stone is of opinion, that "if all the privileges of parliament were once to be set down and ascertained, and no privilege to be allowed but what was so defined and determined, it were easy for the executive power to devise some new case not within the line of privilege, and, under pretence thereof, to harass any refractory member, and violate the freedom of parliament. The dignity and independence of the two houses are, therefore, in a great measure preserved by keeping their privileges indefinite."

Peers, lords of parliament, and members of the house of commons, are exempt from arrest in civil suits.2 Their privilege does not extend to treason, felony, and breach of the peace, nor to contempts of court, which are in the nature of criminal offences (such as an insult to the court, or obstruction of its jurisdiction), as contradistinguished from those which consist in not doing something which ought to be done in the course of a suit.4

ercise and discharge of the functions and duties of parliament, and to the promotion of wise legislation, that no obstruction should exist to the publication of such reports, papers, votes, or proceedings of either house of parliament, as such house of parliament may deem fit or necessary to be published.

1 Blackst. Com. b. i. c. ii. p. 163. Lord Clarendon construes the saying, that the House of Commons are the only judges of their own privileges, to mean, that they are the only judges in cases where their privileges are offended against, and not that they only can decide what are, and what are not, their privileges. Hist. of Rebel. v. i. p. 311. "No lawyer, I suppose, now supports the doctrine of Blackstone, that the dignity of the houses and their independence are preserved by keeping their privileges indefinite." Per Coleridge, J. 9 Ad. and El. 225. 2 12 and 13 Wm. III. c. iii. 2 and 3 Wm. IV. c. xxxix.

3 Blackst. Com. b. i. c. ii. p. 165. 4 Inst. 25. Com. Journ. 20 May, 1675.

4 Lechmere Charlton's case, 2 Mylne and Craig (1837), 316. The court writes to the speaker, after having committed the member, to acquaint him of the fact. And see Long Wellesley's case, 2 Russ. and Mylne, 639; and 18 Tindal, 416.

III. We will now proceed to consider the laws and customs of each house separately taken.

And first of the laws and customs of the House of Lords. These (excluding their judicial capacity, of which we shall treat hereafter,) are principally as follows.

Every lord, temporal and spiritual, enjoys the ancient privilege, either granted or declared by the Charta de Forestá, 9 Hen. III. c. ii., of killing one or two of the queen's deer, when he passes through a royal forest, on his way to or from attendance on summons to parliament. But if the forester be absent, the lord must blow a horn, that he may not seem to take the queen's venison by stealth.

The House of Lords has a right to be attended by the judges of the court of Queen's Bench and Common Pleas, and such of the barons of the Exchequer as are of the degree of the coif, or have been made sergeants-at-law; and also by the king's learned counsel, being sergeants, and by

1 The judges, the master of the rolls, and the attorney-general, are assistants of the house; and the solicitor-general, queen's sergeants, and masters in chancery, are attendants. Their place is on woolsacks on each side of the lord-chancellor. They can neither speak nor vote, but may give their opinions when required by the house. But the judges alone are consulted. They cannot be compelled to give an answer, and have frequently declined to do so,—generally (in later times) because the question put to them by the house might come before them in their judicial capacity. See Co. Litt. 110 a. note 5. Hargr. ; and Rot. Parl. 39 H. VI. n. 12, succession to the crown. 31, 32 H. VI. n. 26, privilege of parliament. Journ. Dom. Proc. P. 17 Feb. and 3 March, 1620; 23 May, 1614; 1 May, 1626, prerogative. Rot. Parl. 27 H. VI. n. 17, cited in Dugd. Baronage, 323; and Wilmot's notes, 77. See Fortesc. Rep. 384, 385, Fost. 199, 241, on the subject of reserve in taking and giving extrajudicial opinions, which may pledge the judges; and 3 Institute, 39, where Lord Coke gives strong opinions against the king consulting the judges beforehand in criminal cases. As for the form of the writs summoning the judges, see Hale, Jurisd. of the House of Lords, c. ii. p. 12, 13; and c. ix. p. 58, &c.

the masters of the court of Chancery, for their advice in point of law, and for the greater dignity of their proceedings. The secretaries of state, with the attorney and solicitor-general, were also used to attend the house of peers, and have to this day (together with the judges and the other assistants and attendants of that house) their writs of summons issued at the beginning of every parliament, ad tractandum et consilium impendendum, though not ad consentiendum; but whenever of late years they have been members of the House of Commons, their attendance here hath fallen into disuse.1

Another privilege of the House of Lords is, that every lord of parliament may, by license, obtained from the queen, make another lord of parliament his proxy, to vote for him in his absence; a privilege which, according to Blackstone, who cites Lord Coke's 4th Institute (p. 12), is denied to the members of the other house, because

