HC Deb 21 June 1872 vol 212 cc47-77
MR. FAWCETT

, in rising to bring forward the Motion of which he had given Notice, to call attention to the Treasury Minute recently issued relating to the remuneration of the Law Officers of the Crown, and to move the following Resolution:— Considering the inconvenience which results from their being in Parliament no Minister of Justice or other official who should be able to give his undivided attention to Law Reform, and to the various legal questions affecting the administration of public business, this House is of opinion that it would be inexpedient for the Treasury Minute relating to the remuneration of the Law Officers of the Crown to continue in operation beyond the time when the present Law Officers of the Crown should remain in office, said, he believed he was expressing the very general wish of the House when he trusted that what had happened on previous occasions when the question of law reform was discussed would not occur that evening.

Notice taken, that 40 Members are not present. House counted, and 40 Members being found present—

MR. FAWCETT

resumed. He had observed that when any hon. Member felt it his duty to call attention to the relations that existed between those who were responsible for law reform and tendering legal advice to Her Majesty's Government, the question was instantly dragged down into a personal discussion as trivial as it was fruitless; and further, that if anyone pointed out the inconvenience resulting to the public from there being no Minister of Justice or other official who could give his undivided attention to law reform and legal questions affecting the administration of Public Business, the issue, though important, was never fairly and openly met, but what happened was this—the Attorney and Solicitor General used a great deal of exalted talk about belonging to a noble profession, and the great sacrifices they had made of their private interests in order to serve the public when they took office. He neither admitted nor denied those sacrifices, for the simple reason that they had nothing whatever to do with his Motion. Nothing was further from his intention than to deny that the profession of an advocate was a noble one, or on the other hand to pretend to inquire the nature of the sacrifice which an Attorney General or a Solicitor General made to take office. But he must submit that that plea, if pressed, only strengthened his case. It was an old saying that it oftened happened that what one person lost another gained; and if they could believe that, when they found the Law Officers of the Crown taking a great portion of their time from their public duties to devote to their private practice, and thereby benefiting certain meritorious individuals, it would be some slight satisfaction. But it was not so. If the representations made on the subject were correct they only proved that we had a system which was not only detrimental to the public interests, but which also deprived us of the small modicum of comfort that it was accompanied with considerable private damage. He did not assert that the present Attorney General or Solicitor General did anything else than what had been done by their predecessors, or what would likely be done by their successors, nor did he wish to raise the question in any spirit of pettifogging economy. His object was not to save a few thousand pounds, but he did contend that the present system was inefficient and unsatisfactory, whilst it was disastrous to the public and costly to the taxpayer; and to secure an efficient system no public money which could be suggested could be spent more advantageously or beneficially to the public. Let the House consider what the Law Officers of the Crown had to do. Taking first their public functions, they were primarily responsible for introducing measures of law reform into that House; for if a great measure of law reform was to be brought in, it must be either by the Attorney or Solicitor General. Again, they were the legal advisers of the Government—a position involving most important duties. If an old treaty was to be interpreted the Government had to rely on the advice of their Law Officers; if a new treaty was to be framed, the Government had to depend on their Law Officers to point out its exact legal bearings. If certain acts had to be done which might vitally affect the future of this country, and might perhaps decide whether or not we should go to war, the Law Officers of the Crown were constantly ready to give advice to the Government as to the legality or illegality of these acts. Further, they had to be the legal advisers not only of the Government, but also of that House. It very often happened that measures were introduced involving difficult questions of legal interpretation. On legal points—with which men like himself felt themselves incompetent to deal—they wanted an authoritative decision; and to whom were they to look for it but to the legal advisers of that House? The Law Officers of the Crown had likewise to perform the duties of public prosecutors; they had to determine for the Government, for instance, if a great commercial fraud had been committed, whether it was the duty of the Government to undertake a prosecution or not; and probably also the Government had to appeal to them for assistance when it had to decide whether or not it was wise to exercise the prerogative of pardon. Those were some—perhaps not all—of the public duties which the Law Officers of the Crown had to discharge; and he asserted that there was no head of a great Department, no Secretary of State, who had to perform duties which more taxed the capacity of the most able, or were more engrossing of the time, the thought, and the energy even of the most gifted man who ever occupied a public position in this country. Not only, however, had they to discharge those heavy duties, but they had to appear in Court as advocates, whenever the Government had any contentious business; and they also generally filled, as far as private practice was concerned, a leading position in a profession which was admitted to be one of the most onerous and exhausting in which a man could engage. What would the public think if the Home Secretary, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, or the Secretary of State for War were at the head of some great commercial establishment, and if the only time they devoted to their public duties was the few occasional hours which they could squeeze out of their absorbing private concerns? He was not blaming the Attorney or the Solicitor General, but complaining of the system; and he was only astonished that those Gentlemen could give up the part of their time to the public which they did. For himself, even as a private Member only, he found that the work he had to do was sufficiently absorbing of his time; and if he had a private practice he should scarcely have a spare hour to bestow upon it. The practical inconveniences of that system were so patent to them all, that he might, perhaps, be pardoned for alluding to one or two instances which had recently occurred. During the last fortnight the country had been passing through a great crisis in connection with the negotiations respecting the Washington Treaty. At such a period it seemed to him that the Government required to have constantly at their service the assistance of their Law Officers; and those in the Government who had the highest legal knowledge should have had sufficient leisure to concentrate their whole thoughts upon the bearing of any new proposal or any new clause which might be inserted in the Treaty. But what was the fact? Why, that just at that very time when the Government required all the aid of their Legal Advisers, those Gentlemen were absorbed in their private practice. Again, as to another instance, he thought he was justified in saying that it was one which concerned the practice and procedure of that House itself. Certain distinguished Members of that House had laboured during the last three years to introduce that important measure of law reform earnestly demanded by the country—the Public Prosecutors Bill. And what had occurred? Why, it came on for discussion on Wednesday last. The discussion lasted four hours, and during the whole of that time neither the Attorney nor the Solicitor General thought it worth their while or were able to attend for a single moment. On looking at the law reports, however, the next morning, he found that the Attorney General had been engaged in a great private will case. Now, if the Law Officers of the Crown were occupied six hours during the day in Court, how many must they spend in the morning or evening in reading their briefs and studying the law of the case? If a Law Officer of the Crown was then engaged in a great and absorbing case, how was it possible for him to attend to his public duties in that House, or to give that amount of time which at such a crisis the Government ought to command from their legal advisers? So long as that system continued it would be as impossible for the Law Officers to give sufficient time to the performance of their duties as it would, he must repeat, be for the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary, or