinite pledges in anticipation of the fulfilment of promises which we have already given in the most spontaneous and solemn form.

said, he had not ventured to introduce this Motion without having given the subject his most careful consideration. He was perfectly aware, as every Member of the House must be aware, from the terms in Her Majesty's Speech, that there was an undertaking on the part of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Gladstone) to do what he called "open the question;" but, in putting this Motion down, he (Mr. R. H. Paget) thought he should strengthen the right hon. Gentleman's hands, by enabling him to see what the feeling of the House was. This was no new question suddenly sprung upon the House. The financial details were clear to the mind of anyone who choose to go into them, and the financial mind of the right hon. Gentleman could have grappled with those details with the greatest facility, and proved to him that the only method of redress must be within the lines of the Resolution he had the honour to move. He could not think that in asking the House to express their opinion upon this matter he was placing the Government in any difficulty. Their course was a clear one. They might well accept his Resolution; but, if not, he should feel it to be his duty to take the sense of the House upon it.

I hoped the hon. Gentleman would not put the House to the trouble of dividing, and would not compel me to rise and make the Motion I am now about to move, which is "the Previous Question." I must point out to the hon. Member and to the House why it appears to me that the Government could not accept the Resolution moved by the hon. Member. I do not find fault with the tone of the speeches of hon. Gentlemen opposite, or of any hon. Gentleman who has spoken in this debate. That, however, is a very different thing from the Government being asked, after the undertaking in Her Majesty's Speech, to accept a Resolution which in itself is ambiguous. As far as I understand, the hon. Member wishes for, or would be content with, contributions from personalty; but from the language of the Resolution it is not clear whether the hon. Member means the contributions to be derived from taxes on labour, or whether he only wishes one class of property to be called upon in aid of another. Then, again, I must point out to the hon. Member what is, perhaps, the greatest difficulty in the Resolution. He asks us to agree to say that the owners and occupiers of real property should without further delay be relieved by an adequate increase from general taxation. What is the meaning of adequate? Does adequate relief mean some contribution from personalty or from general taxation, or that local burdens are to be equally divided between personalty and realty, or between capital and labour, or is it simply a vague and general term which means that which is adequate in the opinion of any Gentleman who will vote for this Resolution? I will not detain the House any longer; but I think that, after the pledge which the Government has given with regard to dealing with this matter financially, and with regard to county government in the Queen's Speech, we cannot agree to accept a Resolution in terms so perfectly ambiguous as those of the hon. Member. Therefore, I am obliged to submit the Motion of the Previous Question.

I will only detain the House one moment; but I cannot help taking notice of an observation by the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down. The right hon. Gentleman says this is an ambiguous Motion, and that it ought not to be accepted in place of the clear declaration in Her Majesty's Speech. It seems to me that precisely the inverse of that is the case. The information afforded to us in Her Majesty's Speech seems to me to be extremely ambiguous, and that my hon. Friend's Motion is one the intent and meaning of which are absolutely clear. The proposal in Her Majesty's Speech is that we shall be invited to deal with proposals for the establishment of local self-government, and connected with various questions of large powers of administration. There are to be financial proposals, which will give you an opportunity of considering what may be the proper extent and most equitable form of contribution from Imperial taxation. My hon. Friend proposes that we should declare that the present incidence is too heavy for real property, and that whatever is done should be done in the way of an increase or contribution. It seems to me that my hon. Friend's proposal is the very reverse of ambiguous.

My right hon. Friend did not speak of a clear statement in Her Majesty's Speech. The words have been put into his mouth, but were not used by him. The declaration in Her Majesty's Speech is the responsible declaration of responsible Ministers, supposed to have the confidence of the country and of the House of Commons, pledging themselves in the face of the country to open up this question—a pledge which I put it fearlessly in the face of the House no Ministers could have made in the terms they used un- less they had intended to propose a measure of relief, and I stated when I rose before that I believed this was the first occasion on which an endeavour has been made to bind them by the terms of an abstract Resolution, in anticipation of the plan they are to propose on their own responsibility; and I shall be curious to see by whom this attempt is supported.

said, he had fully intended to support the Motion of the hon. Member, and he was anxious that his hon. Friends should support it; but he thought, after what the Prime Minister had said, that the proper time for raising this financial proposal would be when the Budget was considered. For his part, he should never hesitate to increase the national expenses, as the Prime Minister had said hon. Members were doing, or to face his constituents after doing so. It was the poorest people in Ireland who paid the poor rates and the county rates; but he thought this matter might wait till the Budget came up. But when the Prime Minister brought up his proposal he hoped that if he did not include Ireland in his scheme he would, at least, give Ireland some share in the relief. If the right hon. Gentleman attempted to give relief to England and Wales and left out Ireland he would probably have a good deal of trouble.