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The election of Speaker is at once proceeded with in the House of Commons. There is no ceremony at Westminster more novel and interesting, and none that illustrates more strikingly the continuity through the centuries of parliamentary customs. The Clerk of the House of Commons presides. He sits in his own seat at the Table. Immediately behind him is the untenanted high-canopied Chair of the Speaker. The Mace, that glittering emblem of the Speaker’s authority, is invisible. The Clerk may not speak a word in the discharge of his duties on this great occasion. All he is permitted to do is to rise and silently point with outstretched finger at the Member who, according to previous arrangement, is to propose the candidate for the Chair, and later on to indicate in the same dumb way the Member who is to second the motion. If there is to be no contest, and at the assembling of a new Parliament the former Speaker is invariably re-elected unanimously, the motion that he “do take the Chair of this House as Speaker” is made by a leading unofficial Ministerialist, and seconded by an old and respected Member of the Opposition. The Government take no part in the ceremony so far, in accordance with an old-established tradition that the election or re-election of a Speaker is the independent and unfettered action of the House. The motion is not put to the House in the customary manner. The Clerk does not say, “The question is that James William Lowther do take the Chair of this House as Speaker.” The Speaker-designate rises in his place on one of the back benches and humbly submits himself to the will of the House. The Commons express their unanimous approval of the motion by cheers without question put. Thus the Speaker-Elect is literally “called” to the Chair by the House.
In one respect only has time altered the symbolic details of the ceremony. In the long, long ago it was the custom for the Member chosen for the Chair humbly to protest that of all the House he was the least suited for the exalted position. An amusing instance of this modest declaration of unfitness comes down to us from the days of Queen Elizabeth. The House of Commons having met for the choice of a Speaker, Mr. Serjeant Yelverton was proposed by Sir William Knowles. “I know him,” said Knowles, “to be a man wise and learned, secret and circumspect, religious and faithful, every way able to fill the place.” “Aye, aye, aye,” cried the whole House; “let him be Speaker.” Then rose the modest, blushing Yelverton. He said he was at a loss to account for his selection for the Chair, lacking as he did every quality that was necessary in a Speaker. He had no merit and no ability. He was moreover a poor man with a large family. Nor was he of a sufficiently imposing presence. The Speaker ought to be a big man, stately and comely, well-spoken, his voice great, his carriage majestical, his nature haughty, and his purse plentiful and heavy. But, contrarily, he was of a small body, he spoke indifferently, his voice was low, his carriage of the commonest fashion, his nature soft and yielding, and his purse light. He adjured the House to consider well before it made the grievous mistake of appointing to the Chair a man so totally unfitted for the post. But the House, mightily impressed by these humble expostulations, so becoming in a candidate for the Speakership, persisted in unanimously electing Mr. Serjeant Yelverton; as, indeed, Mr. Serjeant Yelverton, despite all his protestations of unworthiness, well and gladly knew they would do.
It is not so long since another amusing piece of comedy used to be enacted on this otherwise serious and solemn occasion. The proposer and seconder of the Speaker-designate were required in the prescribed parliamentary phrase to “take him out of his place” and conduct him to the Chair; while he was obliged to wriggle his shoulders as if he were struggling to free himself from their hands and escape from the House. Surely they were not serious—he meant to convey—in conferring upon one so lowly and unworthy an office so dignified and exalted? This display of mock modesty is now a thing of the past. The only part of it that survives is that the proposer and seconder approach the Speaker-designate, and when they are within a few paces of him, the Speaker-designate rises and walks to the Chair, his sponsors following close behind. The Speaker-designate does not, however, immediately go into the Chair. Standing on the dais, he again thanks the House for the high honour conferred on him, and then takes his seat as “Speaker-Elect,” as he is called at this stage of his evolution. The glittering Mace, which all the time lay hidden under the Table, is now placed by the Serjeant-at-Arms in its usual position within sight of all eyes to indicate that the House is sitting. Then follow congratulations generally offered by the Leader of the House and the Leader of the Opposition, after which the House adjourns. The first day’s ceremony of the opening of the new Parliament is over.