Life peerages. the number of Irish peers is subject to limitation. He Chapter I. Life peerages were formerly not unknown in our constitu- 2 Of late years, vacancies in the Irish peerage have not been filled up. Rep. of Lords' Committee, 1874; 9th July, 1875, and address to Queen Victoria; 225 H. D. 3 s. 1210; Lord Inchiquin's Irish Peerage Bills, 1876 and 1877; Lords' Parl. Return, 1877, No. 148. Since this Return one 3 See Coates v. Lord Hawarden, 7 44th Art. of Union. 55 Ann. c. 8, art. xxv. s. 12. Chapter I. revive the dignity, with a view to improve the appellate jurisdiction of the House of Lords, created Sir James Parke, late one of the barons of the Court of Exchequer, by letterspatent, Baron Wensleydale, "for and during the term of his natural life." But the House of Lords referred these letterspatent to a Committee of Privileges, which, after examining all the precedents of life peerages, reported their opinion, "that neither the said letters-patent, nor the said letterspatent with the usual writ of summons issued in pursuance thereof, can enable the grantee therein named to sit and vote in Parliament." The house concurred in this opinion, and Lord Wensleydale, therefore, did not offer to take the oaths and his seat, but was shortly afterwards created an hereditary baron, in the usual form.1 The expediency of creating life peers, however, continued to be discussed; 2 and, in 1876, provision was made by statute for the constitution of four lords of appeal in ordinary. They enjoy the rank of baron and are entitled to a writ of summons for life, but their dignity does not descend to their heirs.3 ritual and form one The two estates of lords spiritual and lords temporal, Lords spithus constituted, may originally have had an equal voice temporal in all matters deliberated upon, and had separate places for body. their discussion: but at a very early period they are found to constitute one assembly; and for many centuries past, though retaining their distinct character and denominations, they have been, practically, but one estate of the realm. Thus the Act of Uniformity, 1st Eliz. c. 2, was passed by the queen, the lords temporal, and the commons, although the whole estate of the lords spiritual dissented. The lords temporal are the hereditary peers of the realm, whose blood is ennobled, and whose dignities can only be 1 Report of Committee of Privileges, 1856, No. 18; 140 H. D. 3 s. 263. 1290; 1 May, Const. Hist. 291299. 2142 H. D. 3 s. 780, &c.; 143 ib. 428, &c. 339 & 40 Vict. c. 59, ss. 6 & 14; 50 & 51 Vict. c. 70, s. 2. The pre cedence of a baron's wife and child III. The lost by attainder, or taken away by Act of Parliament: 1 Ch By constant additions to the peerage the number of members of the House of Lords, comprising the several orders, spiritual and temporal, of which it is constituted, has been raised to nearly 600.2 3 see p. III. The third estate is that of the Commons of the realm. The of Con Commons. The date of their admission to a place in the legislature has and p been a subject of controversy among historians and consti- money tutional writers; of whom some have traced their claims up to the Saxon period, while others deny them any share in the government until long after the Conquest. Without entering minutely into this subject, a brief statement will serve to unfold the ancient character of the House of Commons, and to render its present constitution the more intelligible. Saxon institutions. Shire gemót. It is agreed by writers of learning and authority, that the Commons formed part of the great synods or councils before the Conquest: but how they were summoned or selected, and what degree of power they possessed, is a matter of doubt and obscurity. Under the Saxon kings, the forms of local government were undoubtedly popular. The shiregemót was a kind of county Parliament, over which the ealdorman, or earl of the shire, presided, with the bishop, the shire-gerieve, or sheriff, and the assessors appointed to 112 Rep. 107; 12 Mod. 56; 3 Rep. Dig. Peerage, 93; 2 Burnet, Own Times, 202. 2 In February, 1906, there were 613.--Roll of Lords Spiritual and Temporal. 3 Until 1872, the ancient terms of knights, citizens, and burgesses, barons of the cinque ports and bur- Chapter I. assist their deliberations upon points of law. A shire-gemót was held at least twice a year in every county, when the magistrates, thanes, and abbots, with all the clergy and landowners, were required to be present; and a variety of business was transacted: but the proceedings of these assemblies generally partook more of the character of a court of justice, than of a legislative body. That the constitution of the witena-gemót, or national Witenacouncil, was equally popular, cannot be affirmed with confidence. Although the smaller proprietors of land may not have been actually disqualified by law from taking part in the proceedings; yet the distance of the council from their homes must practically have prevented them from attending. It has been conjectured that they were represented by their tithing men, and the inhabitants of towns by their chief magistrates: but no system of election or political representation, properly so called, can be distinctly traced back to that time. The clergy may have been virtually represented by the bishops and abbots, and the absent laity of each shire by the ealdorman, the sheriff, and such of the rich proprietors of land as may have been able to attend the gemót.1 The people may thus have been held to be present at the making of laws, and their name accordingly introduced into the records. That they were actually present on some occasions, is certain but their right to attend, either by themselves or by elected representatives, is incapable of historical proof.2 But whatever may have been the position of the people in The the Saxon government, the Conquest, and the strictly feudal Conquest. character of the Norman institutions, must have brought them completely under the subjection of their feudal superiors; and it is probable that the commonalty, as a class, were not admitted to any share in the national councils, 1 Kemble, Saxons in England, ii. 193-201. See Sir F. Palgrave's English Commonwealth, 314. 631. 364-658, and Proofs, ccxxix. ccclxxxv.; Tur ner, Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, iii. Knights of the shire. Citizens and burgesses. until some time after the Conquest, but were bound by the Chapter I. were formed of the spiritual lords, and mainly, if not ex- taxation, see p. 586. Consistently with the feudal character of the Norman Origin of councils, the first knights of the shire are supposed to have mentary parliabeen the lesser barons, who, though still summoned to Parliament, gradually forebore to attend, and selected some of the richest and most influential of their body to represent them. The words of the charter of King John favour this position; for it is there promised that the greater barons shall be summoned personally by letters from the king, and all other tenants in chief under the Crown by the sheriffs and bailiffs. The summons to the lesser barons being thus only general, no peculiar obligation of personal attendance was imposed; and, as their numbers increased, and their wealth was subdivided, they were naturally reluctant to incur the charge of distant journeys, and the mortification of being held in slight esteem by the greater barons. This position receives confirmation from the ancient law of Scotland, in which the small barons and free tenants were classed together, and jointly required to send representatives. To the tenants in chief by knight's service were added, from time to time, the representatives of the richer cities and boroughs; and this addition to the legislature. may be regarded as the origin of the Commons as a distinct estate of the realm in Parliament. It is not known at what time these important changes in the constitution of Parliament occurred, for no mention is made of the Commons, in any of the early records after the Conquest. William the Conqueror, in the fourth year of his reign, summoned, by the advice of his barons, a council of noble and wise men, learned in the law of England, and twelve were returned out of every county to show what the customs of the kingdom were: but this assembly, although, in the opinion of Lord Hale, it was "as sufficient and 1 Rep. Dignity of Peerage, 34. 2 1427, c. 102. |