OF PARLIAMENT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18131, 1 July 1922, Page 1 (Supplement)

OF PARLIAMENT.

SEEKING SELF-GOVERNMENT.

BY MA.TANGA

Parliament reopened the other day with due ceremonial. His Majesty's representative met the assembled representatives of the people, and read his speech in review of national affairs and in forecast of the business of the session. The Honourable Gentlemen of the Legislative Council and the mere Gentlemen of the House of Representatives gave respectful heed to the address, and then betook themselves to ' their law-making work. The occasion «a» full of pomp and circumstance. The military adjuncts, the guard of honour, the stately entry; the furnishings of dais and chair; the mace and tho black rod —all marie much of it. But not too much. For that ceremony was more than the opening of a session' of Parliament. It was a solemn rite of western civilisation. It was I the declaration by a people of its wish to i govern itself. It "was a sacrament —an outward and visible sign of inward and spiritup.l grace. Parliament means that--the desire for self-government. The desire may not be riotouslv enthusiastic, nor have anything : approaching perfect fulfilment. But it exists, and Parliament is its proof and proclamation. A Place lor Monarchy,, In reading the story of the arising and fortunes of Parliaments, one is apt to pay undue regard 'to their struggles* against monarchs. Those struggles were inevitable jin the development of democracy. But I democracy's task was not finished when I absolute monarchy was overthrown; it was only begun. That was but the clearing of the ground. A "king like James I. had, of course, to be told that his prattle about his divine right to rule unhampered was all rubbish ; but the denial of his exclusive right to lew taxes and to determine the validity of Parliamentary elections did not carry with it any antecedent objection to pay taxes or to* have a test for the validity of elections. All that was asserted was the popular desire to say what taxes should be levied, and in whateircumstances elections should be valid or invalid. Not the negation of government, but tho wish for self-government, was ill all this strife against kings. Attached to the crusade for "political freedom were often many hangers-on, fellows of the baser sort • eager to join any hue and cry raised against authority and to use any campaign against a particular law as a weapon against all law. An army cannot rightly be judged, however, on its camp-followers. The valiant impulse that opposed Strafford's* attempt to govern' England without a Parliament did not implv any objection to England's being governed. Nor did it mean that a Parliamentary absolute power should be set up in place of a monarchical despotism. To make law honoured, not despised, was the aim; to check lawlessness, not to encourage it. Seen in their true perspective, events in our own and other national histories nave tended ever toward the establishment of Parliamentary institutions, that is. to increase the opportunities of national selfgovernment. Among some peoples tlm has meant the abolition of monarchy. With us, it has involved only the modification of monarchy. Everywhere it has been really the securing of rule " of the people, by the people, for "the people." What if, as -srith us, monarchy remains? It no longer impedes the popular will, but aids it. It is a valuable part of the Parliamentary system. The King remains as the Highest Subject in the realm, the most prominent servant of the State, He owns allegiance— tr» its ideals. He must obey its Jaws as they are applicable to him ; failure to do this "will bring forfeiture of hi s crown. He. along with the rest of the nation, finds self-government in the Parliamentary system.

Imperfect Success. This significance of Parliament is by no means vitiated by the claim that, the work of Government is not well done by it. It is still evidence of the deep desire for selfgovernment, though it may not be the best achievement of it. No human instrument or institution is perfect. As for Parliament no one would claim that it is a ga%hering of the absolutely and unchallengeably best law-makers of the nation. Hazlitt has a brief essay .on Canning. It begins: " Mr. Canning was the cleverest boy at Eton; he is, perhaps, the cleverest man in the House of Commons." Hazlitt then goes on to prove that Canning was not very clever, after all. He is " feeble;'' h* has no " maalv independence of mind" ; and "really," Hazlitt declares, "we do not know anyone so little capable of appreciating the Lyrical Ballads." "His reasoning is a tissue of glistering sophistry ; his language is a cento of florid commonplaces. "The smooth monotony of his style is indeed ag much borrowed, is as little hia own, as the courtly and often fulsome strain of his sentiments. He has no steadv principles, no. strong passions, nothing original, masculine, or striking m thought or expression. There is a feeble, diffuse, showy Asiatic redundancy in all hia speeches—something vapid, something second-hand in the whole cast of hia So the critic goes, rending Canning limb from limb with great gusto I—and1—and he admits him to be, perhaps, the cleverest man in the House of Commons! "If the cleverest man there be so feeble and second-hand," one is constrained to ask, " what were the rest like in Canning's day?" Hazlitt's opinion of them is, by inference, a very poor one. Yet, however inefficient they all were, the House of Commons itself was not thereby condemned. In spite of the feebleness of its personnel, it stood as a witness to the people's achievement of political rights. And, should it happen that in our day the Parliament we know includes many feeble men, it will nevertheless bear its testimony to the progress in civilisation we have made. Rather than enjoy the settled rule, of a paternal autocracy we- will suffer some things at the hands of those we are capable of choosing and influencing; self-government is better than good government. To quote Mr. Nevinson, "It ia nobler for a, nation, as i for a man, to struggle towards excellence j with its own natural force and vitality, I however biindlv and vainly, than to live iin irreproachable decency under expert j guidance from without." It is sureiy rin i the long run better for a nation to strive j after its own uplift, learning by suffering I and success intermingled in it s experience, 1 than to be kept in inglorious calm by the j dictates of any ruler, however wise and capable. It is expedient that the benign autocrat be put out of the way rather than the whole na'tion should suffer through failure to try its hand at governing itself.

Majority Approval. Edward 1., the greatest royal law-giver our history holds, had two fine sayings. One of them, " Pactum serva'' (Keep troth), was appropriately placed upon his tomb. The other motto" of his governing ■was a principle of Justinian's—" Quod omncs tangit, ab omnibus approbetur" (That which concerns all must be approved bv alll. It was a long time ere this latter principle had wide welcome in England. But it came into application more and more, until a widening franchise gave England something approaching its full use. It can never be fulfilled to the very letter. Opinion s vary so much that it is foolish to expect complete agreement on anything. But where free is given for the expression of opinion on men and measures in the political sphere, there is enjoyed a vast measure of citizen free dom, and self-government may be realised. We shall doubt'esc all find fjome cause for complaint in the doings of Parliament this session. In an election year this is hound to happen. In the midst of our grumblinf it were well to call to mind that our grumbling, and our determination to have an alteration made for the better in Parliament'? personnel, are evidences of the lons way our notion has come from political infancy. Our adolescent years are upon us, and we feel an impulse toward the self-discipline of our political powers,. .That way lull national manhood comes.