the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if they were taking an active part in the management of some great commercial concern in the City. But that by no means exhausted the case. To carry out a great and systematic measure of law reform, it was necessary for those who had charge of it to devote to its preparation long and continuous labour. It had been said that the great obstacle to law reform was in that House—that if the Attorney or Solicitor General introduced a measure of law reform they did not obtain sufficient assistance from the House. But the shortest experience in the House of Commons showed that those Bills passed most quickly which was introduced by hon. Members having the confidence of the House; and nothing inspired confidence so much as a belief that the measure introduced was the result of careful, anxious, and continuous labour. His second point was, that the present system was not only inefficient, but extremely costly. If he rightly understood the Treasury Minute, the present arrangement was that the Attorney General should in future receive £7,000 a-year, and the Solicitor General £6,000. And for what? For all the work they did for the Government? No. They were to receive these sums—40 and 20 per cent more than was given to the Prime Minister for the discharge of his public duties—and for the sums thus paid there was no security that these officers would devote a proper amount of time to the discharge of their duties. In addition to these sums, they were paid for every bit of contentious work done for the Government, in each case receiving a handsome fee, and made what they could out of their private practice. He did not say that £7,000 and £6,000 were extravagant sums for the Law Officers; but they were monstrously extravagant sums, unless Parliament could have a much better guarantee than at present that the duties would be properly discharged; and it was impossible they could be so discharged so long as the present system was permitted to continue. And now, it might be asked, what was the remedy for this state of things? He would not shrink from the responsibility of shadowing out a scheme of reform. What was required in the first place was a Minister of Justice. And what were the duties he would be called upon to discharge? With re- gard to his legislative duties, his first would be to draft and prepare Bills. His second would be to exercise a control over the law reports. His third would be to devote his time to a systematic and continuous effort at law reform. His executive duties would be—first, to act as legal adviser of the Government and of the House—the Parliamentary legal authority to whom the Government and Parliament should appeal. In the second place, he would have to discharge the duties of public prosecutor, or if local public prosecutors were appointed, to watch over them. In the third place, the prerogative of pardon should be entrusted to him, and not to the Home Secretary, who might not be a lawyer. He thought he was justified in saying that a Minister of Justice would have duties to discharge second in importance to none, sufficient to gratify the honourable ambition of the most capable man, and he would have the satisfaction of feeling that there was no one in the country who rendered more effectual services to the public. It might be said that they would not get an eminent lawyer to take the position; but would it not be second in importance or dignity to that of Lord Chancellor? and there was never any difficulty found in getting distinguished men to fill that office. With reference to qualifications, Mr. Fitzjames Stephen had said that the man who was most successful at the Bar would be the best man for a Minister of Justice; but it was not necessarily the fact that the best advocate, having the largest private practice, would fill the post with most advantage to the public. The necessary qualifications might co-exist with great rhetorical powers, but that would be an exception. Such an officer as the legal Member of the Council of the Governor General of India was what was needed—a position which had been filled by the most eminent jurists of our own country—Lord Macaulay and Sir Henry Maine—neither of whom had practised in the Courts. It had happened that under their jurisdiction more had been effected by continuous exertion towards codifying the laws of India in three years than we had been able to effect in thirty. The salary attached to that office was £8,000 a-year without pension, and in cases where the person holding the office had retired from ill health, he had invariably returned to his practice in this country. A salary of £8,000, £10,000, £12,000, or even £15,000 then would be ample for the post in this country, with a claim to some easier position on retirement, or a position such as was held by an ex-Lord Chancellor. But the position of a Minister of Justice in this House might be strengthened if there were a permanent Commission sitting outside, which should assist him and render him services analogous to those rendered to the heads of Departments by their Permanent Secretaries. If that were done, hon. Members of the House might be able to refer their Bills to that Commission to have their opinion, not upon the policy of those Bills, but upon their legal bearings; and in that way we might be saved from one of the greatest opprobriums of Parliament—namely, the passing of Acts which were at variance with other Acts, the consequence of which was that unfortunate litigants found themselves involved in additional doubts and difficulties. If we had such a Minister of Justice, there would not be the smallest reason why the Government, when they wished to appear in Court upon contentious matters, should not retain for the conduct of their cases the most able counsel. The Government then would not be represented by the Attorney or Solicitor General, who might be the ablest lawyers in the House or the ablest lawyers who had not sacrificed their claims to office by too much independence. The Government would have an unlimited choice. They would be represented by the ablest men at the Bar, and it was a simple truism to say that the ablest men at the Bar might not be able to find a seat in this House. There would be another collateral advantage connected with the scheme. Nothing seemed so anomalous or mischievous, or produced such a bad impression on the public mind, as that the Attorney or Solicitor General had sometimes to combine what appeared to be the two perfectly contradictory offices of advocate and public prosecutor. For instance, the Attorney or Solicitor General might be retained in a case which, in its progress, might assume an entirely different phase; and then they might be called upon by the Government to decide whether the State should or should not carry on a prosecution. The House might ask what he intended to do with his Motion. He would certainly ask hon. Members to express their opinion upon it. If the Government approved the Motion it would be extremely useful to have that Motion upon the Records of the House. If they disapproved it, of course the House would hear their reasons, and also the reasons of those who would give it their support, and they would be able to judge between the two. He had arrived at the conclusion that nothing could be done by a private Member unless he steadily persevered. He had tried his very best, and he had been defeated by a combination of unfortunate circumstances in never having had an opportunity before that evening of getting the House to express an opinion on the subject. But, as he had escaped shipwreck to-night, he would certainly take advantage of his good fortune, and would not let the occasion slip. His hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Barttelot) said the other night that we were having a great deal too much legislation in this House. We should soon be worried out of our lives by meddlesome and mischievous Government intervention, and people would shortly begin to say—"We won't be Conservatives or Liberals; but we shall join a party that will leave people alone." Whenever such a party was formed he should be a member of it. But, though he said that, there was one field of legislative activity in which all might unite their efforts. The stanchest Conservative and the most advanced Liberal, the stoutest advocate of Government intervention and the most devoted disciple of laissez faire, might combine in carrying out a scheme of law reform which would give to the free energy of this country a better chance of developing itself. They might wish to see the transfer of land rendered cheaper and more expeditious; they might desire to see justice rendered less costly and less complicated, and punishment brought home with greater certainty to the offender, in whatever rank of life he might be. These, and a countless number of instances which he might enumerate, would suffice to show what bountiful blessings a great law reformer might confer on this country. Believing that if he had failed to do so, there were others to follow in the debate who would abundantly point out the evils of the present system, he would ask the House with some confidence to accept the Motion which he now begged to make.