1 Blackst. Com. b. i. c. ii. p. 167, stat. 31 Hen. VIII. c. x. Smith's Commonwealth, b. ii. c. iii. Moor. 551, 4 Inst. 4. Hale of Parl. 140. Com. Journ. 11 Apr. 1614, 8 Feb. 1620, 10 Feb. 1625. 4 Inst. 48. See, also, the Modus tenendi Parliamentum; which, however, is not of the antiquity to which it pretends, but was drawn up, according to Selden and Prynne, as late as the time of Ed. III. or Hen. VI. Co. Litt. 69 b. n. 2, by Hargrave. It is in an appendix to Rapin's Hist. of Eng. Speaker Onslow, in a note to Hatsell's Precedents, vol. ii. p. 27, says that, at the trial of a peer, the attorney-general, as an assistant to the House of Lords, is to sit within the bar, unless he be a member of the House of Commons, and then he is to be without the bar. The true reason why the attorney and solicitor-general and queen's sergeants do not attend in the House of Lords, even on occasions of mere ceremonial, is, that by a standing order of the house, dated 13th May, 1742, they are not allowed to appear at the bar as counsel for any private person after having taken their place on the woolsacks. Hats. Prec. vol. ii. p. 28. Sergeant Lens, appearing at the bar of the house as counsel for a private person, was told by Lord Eldon, that, having taken his seat on the woolsack, he could not be heard. As to sergeants, see Sergeant Manning's Serviens ad Legem.

they are themselves representatives of a multitude of people.

The lords have a right to enter their protest on the journals, with the reasons why they dissent from any particular vote of the house.

Bills which affect the peerage ought, by the custom of parliament, to begin in the House of Lords, and not to be altered and amended by the Commons.1

The House of Lords is presided over by the lord chancellor, or lord keeper of the great seal, who is speaker of that house by virtue of his office, but has no authority there for preserving order in the debates beyond any other member of the assembly, though he be a peer.2 If the lord chancellor, or lord keeper, is a peer, he may take a share in the debates, but he has no casting vote; and when the number of votes is equal on both sides, the question passes in the negative. When there is no lord chancellor, or lord keeper of the great seal (which is the case whenever the great seal is placed in the hands of lords commissioners), a speaker of the House of Lords is constituted by royal commission. Several persons are usually appointed by commission of the crown to be deputy-speakers, for the purpose of supplying the place of the lord chancellor, lord keeper, or lord speaker, when they are respectively absent.

IV. The peculiar laws and customs of the House of

1 Blackst. Com. b. i. c. ii. p. 127. The election of Scotch representative peers is regulated by stat. 6 Anne, c. xxiii.

2 By stat. 5 Eliz. the lord keeper has the same place, authority, pre-eminence, jurisdiction, and execution of the laws, as the lord chancellor of England. He is constituted by delivery of the great seal and taking the oaths, without patent.

3 Lords' Journ., 25 June, 1661.

G

Commons relate principally to the raising of taxes, and the election of members to serve in parliament.

"First," says Blackstone, "with regard to taxes: it is the ancient and indisputable privilege of the House of Commons, that all grants of subsidies, or parliamentary aids, do begin in their house, and are first bestowed by them; although their grants are not effectual until they have the assent of the other two branches of the legislature." The reason usually given for this is, that the supplies are raised upon the body of the people; but when we consider what a large amount of property is in the hands of the lords, we cannot give much weight to such an argument. Blackstone very justly says, that the true reason is, that the lords, being a permanent hereditary

1 Blackst. Com. b. i. c. ii. p. 168. 4 Inst. 29. And Hats. Prec. vol. iii. p. 87. The form of acts for granting or raising money is different from that of all others. The usual form of acts is a preamble, beginning, "Whereas by an act passed, &c., it is enacted; or, Whereas, for such and such reasons, it is expedient, &c. ; followed by the enacting part, which commences, Be it therefore enacted by the queen's most excellent majesty, by and with the advice of the lords temporal and spiritual, and commons, in this present parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, that, &c. But a money-bill begins, Most gracious sovereign, we, your majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in parliament assembled, towards making good the supply which we have cheerfully granted to your majesty in this session of parliament, have resolved to grant unto your majesty the sum hereinafter mentioned; and do therefore most humbly beseech your majesty that it may be enacted; and be it enacted by the queen's most excellent majesty, by and with the advice of the lords spiritual and temporal, and commons, in this present parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, that, &c. If any reasons or acts are to be recited, the recitals are inserted between the words most gracious sovereign and we your majesty's most dutiful, &c., commencing with the usual word whereas.