New Zealand Tablet. Fiat Justitia. SATURDAY, NOVEMRER 1,1873. HOW TO PREVENT DEADLOCKS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume I, Issue 27, 1 November 1873, Page 6

New Zealand Tablet. Fiat Justitia. SATURDAY, NOVEMRER 1, 1873. HOW TO PREVENT DEADLOCKS.

In our issue last week, we deprecated agitation at the present time on the subject of constitutional change in the mode of appointing members of the Legislative Council If we return to the subject this week, it is not that we have changed our mind as to the advisability of such agitation, and because we regard that as now necessary which we considered unnecessary a week ago. On the contrary, our former opinion remains unchanged. But, the question is sure to come up for public consideration x bef ore long ; and it appears to us to be our duty, as journalists, to provide our readers with all the information within our reach, that may contribute to enable them to form a sound judgment on the question. The °reat argument against the present mode of appointment is the want of harmony, that is almost inevitable, between a nominee chamber, and the representatives of the people. Not indeed always, but on certain important ques.tions. We fail, and have always failed, to see the force .of this argument. In our opinion the members of the Council are as fully identified with the people, and the popular interests, as the House of Representatives. There are in the People's House, as it is called, as many aristocrats, and owners of sheep and bullooKs as in the other place, tbe relative numbers being taken into account, or at all events very nearly so. Further, the very independence of popular control through the instrumentality of the hustings, and the security they enjoy in the possession of their seats, render the members of the Council the most efficient conservators of equity, justice, and even of the liberties of the people taken as a whole. But, then, how are deadlocks to be prevented ? By the good sense of the majority of both hcuses. And after all, is it not better to have occasionally a deadlock than hasty and ill-digested legislation ? Deadlocks are not such great calamities, because they occur, and are likely to happen only very seldom, and because when they do occur, they rouse the public.

to more concentrated and earnest thought on political and social subjects, and a more thorough sifting of them "by public writers. Taking for granted, however, for the sake of argument, that deadlocks are a great calamity, will the changing the Council from a nominated into an elected body prevent them. This may not only be fairly doubted, l.ut it will not be going beyond the range of probability to say, that the chances of deadlock, will be just as great after the change as before it. Experience, it appears to us, establishes this. But it strikes us there is a way out .of the difficulty, a Way, too, recommended by experience : could not both houses vote together as one chamber on certains questions when agreement would be otherwise impossible ? The Grand Duchy of Hesse affords a practical illustration of this mode of preventing deadlocks. In this Duchy, there are two legislative chambers, the upper one is composed of the princes of the reigning family, the beads of a number of noble houses, the Roman Catholic Bishop, the chief Protestant Superintendent, the Chancellor of the University of Giessen, and life members nominated by the Grand Duke not exceeding ten in number. These houses, like our own, hold their deliberations apart and pass their measures in their respective chambers ; but on cer- ' tain occasions, as for example, when a proposition of the Government has been accepted by one House and refused by the other and an immediate decision is urgently required, both Houses vote together as one House. Here then is a plan, which would seem a solution of the great difficulty, the apprehension of which causes such great alarm to ardent democrats. It is worth consideration, and we place it before our readers as a suggestion which it would be well to examine and discuss.