Amendment proposed, To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "considering the inconvenience which results from there being in Parliament no Minister of Justice or other official who should be able to give his undivided attention to Law Reform, and to the various legal questions affecting the administration of public business, this House is of opinion that it would be inexpedient for the Treasury Minute relating to the remuneration of the Law Officers of the Crown to continue in operation beyond the time when the present Law Officers of the Crown should remain in office,"—(Mr. Fawcett,) —instead thereof.

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."

THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER

The connection between the speech of the hon. Gentleman the Member for Brighton (Mr. Fawcett) and the Motion he has submitted to the House is so exceedingly slight that I think it necessary to remind hon. Gentlemen of what it is they are asked to vote. The substantial proposition of the hon. Gentleman is that the recent Treasury Minute should not continue in operation beyond the time when the present Law Officers of the Crown remain in office; but he couples with it a statement that inconvenience results from the absence of a Minister of Justice able to give his undivided attention to law reform and the legal questions affecting the administration of Public Business. From that assertion the hon. Gentleman, by some process of logic best known to himself, deduces that the Treasury Minute should be cancelled. That Minute makes an arrangement by which in the salaries of future Law Officers we save £12,000 a-year, yet the first and only step which the hon. Gentleman asks us to take in law reform is to undo it and re-impose the £12,000 a-year on the public. How does he justify that extraordinary proposition? He says the present system is at once inefficient and costly, and he enumerates the duties of the Law Officers. He says it is, in the first place, their duty to introduce measures of law reform; secondly, to advise the Crown; and, thirdly, to act as public prosecutors. There the hon. Gentleman stopped; but not until he had entirely inverted matters, and left out that which was the principal duty of the Law Officers, concentrating his views upon that which was a very subordinate duty. What is their primary object? Any other Member would, I think, have said that it is the duty of a Law Officer of the Crown to be the advocate of the Government, to defend it in all the law suits which, owing to the vast quantity of property they administer and the immense number of transactions in which they are engaged, they are concerned in, or in all the suits or prosecutions they may think it necessary to institute. The main object of a Law Officer is, that there should be at the command of the Government the very best legal advice that can be procured. I will leave the House to judge of the careful analysis the hon. Gentleman must have made of the subject, from the fact that he so ignores the primary functions of the Law Officers. No wonder the hon. Gentleman's conclusion is unsound when his premises are so faulty. It is desirable, no doubt, that the Law Officers of the Crown should attend to measures of law reform, but have they ever been found otherwise than able and willing to do so? Let anyone look through the scanty list of law reforms which have been passed; whatever the cause of their failure—whether the inability of the Government or any other cause—had they not the assistance of the Law Officers of the Crown? Who carried through Parliament the Bankruptcy Bill, or what measure of law reform was carried without the assistance of the Law Officers? I maintain, therefore, that the view of the hon. Gentleman on that part of the subject is radically wrong. Considering their main and primary function, it is far more important for the Government to command the highest legal ability than to be able to command the whole time of any person. It is easy to get persons to give their whole time—men, too, of ability, honour, and very fair professional standing; but we want, not moderate ability, but the very best ability. We can afford to pay for it, and we have a right to have it. The hon. Gentleman has sketched some sort of plan, but is there any certainty of obtaining the best legal ability in any way as well as in the present? Suppose we were to require the whole time of the Law Officers, and call upon them to give up their private practice, we could no doubt find gentlemen at the Bar for the purpose, but they would be gentlemen who had no private practice to give up. What gentleman in large practice, and with all the emoluments and prospects of such a practice, would, for the precarious tenure the Government could offer him, throw up all his connections, sever himself from his professional and political associations, and resign all the prospects they opened to him? They would not be first, second, or even third-rate men who would do so. The hon. Gentleman says we might engage counsel for the occasion; but where acquaintance with private and confidential matters is required, is it not better to have the same advisers and advocates than to separate the two functions? The hon. Gentleman proposes a Minister of Justice, who is to be something a little lower than the angels, and another set of men to defend our cases; but private litigants find it expedient to take advice from the men they employ, and if it is expedient in private life, is it not probable that the experience of so many hundred years, during which the Government has had Law Officers, points to the same conclusion? The proposal, in fact, would deprive us of the best legal assistance and condemn us to the assistance of men of