[□]
[□ | □]
[□=□]
To an Englishman who still holds , as was universally held by every English statesman till at the very earliest 1880 , that the union between England and Scotland was the wisest and most fortunate among the achievements of British statesmanship , there is great difficulty in understanding the new belief that the federalisation of the United Kingdom will confer benefit upon any of the inhabitants of Great Britain.106 A candid critic may be able to account for the existence of a political creed which he does not affect to share . It must be noted that under these two rules the Imperial Parliament does retain , and sometimes exerts the right to legislate in regard to matters which may greatly concern the prosperity of a Dominion , and also does in some respects seriously curtail both the legislative power of a Dominion Parliament and the executive power of a Dominion Cabinet . I venture to assure all my readers that this forgetfulness of England and by England I here mean the country known , and famous , as England before the legal creation either of Great Britain or of the United Kingdom is a fashion opposed both to common sense and to common justice , and , like all opposition to the nature of things , will ultimately come to nothing . the temper of fanatical adoration by just hatred of those " doctors of the modern school , " who , when he wrote , were renewing the rule of barbarism in the form of the reign of terror ; we cannot exactly echo the fervent self-complacency of Hallam , natural as it was to an Englishman who saw the institutions of England standing and flourishing , at a time when the attempts of foreign reformers to combine freedom with order had ended in ruin . They give no satisfactory answer to the inquiry how it happens that the understandings of politics are sometimes at least obeyed as rigorously as the commands of law.10 To refer to public opinion and to considerations of expediency is to offer but a very inadequate solution of a really curious problem . These distinctions till nearly the middle of the nineteenth century produced a kind of disunion among the Swiss people which in 1914 seems almost incredible . These possible results are undoubtedly repulsive to men who see nothing to censure in our party system . Throughout this Introduction , unless the contrary is expressly stated , or appears from the context , no reference is made to the position either of ( i. ) the Crown colonies , or ( ii . It is fair to all the friends who have aided me that I should state explicitly that for any opinions expressed in this Introduction no one is responsible except myself . Peel also was able to show that while he and his followers were prepared to resist any further changes in the constitution , they fully accepted the Reform Act of 1832 , and , while utterly rejecting a policy of reaction , were ready to give the country the benefits of enlightened administration . On the other hand , the officials would , because they were servants of the state who had undertaken certain duties to the state , be forbidden either to organise a strike or in any way to interrupt the working of the Post Office . The other half should , as belonging to conventions which illustrate the growth of law , be transferred either to my friend the Corpus 10 See further on this point , Part III . " 88 Now the doctrine of proportional representation thus interpreted is a dogma to which a fair-minded man may well refuse his assent . And of the party which the parliamentary majority supports , the Premier has become at once the legal head and , if he is a man of ability , the real leader.116 This gradual development of the power of the Cabinet and of the Premier is a change in the working of the English constitution . In the first place , the Imperial Parliament still claims in 1914 , as it claimed in 1884 , the possession of absolute sovereignty throughout every part of the British Empire ; and this claim , which certainly extends to every Dominion , would be admitted as sound legal doctrine by any court throughout the Empire which purported to act under not apply with perfect accuracy to every one of the Dominions . It seems to have been thought that such a covenant might go either way , according as it was made to the tenant of the manor or to a stranger . First Argument Every citizen , or , as the point is generally put , every person who pays taxes under the law of the United Kingdom , is entitled as a matter of right to a vote for a member of Parliament . But supposing B left no heir , C got no help from A , who in the other event would have defended his suit . Now observe that if you take any person , whether an Englishman or Englishwoman , he or she will probably hold that in some one or more of these instances the referendum would have worked ill , and that in some one or more of these instances it would have worked well . It seems to me quite certain that , if for four centuries there had been a very widely extended franchise and a very large electoral body in this country , there would have been no reformation of religion , no change of dynasty , no toleration of Dissent , not even an accurate Calendar . No doubt at all times there have existed , as at the present day , a large number of habitual law-breakers , but though a cheat , a pickpocket , or a burglar does constantly break the law , there is no reason to surmise that cheats , pickpockets , or burglars maintain the doctrine that law-breaking is itself a praiseworthy 51 See Law and Opinion , pp . These rules also deal with Ministers , with their responsibility , with their spheres of action , define the territory over which the sovereignty of the state extends and settle who are to be deemed subjects or citizens .