Nelson Evening Mail WEDNESDAY, MARCH 19, 1913. SOVEREIGN AND PARTIES.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLVIII, Issue XLVIII, 19 March 1913, Page 4

Nelson Evening Mail WEDNESDAY, MARCH 19, 1913. SOVEREIGN AND PARTIES.

IN a speech at Edinburgh a few weeks ago Mr. Bonar Law, the Leader of the Unionist Party at Home, declared that the Monarchy was endangered by reason of the actions of the Liberal Government. Under the Parliament Act any

m-easure passed three times by the Commons and three times rejected hy the Lords, goes automatically to the Sovereign for his decision as to whether it shall become law or not. Mr. Law. for :he sake of illustration., took Hie Home Rule Bill, and assuming that it had been three times passed l and as many times rejectee], asked. What would then he the position of the Sovereign? Whatever he did, half of his people would think he had failed in his duty. 1£ he refused to give his assent to it ,the whole Radical Party would be yelping at his heels on the ground that it was withheld in an unconstitutional way; if he did give his assent to it, then one-half of his people would say he was giving Lis assent to a vital measure of which half the people- did not approve, and that >u such circumstances the assent ought not to be {riven. It does not matter, in my opinion, which is the right view—the vital, effect is, and no one can deny it, that if the Sovereign is placed in that position, whatever the course he takes, half his people will say he has taken the wrong course. That any loyal servant of the Crown should put his Sovereign in such a. position would have been, till a year ago, incredible. To put him in such a position would he a crime

greater, in my opinion, than has ever been committed by any Minister who has ever held power. * * * *

Mr. Redmond, the Leader of the Irish Party, the following night replied to Mr Law. Mr. Law, he said, had- suggested that "the Kins should revive the veto of the Crown, which had not been used for over 200 years, and in that way should thwai't the .will of the people of this country. A more disgraceful suggestion was never made, a- greater insult to the Kiiiir was never offered. The Sovereign of this country was the Constitutional Sovereign ; he governed by virtue of the Constitution in accordance with the advise of his constitutionally elected, Ministers, and for a man in the position of Mr. Bonar Law to make the suggestion even that the King would be false to his Coronation oath and false to the Constitution of which he was the head was an insult to the Throne which, if it had proceeded from him (the speaker), would have been adduced as a final and. convincing proof of his disloyalty."

As the first Minister to address a public gathering after Mr. Law's speech, Mr. Herbert Samuel, the PostmasterGeneral, said that he must- take the first opportunity of protesting in the strongest terms against the reference to the Sovereign in a . matter of party controversy. It was, he declared, the constitutional practice in Britain that the King in political matters acted upon the advice of his Ministers, and if any wrong was done it was those Ministers and not the Sovereign who bore the blame. Every speech of Mr. Bonar. Law, Mr. Samuel went on, contained, some .blunder or i other, but this was worse than a blunder. It was a grave constitutional offence to introduce the name of the Sovereign into .the controversies of party politics, and Mr. Law's speech could only be stigmatised as a most unwarrantable departure from the British sound political system.