Existing rules of the Senate add to these powers; but such is the rule with regard to the presiding officer of the House of Lords, even when a peer. He is not appealed to on points of order. If a commoner, his power is still less.
“If he be a commoner, notwithstanding a resolution of the House that he is to be proceeded against for any misconduct as if he were a peer, he has neither vote nor deliberative voice, and he can only put the question, and communicate the resolutions of the House according to the directions he receives.”[111]
In the early period of English history the Chancellors were often ecclesiastics, though generally commoners. Fortescue, Wolsey, and More were never peers. This also was the case with Sir Nicholas Bacon, father of Lord Bacon, who held the seals under Queen Elizabeth for twenty years, and was colleague in the cabinet of Burleigh. Lord Campbell remarks on his position as presiding officer of the House of Lords:—
“Not being a peer, he could not take a share in the Lords’ debates; but, presiding as Speaker on the woolsack, he exercised a considerable influence on their deliberations.”[112]
Then again we are told:—
“Being a commoner, he could neither act as Lord Steward nor sit upon the trial of the Duke of Norfolk, who was the first who suffered for favoring Mary’s cause.”[113]
Thus early do we meet illustration of this rule, which constantly reappears in the annals of Parliament.
The successor of Sir Nicholas Bacon was Lord Chancellor Bromley; and here we find a record interesting at this moment. After presiding at the trial of Mary, Queen of Scots, the Lord Chancellor became ill and took to his bed. Under the circumstances, Sir Edmund Anderson, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, was authorized by the Queen to act as a substitute for the Chancellor; and thus the Chief Justice became presiding officer of the House of Lords to the close of the session, without being a peer.
Then came Sir Christopher Hatton, the favorite of Queen Elizabeth, and so famous as the dancing Chancellor, who presided in the House of Lords by virtue of his office, but never as peer. The same was the case with his successor, Sir John Puckering. He was followed by the exemplary Ellesmere, who was for many years Chancellor without being a peer, but finished his career by adding to his title as presiding officer the functions of a member. The greatest of all now followed. After much effort and solicitation, Bacon becomes Chancellor with a peerage; but it is recorded in the Lords’ Journals, that, when he spoke, he removed from the woolsack “to his seat as a peer,” thus attesting that he had no voice as presiding officer. At last, when the corruptions of this remarkable character began to overshadow the land, the Chief Justice of the King’s Bench, Sir James Ley, was designated by the King to act as Speaker of the House of Lords. Soon afterward Bacon fell. Meanwhile it is said that the Chief Justice “had very creditably performed the duties of Speaker of the House of Lords.”[114] In other words, according to the language of our Constitution, he had presided well.
Then came Williams, Coventry, and Finch, as Lord Keepers. As the last absconded to avoid impeachment by the House of Commons, Littleton, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, “was placed on the woolsack as Speaker.”[115] At a later time he received the Great Seal as Lord Keeper. This promotion was followed by a peerage, at the prompting of no less a person than the Earl of Strafford, “who thought he might be more useful, if permitted to take part in the proceedings of the House as a peer, than if he could only put the question as Speaker.”[116] Clarendon says, that, as a peer, he could have done Strafford “notable service.”[117] But the timid peer did not render the expected service.