At the expiration of the
five years a member should cease to hold office unless reappointed, in
order to provide a convenient mode of getting rid of those who had not
been found equal to their duties, and of infusing new and younger
blood into the body.
The necessity of some provision corresponding to this was felt
even in the Athenian Democracy, where, in the time of its most
complete ascendancy, the popular Ecclesia could pass Psephisms (mostly
decrees on single matters of policy), but laws, so called, could
only be made or altered by a different and less numerous body, renewed
annually, called the Nomothetae, whose duty it also was to revise
the whole of the laws, and keep them consistent with one another. In
the English Constitution there is great difficulty in introducing
any arrangement which is new both in form and in substance, but
comparatively little repugnance is felt to the attainment of new
purposes by an adaptation of existing forms and traditions.
It appears to me that the means might be devised of enriching the
Constitution with this great improvement through the machinery of
the House of Lords. A Commission for preparing Bills would in itself
be no more an innovation on the Constitution than the Board for the
administration of the Poor Laws, or the Inclosure Commission. If, in
consideration of the great importance and dignity of the trust, it
were made a rule that every person appointed a member of the
Legislative Commission, unless removed from office on an address
from Parliament, should be a Peer for life, it is probable that the
same good sense and taste which leave the judicial functions of the
Peerage practically to the exclusive care of the law lords, would
leave the business of legislation, except on questions involving
political principles and interests, to the professional legislators;
that Bills originating in the Upper House would always be drawn up
by them; that the Government would devolve on them the framing of
all its Bills; and that private members of the House of Commons
would gradually find it convenient, and likely to facilitate the
passing of their measures through the two Houses, if instead of
bringing in a Bill and submitting it directly to the House, they
obtained leave to introduce it and have it referred to the Legislative
Commission.
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