The Dominion. TUESDAY,JANUARY 7, 1913. PARLIAMENT AS A COURT.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1641, 7 January 1913, Page 4

The Dominion. TUESDAY,JANUARY 7, 1913. PARLIAMENT AS A COURT.

There are some points of interest i to all tho colonial publics in a de-' ; bate which took place in''the_ House of' Commons as to the. eligibility' of /1 a certain member to retain his scat. : Sir Stuaut SaMuel, the Liberal i member for Tower Hamlets, is a ] partner in the firm' of SA-UEI, Mon- i taoue, and Co., .bankers and bullion : brokers. (Mr., Lloyd-Geoeqe's , allies ■ are. quite as interesting people; as : Dukes are), and this firm, it \ was recently found,,has been engaged'in heavy, silver purchase; contracts with, the British.Government.. There was , Bome , vigorous / agitation over' the _ case,-;and' it was urged that Sib Stuajit Samuel had. forfeited • his scat by committing a breach of the ; statute of 1782, which forbids, members of the House to enter into contracts; with any persons on account of the 'public service. Although urged by the Jewish Chronicle and the Jewish World to resign, his scat; Siu Stuart Samuel has chosen not to do so,/doubtless because'the Gov-, ernment is anxious to avoid a byelection. On i November. 22, the I Attorney-General moved to sot up a Select Committee of the House to i determine whether the seat is; vacated, ■■'■ and, very strong ; exception was taken to this course by members of the Opposition, although ulti- : mately they allowed the motion to pass without a division. Since Sir Stuart Samuel would not vacate hiß seat voluntarily, and re-submit himself to his constituents,; the Unionists claimed that the. matter should be referred to the courts. The Government took the Btand that a difficult question of law was /involved, that tho. House had always decided , such questions, and that.in.any case a reference to the courts would mean a considerable delay. •. Lord Balcarres pointed out that since .1869, and particularly since 1885, the tendency of the House of Commons'.had been to withdraw, from committees of .the ; House the duty of deciding whether any particular member was entitled to sit and vote in the House, and in any case the\ decision of the committee would riot oonimand the public confidence which would be commanded by 'a decision) of the High Court. Several other members referred also to-the fact that in any case proceedings could bo taken in the courts against ihe member involved, and that as - the courts would not pay the slightest attention to any decision by a Select Committee of the House, it might be decided that what, the committee might call legal was really illegal. It would be disastrous to the House, Sir Edward Carson pointed out, if a collision took place between ''the futile jurisdiction of tho House and tho absolute determination of the courts.". Mr. Bonar Law put the objection to/the Government's proposal in terms tho force of which wo in New Zealand have been taught to appreciate by a few incidents in recent years: Any one interested ' in* the history of the House, and in the decision of questions precisely the same as this, must know lliat nothing could be worse,for. the House tlian to take up a position where it could even bo supposed that it was a party committee, and still more when it gave a decision which could not bo binding upon it. (Hear, hear.) If this committee decided tho question, it would not carry conviction, because obviously it was a party 'committee, and however anxious they were to give a judicial verdict, the composition of tho committee would prevent it from carrying, the confidence, which it ought to carry. r . It is ho reply to this to say, as Mr. Lloyd-George said, that "after all, if it was to be said that the opinion of a committee of that House had no weight because there was a party ' majority upon it, all the committees were party committees, and the Government in power always had a majority." Everybody, is able to tell when it question decided by a Select Committee is one into which party i considerations enter. ' The regrettable, thing is that tho • carrying of the motion amounts to [ a fresh affirmation of the virtual u supremacy of the House itself, as distinct from the actual (statutes passed by it. One or two Radical

commentators justified the decision as a recognition of tho fact that the House is "a supremo judicial assembly/' That is precisely what no Parliament should be: it is precisely what the growing tendency of governments to exalt the rights of Parliament over the rights of the public and the public good has led prudent people to think that it is what Parliament should cease to be. In this particular case the Government was insisting that the committee should, decide a question precisely similar in principle to the question of whether or not a member has been properly elected, which the House long ago decided should be referred to the courts. At ihe bottom of the Governments action, of course, was .its' reluctance to seo another seat go vacant. , The main reason why the Opposition did not pres3 hard against tho motion was the general feeling that if Bin Stuart Samuel committed an offence in continuing to hold his seat, he did so unwittingly, and the fact, also, that the law is so anomalous that tho principal shareholder, who may be practically the sole shareholder, in a contracting company, can secure immunity from the consequences of the Act of 1782, in circumstances which would lead to the disqualification of a partner in a contracting firm. But most peoplo will thins the decision of the House a mosl unfortunate one.