CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE LORDS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 13812, 28 January 1907, Page 5

CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE LORDS.

.SPEECH BY LORD ADVOCATE OF SCOTLAND. Presi, Ajsocinlicn-By Telegraph-Copyright.

LONDON, January 25. The Lord Advocate of Scotland (Mr T. Shaw, K.C.), sneaking at Edinburgh unofficially, suggested! that the fust move of the House of Commons against tin- House of Lords ought to be a resolution limiting tlio peers' obstruction of legislation to a single session. If the Lords refused to concur in such a limitation, the Crown ought then to create stiflicient peers to overawe them.

the last and most notable intervention ot the Lords (says iho Saturday Beview) look place in 1893, when tlu?y refused to pass tho second reading of Gladstone's second Home Itulo Bill. The nation was immensely relieved when tho House- of Lords rejected the. bill, anil the l'enrs attained a popularity which they hud never before enjoyed. The explanai'ion of this apparent anomaly i«. oi course, that the Liberal majority of 1392 came from Ireland! ami (hat tin; majority of Hnirlishmen and hcotsmen were still opposed to Homo ivule. Out of six. conflicts with the House ot Lommons-thcro may he others, but wo CanilOt meall fliom-lhe House of Lords wero beaten thrice and wen; victorious tirico. Once they were heal en because they tried to defend the propyl v and privileges of their class against a nut ion winch would recognise, neither. Twice they wero worsted in a dispute eliout money, which is not their business. Their throe victories were won by the presence of public opinion at their back. It is therefore obvious that in a filrilL'clo bo fween the House of Commons and the House, of Lords,. the Hpnse of Commons is a negligible quantity: its eloquence and threats and votes matter not a whit: it is tho nation which matters."