CAUCUS TO DECIDE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 73, 27 March 1940, Page 10

CAUCUS TO DECIDE.

RECOMMENDATION TO HIS EXCELLENCY. CONSTTTUTIOHAI. POSITION. Mr. Fraser, as deputy-leader of the Labour party, has in recent months, 'been acting-Prime Minister, and it is believed that he will continue in that capacity until the Parliamentary Labour party meets, when a leader will

be selected. The leader must, of course, be a member of the House of Representatives. His Excellency the GovernorGeneral, after Mr. Savage's death has been gazetted, wiil send for Mr. Frase.r, whose duty it will then be to request his Excellency to eend for the Minister selected by the party, and that Minister will be asked to form, a Ministry.

Such was the procedure followed in May, 1923, on the occasion of the death of the Rt. Hon. W. F. Massey. Like Ballanee and Seddon, Mr. Massey died in office. To-day the position is practically the same as in 192.'), since Mr. Eraser, like the late Sir Francis Bell, who took up the reins of office after Mr. Maseey's death, prior to the selection of Mr. Coates as Prime Minister, ha.s been for some time carrying out the duties of Prime Minister.

At the time of Mr. Seddon's death in 1906, the. acting-Prime Minister, Mr. Hall-Jones, was a member of the Lower House and, like Mr. Eraser to-day, eligible to be appointed Prime Minister. Pending the return from abroad of Sir Joseph Ward, he was appointed to that office. It has been customary on the death of the Prime Minister for the Ministers to resign, but before the return of individual portfolios is made to members of the Cabinet, the position of Prime Minister must be settled. Procedure Followed in 1925. The constitutional position regarding the formation of a new Government following the death of the Prime Minister was clearly explained on May 14. 1925, by the late Sir Francis Bell, an authority on constitutional law and procedure.

The Rt. Hon. W. F. Massey had died on Sunday, May 10. and. after th* funeral obsequies 011 May 14. Sir Francis Bell waited on the GovernorGeneral, at Government House, and was sworn in as Prime Minister. Sir Francis, on his return to Parliament House issued a statement to the Press, in which he said that Mr. Massey had for many years held unquestioned supremacy in the Government and in his party, within .nd without the walls of Parliament.

"The death of the Prime Minister," he said, "although it does not automatically terminate the actual tenure of the other members of the Government, and the Executive Council, creates at once the right, and indeed the duty, of the Crown in England, or the representatives of the Crown in the Dominion,

to call upon some person to take that office, the holder of which has special constitutional functions and duties. Party Makes The Choice. "Until the members of that party of the House of Representatives which had placed the Ministry in power could be duly consulted, and themselves choose their leader, it was not possible for his Excellency to select, or for Ministers (if their advice was asked) to name to his Excellency the member of the party who should, by the common consent of finally take the late Prime Minister's place as leader and head of the Government. - His Excellency was pleased to communicate with me and to accept my advice that the surviving members of the Government should, for the present, be confirmed in their respective offices. His Exoollency was also pleased to appoint me to be Prime Minister, and so to continue the official duties which I have recently, as on various previous occasions, been called upon to undertake during Mr. Maesey's lifetime."

Sir Francis Bell ml so said that a meeting of those members of the House of Representatives who had supported Mr. Massey's Government in Parliament would be convened at a very early date and at that meeting would be aeked to choose the party leader in the House and in the country. Sir Francis added that when that had been done he would tender to his Excellency the resignation of the Government and, if his Excellency thought fit to ask his advice, he would be in a position to speak confidently on behalf of the party, and to name the leader to whom it was desired that the duty of forming a new Reform Government should be entrusted. Some little time afterwards the Rt. Hon. J. G. Coates was chosen as leader and sworn in as Prime Minister. It is expected that the Parliamentary Labour party will assemble aa soon as convenient, so that the new Prime Minister may be selected in readiness for the summons of the GovernorGeneral, following the gazetting of Mr. Savage's death.