A PARLIAMENTARY DIFFICULTY.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1954, 29 May 1880, Page 3

A PARLIAMENTARY DIFFICULTY.

Therefusal of Mr Charles Bradlaugh, tho new-ly-elected member for Northampton, to take tho oath of allegiance to the Queen, raises a singular question—is it possible for a professed Republican, having tho courage of his convictions, to sit in tho British Legislature ? Were Mr Bradlaugh to take the oath, he would be false to his convictions, and giving the lie to the Republican agitation, of which he has been the acknowledged leader in England for many years. Those who have any knowledge of the Home Constitution, must have foreseen that the House of Commons would insist noon Mr Bradlaugh taking the oath ; and those who know that iconoclastic gentleman must be aware that he is just about the last person who will take it. Tho seat will probably be declared vacant, and the Radical shoemaking borough of Northampton will no doubt again return the same man of their choice (who has wooed them for many years), and the Legislature will again and again have to face the d-fficulty. Although the circumstances are hardly parallel, some of our readers (says the Wellington “Chronicle ’’) may remember that the City of Loudon time after time returned Baron Rothschild until tho Jewish disabilities were removed, and the county of Tipperary twice returned O’Donovan Rossa, although then a prisoner for treason and felony. Should the present difficulty end in the House of Commons declaring that a person may sit in it without swearing allegiance to the Crown, the axe will undoubtedly be laid to the very root of monarchy. How the complication will end 1 it s of course difficult to say.