STRANGE PARLIAMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14133, 7 August 1909, Page 1 (Supplement)

STRANGE PARLIAMENTS.

HAWAII, CANADA, AND THE

UNITED STATES.

BY FRANK FOX.

[ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.] In "strange Parliaments" I do not include the House of Commons. It was so obviously copied from an Australian Parliament that, sitting in one of the galleries for the very first time, I found myself appealed to by a handsome Guardsman, who was in the next seat, for information on forms and procedure, and was able to give it. A strange Parliament—to define terms at the outset—is a Parliament different from an Australian one. Now, to know a Parliament, to know it in the sense that you can drop in for an hour or two and grasp the trend of the debate, and roughly judge the character and the feelings of the men there, you must have studied that Parliament and its politics for years. , The tyro is no good in a Parliamentary gallery. These impressions therefore of a bunch of Parliaments are just fugitive snap-shots, not attempts at studies.

Hawaii's Parliament- is composed very largely of natives. They enjoy Parliament obviously. The Hawaiian native has a genius for getting fat and talking. He can follow both pursuits in Parliament. The Assembly is bi-lingual. You may talk the American modification of the British language or the Hawaiian tongue. Members are seated at desks in a large hall, and generally, I was . told, they are discussing land matters or the civil service. If Parliament passes a Bill the Governor, an American appointed directly by the Washington Government, may veto it he often does. Then, if Parliament feels keen enough about the matter, it- passes the Bill again by a two-thirds majority, and so overrides the Governor's veto. This also often happens. It would appear thus, at first sight, that the American paramountry has no secure footing. Since the Parliament is made up mostly of natives, and is, on the face of things, ultimately supreme, what if it passed measures hostile to the United States? Well, there is the Supreme Court ,of Hawaii, composed, with one exception, of Americans. It could veto as "unconstitutional" any such legislation. Hawaii is, technically, a .territory of the Union, governed by an organic Act of the United States Congress, and its Parliament must not go outside the ambit of that Act, just as a State in the Australian Federation must not go outside its powers.

Uncle Sam, under the circumstances, feels pretty safe, and the Hawaiian finds it very comforting to talk and to pass Acts, and to imagine himself independent.

In Canada, too, they have the "desk" system of seating members. It may be the prejudice of conservatism, but an array of desks never suggests to mo a Parliament, an Assembly, as a House of benched members does. A collection of desks may be very convenient but the system isolates the men—they look like clerks in a counting-house, competing brokers at a wool sale, anything but a corporate body, a national entity, a Parliament.

;? The Afternoon I spent in the Ottawa Hous« ijf Commons a. Water. Rights Bill, was, under discueelon, and there was much talk and suggestion of " graft,which is the American ; term, net for honest labour, but for dishonest work in the political field. The member in charge of the Bill was alleged to have a financial interest in its passage. . This he strenuously denied. The House did not seem to believe him, and the* Bill did not go through.

The printed "orders of the day" advertised ft curious fact. Canada has • no divorce law. The only means of divorce is by Act of Parliament. This fact is duo to the strong influence of the Roman Catholic Church in the Dominion. It makes divorce a luxury for the rich. The poorer matrimonial misfits go over to the United States, where there are all sorts of divorce laws, and you may have the bond cut in almost any style and at almost any . price; or they just grin and bear things. It is usual for about 20 Acts legalising individual divorces to be passed by the Canadian Parliament each session. In all cases a committee of Parliament investigates the merits of the case. There are some incidental privileges of being a member of Parliament in Canada. Fancy how Mr. Daniel O'Connor would shine on a Divorce Bill committee! How tender his sympathy for the lady, how exuberant his eloquence, how happy his phrasings!

Following the custom of the British House, Mr. Speaker in the Canadian Commons has a 6uile of apartments in tJie Parliamentary buildings. Hon. members have no separate refreshment room, but the House . shelters a wonderfully cheap restaurant, quite the cheapest thing in Canada, where members, their relatives and friends, Parliamentary pfessmen and their relatives and friends, may eat and be happy. The food is not luxurious, but it is wholesome, and—that fact is important, for most things are dear in this countrycheap. V ■ £ The Canadian Parliamentary building is impressively situated 011 a great cliff overlooking the Ottawa River. The library, occupying an apse of the Gothic building, is particularly fine, and a tower, to the top of which the athletic may climb, gives a grand view of the surrounding country. At Washington I was able to see the Senate only at work. The House of Representatives had adjourned to allow the Senate a chance to discuss the Tariff Bill. This the Senate was doing with a , curious looseness of debate. All the afternoon that I was in the gallery the principle of an income tax Was the main topic, though the House was supposed to be engaged on the tariff, and irrelevant personal discussions were frequent. • Jt appeared that members could talk quite,.at large. interruptions were frequent and lengthy. One Senator would break into another Senator's speech with a ten minutes' argument to show that he was wrong on some point. I did not wonder, under these circumstances, to hear it forecasted that the tariff debate would last into July. ■ '

Senators may not smoke in the House, but they , may eat cigars, and many of them take advantage of this privilege. Also they may chew other forms of-tobacco, and a, gigantic cuspidor at each desk proves that this habit is allowed for.

: There is no bar or Parliamentary refreshment room, no billiard or card rooms, practically no lounge rooms, in the American Congress building. Public sentiment .is against anything of " club" • , >l<&~besag"-aW tached to the legislature. It is even made a matter of complaint in the papers that members of Congress have supplied for their use,', at a small cost, pure drinking water, instead of taking the dirty and somewhat dangerous stuff from the tap.

It is a curious fact that in the majority of the Canadian and United States cities I visited the public water supply was not drinkable, and all well-to-do people bought their drinking water in jars from the owners of private springe ; it shows a low standard of civics that this should be tolerated. » k '

The library, of Congress is a magnificent one, sheltered, too, in a noble building close to the Capitol. But it would take a month's ttiidy to get any idea of its scope. ' v; v .y.;;","