THE PRESS AND PARLIAMENT OF VICTORIA.

Otago Witness, Issue 567, 11 October 1862, Page 6

THE PRESS AND PARLIAMENT OF VICTORIA.

(From the Scotsman, June IB.) A " ease of privilege " pending in a place in which a short time ago only parrots and 'possums held Parliaments i> certainly a curiosity of political histoiy. At the h^ad of its last " Summary for Europe '' the Sldii uinic Ar^us gives the following "Introduction"' in large type: — ''The chief matter of interest which has occupied the Iloiibc during the past month | has been the question of privilege. On this question the Assembly and the Press — a^ represented hy the Argu? — are in open conflict ; the former claiming to have acquired all the powers and immunities of the House of Commons ; the latter dem ing that such privileges are, or ought to he, posseted hy any colonial Legislature." The following seems to us a fair narrative of the ri-e and progress of this very pretty quarrel, which, notwithstanding the puerile character of some of its circumstances, does certainly involve an important principle. For some time the police of Melbourne appears to have been in an unsiti*f.ieiory st'itc. Ii farther appears that the insubordination of the professed guardians of the peace, originating in a proposal to reduce their wa^cs. was aggravated by the appointment of a select committee, on the motion of an opposition member, one Mr. Fraser, " lion, member" ; for Cre^wick— so are they all, all '"lion, members "" — to inquire into the administration of the Victorian police. 'We infer tbat the Committee sided with the men, and blamed, possibly from personal or political motives, the Government-appointed official at their head— described by the Melbourne correspondent of the Times as " a very efficient officer "—attributing to his misgovernment his men's discontent. If the committee behaved in the manner we infer from the ca idence before us, no doubt the committee acted in an exceedingly shabby manner. As a publisher in this country cannot be summoned to the bar of the Victorian House ol'Commons,o I ' Commons, and, in case of the recusancy, be hailed thither, Via Suez, or round the Cape of Good Hope, by a Southern " Sergeant-at- Arms'" (the colonial Parliaments hnv-' such officials, and "Ushers of the Black IloJ,' 1 also), -we may venture to speak out. The Argus was quite right when it denounced the meanness of men who, appointed members of a select committee, could v indulge their private grudges or serve their personal interest 5 by the persecution of an officer;" but the Arg?n wrote preposterous nonsense if, as it appears to ha-\ c done, it denied the right of the colonial Legislature to inquire into the conduct of any member of the colonial Executive. The violent language in which the Argus couched its denial, however, seems to have been the cau*e of the colonial House's wrath. The present editor of the Argus is, we believe, a gentleman whose pungent pen has earned him many admirers and many enemies in India and New South "Wales as well as in Victoria. In the article, or rather in one passage of it, weak, virulent vulgarity seems, unfortunately, to have been substituted for the vigorous* trenchant, but still gentlemanlike tone which generally characterises the Melbourne Argu? article*. "What officer," the here not "able" but simply abusive editor wrote, v is safe from this sort ot of attack on the part of some prhileged ruffian whom accident may have pitchforked into the House V" ' The Press's I' legitimate liberty of discussion " was in this insinuation unquestionably exceeded. The "privileged ruffian" alluded to, "hon. member " for Creswick, mover for, and chairman of, the police committee, brought the article before the Legislative Assembly : it was voted a breach of privilege, and the 'publisher of the Argus was ordered to appear at the bar of the House on the following day. Bad as the language of the passage we have quoted is, we are astonished that the Victorian Commons discovered anything wrong in it, when we read the language some of them used in the debate on the article objected to. "The fellow must have been half drunk when he wrote it," said one hon. gentleman. " Such a man must be a scoundrel— a literary blackguard,"' shrieked another. Colonial Parliaments may call newspaper publishers from the vasty deeps of their offices, but it seems that the publishers will not come when called for. At any rate, the publisher of the Argus turned a deaf ear to the Victorian Speaker's summons. Accordingly, the Serjeant-nt-Arms received the Speaker's warrant' to bring the publisher before the House to answer for his contempt. The House good-naturedly wishing not to deprive the publisher, who, ot course, was only nominally responsible for the offensive article, of his holidays, arranged that the warrant should not be executed until the House re-assembled after the Easter recess, on the eve of which this hubbub took place. The editor of the Argus, with what I we cannot help thinking bad taste, thereupon I mounted the high horse, and talked foolishly L of the House being " frustrate of its wicked . will." The sections of clo\erly-managed serial ; noveh always terminate n,t points which have i greatly excited the reader's curiosity. We f feel somewhat a^> the exasperated admirers of t the " Woman in White '" often felt during its serial publication, when we find that we " must wait until the next Australian mail corner £ in before we can hear any more of the facts of f this antipodean privilege-case. A programme t of the probable action of the two parties con1 cerned has, however, been chalked out in the 1 letter of the Melbourne correspondent of the r Times, who is, no doubt, a lawyer :—: — > The publisher (Mr. Dill) will submit to lie arrested. - Upon his ai rest lie will probably try his writ of habeas n corpus, and, whether the court lii.-chavee him or not, b will mo.st likely, following three colonial precedents, t bring his action against Sir F. Murphy, the Speaker. 1 He will, of coursp, follow the sameprecedents. plea'thc c pmilege3 of the House, to which the plaintiff 'will j demur, and this will bring the question of law before the Supreme Court. From thcjndgmenf of the Supreme Court, whichever way it may , be, an appeal -vt 131 £0 J to the Privy Council, and thus a fourth great privilo"etl case will be added to the lecords of that au-r.ist trin bunal, and it is hoped will set the subject at rest for d ever. d The Argus hints that the Assembly may, pern chance, accept the decision of the Supreme * Court, which the paper takes for granted will be adverse to the Parliament, and then prod ceed "to define its privileges in the manner .. contemplated by the Constitution Act. 11 The h Argus justifies its defiance of the local Parliac meat on the ground that "if the power which y the Assembly claims is conceded to it, elected n as it is, we are practically delivered over to an autocratic rule, which 'would be absolutely « intolerable." Tt seems to us that the questions I of the fact and the fruit of colonial Parliar mentary privilege must be separated. ' r The local statute conferring all the priviy leges of the Imperial House of Commons, II save, of course, its omnipotence over Victoria t- and the rest of the British Empire, on the 0 Victorian Legislative Assembly so far as Vied toria is concerned, was not objected to at home g on the ground of vagueness. It received from :e her Majesty, acting on the advice of her Seca retary for the Colonies, the requisite Royal > c assent. Vagueness of definition appears to us • a strange ground for questioning the validity jj and scope of a Colonial Privilege Act, the d object of which was to export to the utmost jf extent which local analogy would permit, ir Imperial Parliamentary privileges, since, g writes Buckstone, "If all the privileges of r- Parliament were once to be set down and