comparatively mediocre talent. Moreover, the hon. Gentleman seems to have passed by the question how the chief seats on the Judicial Bench are filled. They are filled by Gentlemen who have had seats in this House and filled the offices of Attorney and Solicitor General; and what has been the effect? Gentlemen promoted to those high offices have not always been superior in knowledge of the details of law to the puisne Judges, but by experience in this House, intercourse with the Government, and participation in important affairs they have acquired an insight into affairs and a wideness of view which have tempered the narrow and restrictive tendency of law. A liberality and wideness of view have been thus obtained in our Courts, and no greater blow could be struck at the administration of justice than to separate promotion to the higher offices of the law from seats in this House and from political life. The hon. Gentleman complains that the Law Officers are absorbed in their private practice, and he gave an illustration of great force. He says the affairs of this House are so absorbing to himself, that he cannot conceive how the Law Officers can find time to devote both to their Parliamentary duties and to their private practice. Now, I will not push the remark further than to say that every day's experience shows us there are things which one man can do and another man cannot. It is just possible that men selected by the keenest competition from the highest ranks of a high and laborious profession may be capable of exertions which some of us would find difficult, if not impossible. The hon. Gentleman referred to the labours of the legal Members of the Council of India. I have nothing to say against those distinguished gentlemen, but perhaps he will allow me, as a former Secretary of the Board of Control, to say that the measures carried there—a less difficult task than carrying measures through the House of Commons—were not all prepared by them, but by persons of whose services we hear little, but which were not inconsiderable. Again, has the hon. Gentleman considered how a Minister of Justice, to advise the Cabinet, would square with the present position of the Lord Chancellor; or how both could go on together? He complains of legislation being pushed on which is not particularly wanted, yet he proposes to appoint an officer, with £18,000 a-year, to occupy himself with law reforms. Now, being a very able man, he would naturally find out a number of defects not obvious to other people, which he would press on the consideration of the Government in season and out of season, and then I suppose the hon. Gentleman would get up and complain of legislation being forced upon us which was not wanted. Whatever may be the hon. Gentleman's opinion as to the demand for law reform, it is a demand which might very easily be exceeded by the supply. As to this paragon of a Minister—a man of boundless erudition, knowledge, and capacity—where are we to find him, and having found him, what are we to do with him? He is to receive a salary equal to about three of the rest of us. When he goes away, his pension would, of course, be calculated on that salary, and how can the hon. Gentleman ask the country to meet that expense, unless he thinks an additional charge of £12,000 is a step towards economy? But, in truth, there would be no person of any weight who would impair his position at the Bar by accepting such an office. The only chance of filling the office efficiently would be to take some old Judge—probably from the House of Lords—who had served his time, and who would be willing to occupy his time in the preparation of Bills to be sent down to this House, where no doubt they would be treated with the degree of attention which we usually bestow on such measures. And not only that, but when a change of Ministers occurs, the Minister of Justice, in common with the others, is to retire on a pension, and another is to supply his place. I therefore say that the hon. Gentleman has not shown that the present system fails in its object of providing the Government with the very best assistance and advice. Indeed, the hon. Gentleman does not seem to have grappled in his own mind with the insuperable objection to any other scheme—namely, that the best ability can only be obtained by allowing gentlemen to retain their practice at the Bar. Again, I do not think the hon. Gentleman has shown any reason why we should have a Minister of Justice, at least for the purpose of preparing measures of law reform; for, though perhaps I have no right to speak on the subject, I am perfectly aware that if it be the wish of the House, we shall be quite ready to place before it measures of law reform which would occupy it for several Sessions. The only difficulty in the way is that the attention of hon. Members is turned to other pressing subjects which have attracted public notice, and that these dry details and changes in the law do not command the attention of the House so much as measures relating to the public health, police, and local Government, which directly interest every man in the country, whether he be a litigant or not. This being the case, the only other question to consider is whether the hon. Gentleman has made out a case for rescinding the Treasury Minute, which saves the country £12,000 a-year, and for putting that sum back into the pockets of the Law Officers of the Crown. Now, he has adduced no argument in favour of the change, and as I assume the Law Officers are satisfied with it, and as the public gain by it £12,000 a-year, why should we revert to the old system in order that there may follow from it the appointment of a very inferior person to assist the Go- vernment in advocating their cases in the Courts of Law?

