Los Angeles herald., 1909-09-05
COMMONS TIRE
OF THE LORDS
UPPER HOUSE ACCUSED OF
BETRAYING MULTITUDE
LABOR PARTY GAINING GREAT
WEIGHT IN ENGLAND
Dukes, Marqulses and Noble Lords
Busy on Stump Talking Against
the Work of the So
cialists

LONDON, Sept Am view of the
practical certainty that there will be-
a general election next year-if, indeed,
it is delayed until then-all political
parties in this country are devotingI
their special attention to this years
register Enormous sums are being
spent on the work, and when the re-
vision courts open next month the fight
will be exceptionally keen.
Assuming that the lords do not pre-
cipitate a dissolution over the budget,
which seems more than ever unlikely,
the general expectation is that it will
come next autumn. There are many,
however, who believe it would be good
tactics for the government to dissolve
on the new register in January. They
would still, it is pointed out, have the
advantage which the popularity of the
budget has given them, and heretofore,
at any rate, a new register always has
been supposed to favor the liberals,
though now that the labor party has
become so important a factor in the
parliamentary situation it is doubtful
if they would gain so largely in this
respect On the other hand they are
plegded to bring in a new electrical re-
form bill next year, and may prefer to
wait until they can fortify themselves
by it's provisions.
Devonshire Pessimistic
Speaking at a conservative demon
stration at Elvaston, near Derby, the
duke OF Devonshire said he belonged
to a law-abiding section of the COM
munity which apparently had most
disastrous effect upon the temper of
the members Of the government. He
did not wish to say anything that
would throw the chancellor of the ex-
chequer into Mysteries. The mere
thought of a duke was apparently
enough to send him to the outskirts
of the metropolis to make speeches of
a somewhat violent declamatory char
acter. His grace could only think
when one found a speech of that sort,
containing a considerable amount OF
suppression of truth and a great deal
of suggestion of the false, that the re-
sorts and eXpedients to which the gov
ernment were turning showed their line
of defense was not SO strong as the
ministers might desire. The finance bill
was not being used for the purpose OF
revenue only, but also to carry out var
ious legislative projects which the gov
ernment knew had no chance of pass
ing unless tackled on to finance bill.
1t would be difficult now to forecast
what form the measure would take
when it reached the house of lords, but
he thought himself justified in saying
that a new condition of affairs had
arisen. and he was of opinion that the
lords would be fully justified in taking
every precaution for observing how far
the bill dealt with finance, and how
far it went into the rather sketchy
realms of future legislation.
Appeals to Country
tnJ
further step to curtail the liberties of
debate in the house of commons, and
before proposals so vast as those in the
finance bill were forced upon the coun-
try the latter ought to have an op-
portunity of expressing it's opinion
Many who supported the government
were honestly opposed to socialism, but
it was the socialist wing of the party
that had triumphed. The appeal the
other day of the chancellor of the ex-
chequer was not to liberalism or rad
icalism, but to socialism pure and SIM
pie, he declared.
The earl of Dartmouth, speaking at a
Primrose league demonstration at Wes-
ton, Salop, the seat of the earl of Brad
ford, said he could not tell them what
the house of lords was going to do,
but even in the midst of msrepresenta-
ton and attack the people Of the coun-
try looked to them for craftsmanship
and justice.
AS far as the position of the upper
chamber to the house of commons as
an advisory chamber was concerned,
1T would be perfectly easy to show that
in the case of measures which they had
revised, and to which they had added
amendments, they had been perfectly
justified in the action they had taken
The difficulty was to turn the abstract
cries of elections into the concrete form
of bill. The house of lords had one
idea, and that was the desire to in
terpret the wishes of the people. In
the Limehouse speech the chancellor of
the exchequer trusted to the ignorance
of the audience and appealed to their
cupidity. However, said his lordship.
nobody could afford the luxury of two
radical governments in one generation.
Druce Case Mentioned
An interesting reference to the
Druce case was made by the Duke of
Portland in an anti-budget speech at
Bothal, Northumberland. He complained
that, as a result of what he said before
his Welbeck tenants recently, pailfuls
Of abuse had been poured over his head
by radical newspapers. He noticed
that the paper which poured out the
most dirty water and made the most
use of strong expressions, was that
which published the largest and most
untruthful reports of that wonderful
and ridiculous fabrication known as
the "Druce case"
Was 1t too much to hope that the
more or less ridiculous proposals and
impostures contained in the present
finance bill might be as completely