Abstract

Position and Prospects of the House of Lords

That contest between the two British Houses of Parliament which has now become an annual event, expected as regularly as harvest in August and fogs in November, is keeping before men's eyes in England the question of what is to be done with the House of Lords. While the House of Lords remains what it is, they must necessarily recur whenever the Liberal party has a majority in the House of Commons. How, then, is the House of Lords to be reformed? Some of the Peers themselves, particularly the younger Tory Peers, who of course are more hot-headed, chafe so much under their present condition of nominal equality of powers, theoretical superiority in rank, and practical obligation to submit to the will of the Commons, that it is by no means impossible that they may seek to precipitate a solution of the problem.