MR. PERCY WYNDHAM

said, that though prepared to support with great cordiality the Motion of his hon. Friend the Member for Brighton (Mr. Fawcett), he confessed he found himself more in accord with the terms of that Motion than with the tone of some portions of his hon. Friend's speech. He also thought the Chancellor of the Exchequer had devoted himself rather to replying to the tone of that speech than to the terms of the Motion, for the Motion, as he understood it, meant that the exigencies of the time had quite outgrown the system of legal advice and preparation of Bills. The opinions he was about to state were not given on his own authority, but had been expressed by Lord Brougham, Mr. Napier, and many other distinguished members of the legal profession. In dealing with this question it was necessary to consider that the Home Office was the most overworked Department of the State. It had, among other things, to deal with a large portion of the legal business of that House, and only the other day it appeared that in consequence of there being no regularly constituted authority on whom hon. Members could depend to state the exact effect of proposed Amendments, the Government were obliged to say with regard to a great Bill they felt they were in the hands of the House. It would be of immense importance to have some authority outside the House to assist in drafting Bills. At present the able gentlemen engaged in this work got no praise if they succeeded, and were beyond the reach of blame if they failed. He did not mean, however, to say it was not of immense advantage to have in that House two legal Gentlemen who were actively engaged in private business, because he knew that in all matters in which there was contest and argument, it was necessary to have men who were practised in contest and argument; and they had recently seen the result of that necessity in the sending a Professor of Law to Washington instead of a legal politician. He, however, regarded his hon. Friend's Motion not as a subversion, but as an extension of the present state of things, for, in his judgment, unless there were an authority to appeal to, the legislation of that House would become more and more unsatisfactory. What happened last year? First, he would take those Acts, which might be termed partly general and partly legal in their character, such as Highway Acts. It was a general complaint throughout the country that those Acts were often entirely unintelligible or contradictory. An attorney of high standing once asked him who were the draftsmen employed at the Home Office. He replied that to the best of his belief they were most able and efficient men, but he added that these Bills had to undergo sifting in the House of Commons, and the criticisms of hon. Members who did not understand the precise force of legal language, and that as there was no legal authority to give cohesion and unity to the Amendments, confusion was the result. When the House passed Bills of a purely legal character, it was impossible, under the present system, to have any satisfactory amendment of the law. Mr. Greaves, a gentleman largely employed on the Criminal Law Amendment Act, speaking of the prospects of a consolidation and codification of the law, expressed a doubt whether a code could ever be passed through Parliament, and said his strong impression was that it could never be so passed, as the success of such a measure would entirely depend on the accuracy of the language employed. Again, Mr. Napier, in bringing before the House the subject of a Public Prosecutor in 1856, said he found the same system constantly pursued; the Government consented to the introduction of Bills of private Members, but would not consent to the details, and so matters went on night after night, and Session after Session. In conclusion, he must say that if the Motion were pressed to a division he should deem it his duty to support it.

