In these days of open courts of justice, a free Press, and wholesale publicity the need for petitions is not so great as it was in times when the voice of the people could not always obtain a hearing. To-day the papers are only too ready to lend their columns to the airing of any grievance, real or imaginary, and politicians are not unwilling to make party capital out of any individual instances of apparent injustice or oppression that may be brought to their notice.
A hundred years ago all petitions were read to the House by the members presenting them, and lengthy discussions often ensued. Much waste of time resulted from this practice, and the frequent arrival at Westminster of large bodies of petitioners caused great inconvenience, and sometimes led to rioting. In 1641, a huge crowd of women completely blocked the entrance of the House. They were led by a certain Mrs. Anne Stagg, "a gentlewoman and brewer's wife," and their object was to present a petition directed against the Popish bishops.[387] The Sergeant of the Parliamentary Guard appealed to the House for advice as to how he should treat these women, and was told to speak them fair and send them away. This he accordingly proceeded to do, but not without much difficulty.
Two years later three thousand other "mean women," wearing white ribbons in their hats, arrived at Westminster with another petition. "Peace! Peace!" they cried, in a manner which was little calculated to gain that which they were seeking. "Give us those traitors that are against peace, that we may tear them to pieces! Give us that dog Pym!" The conduct of these viragoes at length became so unruly that the trained bands were sent for, and the order was eventually given to fire upon the mob. "When the gentle sex can so flagrantly renounce their character, and make such formidable attacks on the men," says a contemporary historian, "they certainly forfeit the polite treatment due to them as women"—and in this case their forgetfulness cost them the loss of several lives.[388]
To-day, under the provisions of the One Mile Act of George III.—the result of an attack made upon the Regent on his way from the opening of Parliament in 1817—no assembly of petitioners or public meeting is allowed within a mile of the Palace of Westminster. Petitions themselves are treated in a summary manner which permits of little time being wasted. No debate is permitted upon the subjects raised by petitions, and the formal method of presentation has given place to a more satisfactory (if somewhat perfunctory) fashion of dealing with them.
Behind the Speaker's Chair hangs a large bag. In this a petition may be placed, at any time during a sitting, by the member in charge of it. Thence it is sent to the Committee on Public Petitions, and presumably never heard of again. Petitions sometimes contain so many signatures, and are consequently so bulky, that no earthly bag could possibly contain them. In 1890, for instance, a petition eight miles in length, in favour of the Local Taxation Bill, was presented to Parliament, and in 1908 another, almost as voluminous, provided a material protest against the Licensing Bill. Petitions of such proportions are carried into the House on the shoulders of stout officials, and, after reposing for a brief space upon the floor, are presently borne away to be no more seen or remembered.
When petitions have been disposed of, motions for unopposed returns are taken, and other formal business; and then follows question-time, perhaps one of the most important hours of the parliamentary day, when a hitherto languid House begins to take some interest in the proceedings.
Politicians would appear to be among the most inquisitive individuals on the face of the globe; their thirst for general information is as insatiable as it is amazing. The time spent by various Government officials in pandering to this craving for knowledge on the part of legislators is very considerable: it has even been hinted that the clerks at the Irish Office are employed exclusively upon the task of answering conundrums set by members of the House of Commons. Nothing is too insignificant, no matter is too sacred, to be made the subject of a question in the House. But, although any member has a perfect right to apply for a return, or to ask any question he pleases, within certain bounds, a Minister of the Crown may always refuse to supply the return, or decline to answer the question; nor need he give any reason for so doing. This rule provides a loophole for a Minister who is confronted with an awkward question to which it would need the powers of subtlety and casuistry of a Gladstone to find a non-committal reply.[389]
A member of Lord Aberdeen's Ministry in 1854 was attacked for not rendering a certain return that had been applied for. He made no comment at the time, but on a subsequent occasion produced and laid on the Table of the House a huge folio volume weighing 1388 lbs. and containing seventy-two reams of foolscap. The compilation of this return, as he informed the House, had caused the dispatch of 34,500 circular letters and the cataloguing and tabulating of 34,500 replies. The result of the figures mentioned therein had not been arrived at, the Minister went on to explain, as it would have taken two clerks a whole year to add them up. Further, he added, the return, if completed, would afford no information beyond that which the House already possessed.[390]
Ever since 1902, a written instead of an oral reply can be rendered to all questions that are not marked with an asterisk by the member who asks them. No questions may be asked after a certain hour, and the answers to those that have not been reached at that hour, as well as to those that are not marked with an asterisk, are printed and circulated, thus saving a great deal of valuable time.
Questions must be brief and relevant. No member may ask an excessive or unreasonable number, nor may he couch them in lengthy terms. They may not be framed argumentatively nor contain personal charges against individuals. The Speaker is empowered to disallow any question if he thinks fit, and often interposes to check supplementary questions which are not relevant, or which constitute an abuse of the right to interrogate Ministers; and the latter are always at liberty to refuse an answer on the grounds that a reply would be contrary to the public interest. Whenever our relations with foreign Powers are in any way strained, certain members seem to take a delight in asking questions calculated to hamper the movements of the Foreign Office, or to provide other nations with all the secret information they desire. And it is not always expedient or easy for Ministers to refuse to satisfy the thirst for knowledge of their friends or opponents, or to try and choke off the inquisitive or importunate with evasive answers. It was always said that "Darby Griffith destroyed Lord Palmerston's first Government," by asking perpetual questions which the Premier answered with a "cheerful impertinence which hurt his parliamentary power."[391] And the amount of patience and tact displayed by modern Ministers in replying to frivolous or petty queries is always a subject of admiration to the stranger.