BEING DECISIONS OF THE RIGHT HONOURABLE CHARLES SHAW LEFEVRE, Speaker of the House of Commons, ON POINTS OF ORDER, RULES OF DEBATE, AND THE GENERAL PRACTICE OF THE HOUSE. BY THE HON. ROBERT BOURKE, OF THE INNER TEMPLE, BARRISTER AT LAW. LONDON: HENRY SWEET, 3, CHANCERY lane, fleet STREET, HODGES & CO., GRAFTON STREET, DUBLIN. 1857. 226. l. 3. These Reports ARE, BY PERMISSION, INSCRIBED TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE CHARLES SHAW LEFEVRE, Speaker of the Bonse of Commons, BY HIS HUMBLE AND OBLIGED SERVANT, ROBERT BOURKE. PREFACE. IN presenting these pages to the public, the compiler has only to observe, that they are simply a collection of all the Decisions of the present Speaker on points of interest or importance. The result of many will be found embodied in Mr. May's well-known and learned Work, but a great part of the Law and Practice of Parliament being unwritten, and* "ab omnibus quærenda, â multis ignorata, â paucis cognita," it has been thought that a Book of this kind would be as acceptable to Members of Parliament as a series of Reports to Lawyers. It is unnecessary, and would be here presumptuous, to dwell on the intrinsic value of the decisions of a Speaker who has been four times elected by the House of Commons; but the authority of Sir Robert Harry * 4 Inst. 14. |