MR. VERNON HARCOURT

Sir, I was sorry to observe this morning in the leading journal that the prospects of law reform in this country are desperate. However, I might borrow the words of an epitaph in the Abbey— Life's a jest, and all things show it. I thought so once, and now I know it. —[Laughter]—after hearing the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in which he has used all the well-worn arguments, and employed his wit and rhetoric in ridiculing law reform. He has said we may have a great deal too much of it, and that the House does not wish to occupy itself with dry details of that character, being impatient, no doubt, for those moist details of the Licensing Bill which presently await us. What is the spirit in which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has approached this great subject? How has he treated the weighty remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton (Mr. Fawcett)? He has treated them with banter—of which no man complains—and with unfairness, which any man has a right to complain of in this House or elsewhere. A more complete misapprehension—I will not say misrepresentation—of a speech I think I have never heard than that of the right hon. Gentleman with regard to the observations of my hon. Friend. The right hon. Gentleman began by saying that the object of the Motion is to restore the system of remuneration of the Law Officers of the Crown which existed before the Treasury Minute; but that is exactly the opposite of the fact, of the Motion, and of the statement of my hon. Friend. He did not propose to restore payment by fees; he said that the Treasury Minute ought not to be continued in order to express an opinion that the whole system should be put upon a new footing for the future. Therefore, a more complete misapprehension it is impossible to conceive. What is the next point of the Chancellor of the Exchequer? He says that my hon. Friend represented that the almost exclusive duty of the Law Officers was to conduct the legal business of this House and to advise the Government, and almost omitted to notice their duty of carrying on the business of the Government in the Courts. Why, a great part of the speech of my hon. Friend was occupied with pointing out that the performance of that duty was in no way connected with their position in this House. If their main business is in the Courts, I agree with my hon. Friend that it would be no hard measure that they should not be in this House at all. But I do not think that is the principal duty of the Law Officers of the Crown. Indeed, I have been surprised by some statements which I have heard from the highest authority with reference to the position of the Law Officers of the Crown in this House—with reference, for instance, to advising the Government. I have always understood that they were responsible to this House and the country for advising the Government upon great and important legal and International questions; but, if I am not mistaken, in answer to a Question put by the hon. Member for Chatham (Mr. Otway), the Attorney General stated that the opinion of the Law Officers of the Crown was never taken upon that important transaction, the Treaty of Washington. If that be so, it goes a long way to establish the opinion of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that advising the Crown upon great matters of public policy is almost a non-existent function of the Law Officers. The right hon. Gentleman then went on to say it is necessary that the persons who conduct the business of the Crown in the Courts should hold confidential office and be in close relations with the Government. I am astonished that the Chancellor of the Exchequer does not know that a great part of the business is not done by the Law Officers of the Crown at all. If the Attorney General and the Solicitor General happen to belong to the Common Law Bar, the business in Chancery is conducted by eminent members of the Chancery Bar. On the other hand, suppose that both were at the Chancery Bar, would they go to the Central Criminal Court to conduct great prosecutions? Not at all. Everybody knows they receive assistance, and that the work is practically done by persons conversant with the Courts of Law. And when you want to have conducted a great transaction of the most confidential character, upon which the credit and reputation of this nation depend, whom do you get to conduct it? Why, a person who is not a Member of the Government—a man who is most eminent at the Bar, but a man who cannot conduct—as everybody would be proud that he should do—the affairs of this country in a confidential relation with the Government, because his own conscientious convictions have stood in the way of that position which he would otherwise have occupied. But, really, in the face of the fact that the hon. and learned Member for Richmond (Sir Roundell Palmer) is this day at Geneva representing the Government, for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to turn into ridicule the suggestion that advice of that character can be obtained from independent sources, seems to me to be a remarkable and strong position for that right hon. Gen- tleman to take up. This question is far too large to be treated with the levity with which we have heard it treated to-night; and I venture to say that the time will come when there will be a Government in this country which will not laugh and jeer at law reform in the House of Commons. When the country comes to understand the magnitude and importance of the subject, its bearings upon the social relations of all classes of society, and especially upon those classes who cannot afford expensive litigation—justice delayed and justice denied—there will exist in this country a Government whose Chancellor of the Exchequer will treat the question of law reform in a very different spirit from that in which we have heard it approached to-night. If my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton goes to a division, I shall vote with him, as a protest against the existing condition of law reform in this House. It is no use in this Parliament, and with this Government, hoping for law reform after what we have just heard. I did not hope much before, for the experience of this Session has taught us something. What happened during the present Session? One of the greatest lawyers in this country, the hon. and learned Member for Richmond (Sir Roundell Palmer), came forward with a well-considered scheme for the reform of legal education, when the Law