ascertained. a*irl iio priviL'^i? to be allovvtd hut wliat was so elcniu' 1 anil ck'tonniaoel, it W'^re easy for the Executive powvr to devise sonic new cti^e, not wit'iiu tho line ofpvivili-^o, and under pretence iliere n to luux-w ;my rcir'ictoxy metnbjr and violate the freedom of Parliament. The dignity and independence of the two Houses are therefore in great measure preserved by keeping their pm ilexes indennitc." The "two Houses "of Victoria are not likely to buffer much from unconstitutional Crown interference, but at the same time it must be admitted tluit the Lower (and apparently very '' low") oftho.se two Houses seems to have a full legal right -to the power which it Ins recently exercised. Now the other qu 'stion ari>es — Is it expedient that the Yic;orian Legislative Assembly should possess Mich a power i On this point we became Of the English Parliament Sir Edward Coke wrote—" Si antujaitaIcin sprclc.s, rst wtHiti,ssini(i ; *i dignitatem^ rst houornlissiitia ? si j-irisdictinncm, at capnsissuna." The anriquity of the Victorian Parliament is where Caractncus, Marquis, and ISuekstonc leit, ''the field ;-"' the dignity of the Victorian Parliament hccnb to be xery doubtful. Ought, then, the Victorian Parliament, constituted as it is, to be allowed to possess the wide jurisdiction it claims? It may endeavor to burk legitimate as well as insolent-worded criticism. Let it remember that the Imperial Parliament is able to re\oke or revise the con«t'tution j which it granted to the Australian colonies'. So long as Victoria remains a portion of the British Empire (and tho majority of Victorians appear to be auxiou-iy desirous to continue British subjects), the Victorian Legislature must bear in mind that the charter of its existence — for good reasons brought forvvaui by the majority, or a con-idcrable minority, of those whose interests are in its keeping— could and would be cancelled, or importantly codiciled by the Imperial Parliament, who^e power o-\er British colonies. Australian Ministries arc, perhaps, too apt to forget, has been put, so to speak, " into commission,"' not relinquished.