DEMOCRACY THROUGH THE AGES

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 65, 9 December 1938, Page 11

DEMOCRACY THROUGH THE AGES

Second Volume Of History Of Parliament Now Out

Dominion Special Service.

LONDON, November 25. The English Parliament lias served as a pattern for so many democratic parliamentary systems throughout the world that it has become affectionately known as “The Mother of Parliaments.”

It is therefore quite natural that an official history of this great institution should be something remarkable both in its historical and scholastic aspects. A Parliamentary committee reported in 1932 that sufficient data existed for a history of Parliamentary members and politics since the year 1264.

For a long time the expense of the necessary research had been the chief factor militating against the undertaking of such a history, and the committee estimated that the venture would cost not less than £30,000 by the time it was finished. Fortunately, offers of voluntary subscriptions ultimately made it possible to proceed with tlie work, the first volume of which appeared, in 1936. The second volume has just been published. This covers the same period as the first volume, from 1439 to 1509, but whereas the first volume was mainly biographical in character, the new volume concerns itself more with: tlie parliamentary and historical aspects of the period.

There is, for instance, a complete list, of the Speakers who presided over tlie House of Commons during tlie period, with their offices and rewards: the latter range from such entries aS "£4O a vear” to the grim entry "Beheaded.” The present-day reward of the Speaker forms a pleasant contrast; a pension of £4OOO a year and a viscounty on retirement. When this work is finished it will form the most illuminating history of the democratic system ever made, and it is a significant fact that a large proportion of the issue of the first volume was sold to democratic countries abroad, while libraries and institutions nt home bought numerous copies for the benefit of the serious reader.