Officers of the Crown got up one after the other and shuffled it out of the House. Then a measure of law reform was brought into the other House of Parliament, with reference to the reform of Appellate Jurisdiction, and I think the Attorney General stated that the Lord Chancellor did not consult the Law Officers of the Crown with regard to it. That is another proof of what the right hon. Gentleman has stated—that advising the Government upon law reform was but a secondary part of their duty; and with the added fact that they were not consulted with reference to the Treaty of Washington, the proposition may be considered proved. That second measure of law reform has gone to a Select Committee, from which it will probably never emerge, and certainly never in a form likely to be accepted by the House of Commons. Then there came the Public Prosecutors Bill, which has been referred to. It was brought forward by the right hon. Member for the University of Cambridge and the Recorder of London. They had made their little straw nest with great care, when the Government came like a cuckoo, and laid the egg of local taxation in their nest, expecting them to hatch it. The fact was that the Government had got into difficulties with hon. Members opposite, and they seized upon the unhappy Bill in order to get out of them. So the Bill has disappeared, and that is the end of the chapter of law reform for the Session of 1872. It has been finally closed to-night by the funeral oration pronounced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The hon. Member for Southwark (Mr. Locke) said the other night—"Why don't you try to do something?" I think everybody must see why nobody should try to do anything in the present state of affairs. Is it not perfectly obvious that the first thing done with any practical proposition upon subjects of this magnitude is to endeavour to laugh them out of the House of Commons? Such a course succeeds, and it saves the trouble of considering difficult questions. But it is idle to say that these are speculative opinions. We have the opinion of the Judicature Commission, formed of the most eminent lawyers, of members of both branches of the legal profession, solicitors as well as barristers, and they have unanimously condemned the system of legal administration in this country. That has been lying on the Table of this House for three years. The Commissioners recommended that we should do away with the extraordinary higgledy-piggledy system which now prevails in our jurisprudence, and they recommended the establishment of a Supreme Court of First Instance. They also testified to the fact that we have the ablest administrators hampered by the worst system that ever cursed a country, and that we have the greatest expenditure in our legal system to produce the most unfortunate results that are anywhere to be found. Having got the Reports of the Judicature Commission as to the Courts of First Instance, as to the Courts of Appeal, and as to the County Courts, what have we done? Nothing. Are these the dry details which the Chancellor of the Exchequer says that people may have too much of? And what are the efforts that have been made to carry out law reforms? I can hardly call what took place in the House of Lords an effort, for nobody expected that to succeed. The Government should come forward in a different spirit to that they have evinced this evening, and bring the ability that they can command in their Law Officers to bear, so that they may deal with a question of this magnitude, for they would at least have as much chance of carrying such a measure, as they have of carrying some of their other measures. The Chancellor of the Exchequer said that this question of appointing a Minister of Justice cannot be dealt with apart from the question of the position of the Lord Chancellor, and no doubt it cannot; but this Motion deals with only one part of a great question. I know quite well that all efforts of private Members have failed and must fail; and all my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton hopes to do is to stimulate the House to protest against the existing system. I know the question of a Minister of Justice cannot be settled except by dealing with the position of the Law Officers, including the Lord Chancellor, which like many things which have come down to us from antiquity, is wholly indefensible. That the head of the judicial Bench should go in and out of office with the Government; that there are men whom we would choose for the office who are excluded by its conditions; and that it involves a mixture of incongruous functions are matters the reform of which no amount of ridicule can long postpone; and it is only by attracting public attention to them that any pressure can be put upon the Government to deal with them in a practical way. I feel that any scheme dealing with the present question, to be at all satisfactory to the country, must be far larger in its scope than that embraced in the Motion of my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton. It must comprehend not only the reconstruction of the duties of the Law Officers of the Crown, but those of the Lord Chancellor, and probably of the Judges themselves. I look upon it as a matter highly deserving of consideration, when there are acknowledged delays, causing infinite mischief and expense, the cause of infinite injustice, and I think that I and those who take a similar view should protest, as far as in us lies, against the continuance of such a state of things. The question of the appointment of a Minister of Justice, so far from being a subject fit for ridicule, is one, I think, which is of a very serious and practical character. More ought, I believe, to be done to separate judicial from political action in that House, and the present state of legislation is, I cannot help thinking, a scandal to any civilized Assembly. Statutes are passed Session after Session of a character so conflicting as to astonish, I will not say lawyers, but men of common sense. There is a Commission employed in repealing the statutes; but, like Penelope's web, as the Commission is trying to unravel the web at one end it is woven at the other, so that the Commission pant after Parliament in vain. I am not prepared myself to deal with the question with the thoroughness which I could desire; but I cannot sit down with entering my earnest protest against matters of such consequence being treated by a responsible Government in the tone in which they have been treated this evening.

