Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-12-18
NOTES AND QUERIES.
Queen Victoria Would Have a Big
Time if She Tried the Veto.
BALLOT OF THE STAKEHOLDER.
The Observation Of Christmas Day and
ether Like HolidayA
SALARIES PAID TO OUR GOVERNORS

The change of Administrations and the like
lihood of difference OF opinion between a
majority of Congress and President-elect
Cleveland on the silver question has been
the occasion of a number of questions as to
the veto power. That prerogative in the
United States is pretty generally under
stood, but questions as to the power in
England are often asked The DISPATCH.
Queen Victoria has never vetoed a bill
since she became Queen. She could not
have vetoed one without causing a revolu-
tion. The Sovereign of Great Britain does
not rule; she reigns. That is, the whole
management of the kingdom is in the hands
of committee of the House of Commons
and House of Lords called Cabinet; they
are the Government and responsible to Par
Lament and the people. They remain in
power so long as they can keep a majority
in the House of Commons behind them.
Now if the Queen should veto a bill
which the Government wished to have
signed, the members of the Government
would resign, and the Queen would have to
ask some other members to form Govern
ment But they would not obtain a major
ity in the House of Commons, and so could
not do anything; and the Queen would
have to ask the Ministers whose bill she
had vetoed to return to power. They would
refuse to return unless she signed the bill.
Meantime Parliament would be at odds and
ends; everyone would be indignant al the
Queens venturing to refuse to do some
thing which the peoples representatives
- cl,a
about very promptly, she would find he rself
minus throne The Queen might dissolve
Parliament, but there would be no one in
Office to issue writs for o new Parliament,
so things would still be at loose ends. The
sovereign has the right of veto still, but the
right has not been exercised since 1907, and
is practically out of date in Great Britain.
A correspondent of New Brighton, Pa,
who signs himself G. L. E, writes as fol-
lows:
Under 'tNotes and Queries" in THE DIS
PATCH of December 4, in giving the names
of the officers of General Lees old regi-
ment in the regular army it was stated that
Captain Theodore O'Hara wrote his IA
nous poem, "The Bivouac of the Dead, !"
for the return Of q regiment of Missouri
volunteers from the Mexican war This is
q very serious error. and there is nothing
in the poem to indicate, in the remotest
degree, that it was written for the return
of living men. 1t is threnodial in every
line-every stanza an apostrophe to the
dead.
The true origin and history of the illus
trious threnody is as follows:
The Legislature of Kentucky passed
law providing for the expense of having
the remains Of all the soldiers of that State
who fell in the battleNof Buena Vista, IN
the Mexican war, brought to Frankfort,
there reinterred and handsome monument
erected over their ashes Captain Theodore
O'Hara was chosen as orator for the occa.
sion of the dedication of the monument,
and it was there that, for the first time,
the grand elegy was made known and read
to the public. The poem comprises IL
stanzas of eight lines each, but is seldom
all seen in print.
The four lines most frequently quoted
are in the first stanza, which here repro
duce:
The mu1f1ed drums sad roll has beat
The soldiers last tattoo;
No more on lies parade shall meet
The brave and fallen few.
On fame's eternal camping ground
Their silent tents are spread,