IMPERIAL POLITICS

Evening Star, Issue 12684, 10 June 1907, Page 6

IMPERIAL POLITICS

TOLICY OF THE GOVERNMENT. DOWN WITH THE LOESS. Press Association —By Telegraph—Copyright. LONDON, Jtme 8. Speaking at a conference of the National Liberal Federation at Plymouth, the Bight Hon. Thomas Shaw (Lord Advocate for Scotland), referring to the House of Lords, said the die was cast, and it was to be the people's struggle for the mastery of the Houso of Ccanmoais. Sir H. CamphellBannerman's scheme would leave no beating about the bush. In the evening, at a meeting in tho Drill Hall, Sir H. CJampbeU-Baonorman, addressing a gathering of 6,000 people, declared that the harmony of the Liberal party, both inside and outside of the House, was perfect, and had never been so great as at present. It had gained rather than lost in intensity. The House of Lords had been responsible for enormous waste of time. The successive blows by the Lords at the authority of the Commons, though directed against particular measures, were part of a general scheme for discrediting any Liberal Government. The very existence of Liberalism as a power in the State depended on the struggle on which the Government wa"3 embarking. If self-respecting Liberalism, with the country behind it, was unable to enforce its policy, it would be better to go down in asserting its rights than to linger as a shadow of Government. The House of Lords had abused its powers within the Constitution, and the Liberals, in assigning tho Lords their proper places, were defending the Constitution which the Lords were straining. The time for compromising, temporising, and expostulating was gone, and the Lords must be told that the people must bo mastors in their own house. According to the accepted constitutional doctrine, tho last word and ultimate supremacy must rest with the House of Commons

' The Times' declares that the. Government's plan apparently now is an attempt to secure an expression of the permanent intentions of the people. ,bnt their plan of putting the party majority in the House of Commons in a position of supremacy m never intended. It would fundamentaHr alter the Constitution az>d defeai the Government's proposed objects.