MR. SERJEANT SHERLOCK

said, he thought the delays and mischiefs which had been spoken of could not be of a very urgent nature, seeing that the hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. Fawcett) would allow such evils to continue until the present Law Officers retired. He also wished to remind the House that the present Law Officers of the Government had no personal pecuniary interest in the Motion, because the hon. Member for Brighton did not attempt to interfere with them, and the alteration proposed would only affect their successors. It was said that it was part of the duty of the Law Officers to be the Advisers of the Crown; but so long as these appointments were party appointments, it could not be expected that the professional views of the Law Officers should not be regarded with some jealousy. The hon. Member for Brighton had admitted that there was too much legislation already, and there was therefore a general concurrence in the view that there was no pressing necessity for law reform as contrasted with measures for which the demand of the country was louder. If the question at issue was one involving the appointment of a Minister of Justice, the observations of the hon. Gentleman might, be important; but as it was his Motion would lead to no immediate practical result, except, perhaps, it might be to the flooding of the House with measures of law reform, to the exclusion of other business.

MR. STAVELEY HILL

said, he was prepared to admit that there might be some convenience in the establishment of a High Court of Appeal and in the removal of certain antiquated modes of procedure, but doubted whether any practical advantage would result from the presence in Parliament of a Minister of Justice. As far as the first part of the Preamble of the Motion of the hon. Member for Brighton was concerned, he maintained that it was not proved that any inconvenience arose from there being in Parliament no Minister of Justice; and as for the second part of the Preamble, that there should be in the House some one able to give his undivided attention to the various legal questions affecting the administration of Public Business, he asked whether, on the other hand, it was not necessary to have in that House, for the purpose of conducting the business of the Government, persons of the greatest eminence at the Bar, and who could command the attention of the highest Courts of Justice in conducting the business of the Government in the Courts of Law? Another part of the business of the Law Officers was to advise the Government, and if any hon. Member rose to ask a question as to an Act of Parliament on a proceeding in a Court of Law, Ministers of the highest talent might give an answer; but everybody knew that the answer would come with much more force from a lawyer accustomed to deal with such matters. There was nothing in the present system to prevent law reforms being carried out, for what would be the use of the Law Officers of the House if they could not give their attention to the various questions affecting public business? They must have two persons of the highest powers, able to conduct the business of the Government, so far as all legal matters were concerned; and a field of choice was likely to be left open as long as so many distinguished lawyers were ready to sacrifice emoluments in order to secure the honour of a seat in that House.

MR. HINDE PALMER

said, that no hon. Member in that House more felt the necessity of law reform than himself, and if by voting for the Motion of the hon. Member for Brighton he thought that he should be promoting law reform, he should not hesitate to support the motion; but he regretted he could not do so, for he saw nothing in it calculated in the slightest degree to advance law reform. Although favoured with a position in the most gracious Speech from the Throne, as a subject in which amendment was greatly required, yet the reason why measures of law reform were not carried into effect was on account of the disinclination of the House to entertain measures of that description, because hon. Members thought that there were other measures of a more practical character which ought first to engage their attention. He made these remarks because, after the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. V. Harcourt), he should not like it to go forth that any one voting against the Motion was desirous of obstructing law reform. He did not regard the hon. and learned Member's criticism, of the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer as fair, for he did not think that the Chancellor of the Exchequer intended to cast the slightest ridicule on law reform. What he understood the Chancellor of the Exchequer to ridicule was the imbecility of the proposal of the hon. Member for Brighton for the accomplishment of the law reform which that hon. Member desired to effect. That he understood to be the tone and spirit of the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who, far from attempting to ridicule progress in the way of law reform, was well known among law reformers for his desire for the improvement of the law. But what was it that the House was really called on to do by the hon. Member for Brighton? It was to place an obstruction in the way of all those measures of legal reform which would be facilitated by altering the mode of paying the Law Officers by means of fees, and among the measures impeded by that mode of remuneration was the reform of the Patent Laws, a subject upon which he would not dilate upon the present occasion. The hon. Member for Brighton wanted a Minister of Justice, in order that Acts of Parliament might come before the House in a more perfect state than they did. But how was a Minister of Justice to prepare Acts of Parliament so as to prevent them from being imperfect, seeing that the Amend- ments introduced into clauses in the passage of a Bill through the House often left the clauses less clear than they were? He opposed this Motion as one which would do more harm than good if adopted, and while doing so he strongly protested against being characterized as one who disregardèd the advantages of law reform.

MR. STRAIGHT

said, he must confess he had felt some difficulty in clearly understanding the object of the Motion, and he attributed that difficulty to the ungrammatical structure of the proposition itself. If the meaning was that the offices of Attorney and Solicitor General should be abolished, he certainly could not support such a proposal; and if it was meant that a Minister of Justice should be appointed, he must say that was a very large question, which would require a much wider discussion than could be given to it upon the present occasion. A great deal had been said about law reform; but why did not those who spoke so much about it take the trouble to bring forward some measures of law reform? It was very easy to make long speeches before Social Science meetings; but why did not the advocates of law reform do something to show the House what they really wanted? After all that had been said by his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Oxford (Mr. V. Harcourt), it really was very natural for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to be somewhat jubilant, having made a bargain by which the public were gainers to the extent of £12,000 a-year. Probably the public were all of one mind on the subject. The Attorney and Solicitor General, perhaps, were not quite of the same opinion—they had been very quiet during the evening, and their reticence might to some extent be due to that fact. He objected to discuss a large subject like this on an abstract Motion, for he thought in so doing they might be led into a great deal of mischief. He was anxious for law reform; and if at any time the hon. Member for Brighton was disposed to bring forward some practical measure of law reform—such as a proposal to amend the machinery of the law in reference to small debts and the like, or in reference to public prosecutors—he should be happy to assist him.

MR. DENMAN

said, in common with most of the hon. Members who had addressed the House upon this subject, he considered the Motion a most unfounded one. It was a complete non sequitur. It recited certain supposed evils, and went on to propose what would be no remedy for them—what, indeed, had no relation to them, and what would be an evil in itself. He, for instance, did not think it was true to say that inconvenience had resulted in that House from the inability of the Law Officers to do all they could reasonably be called on to do, looking to the functions they had to perform; and he could not see that those functions could be remodelled to any extent without impairing the high position they held, and their usefulness by reason of holding that high position. They must be lawyers of the highest eminence, and they must be Members of that House, for it was only by passing through a Parliamentary training that they could fill the highest situations of the law with that efficiency with which they ought to be filled. It had been said that it was the duty of the Law Officers to advise the House in questions of law; but he must say he had often wished that they had been more reticent in their opinions, given on questions put to them by private Members in that House. They were the Law Advisers not of the House, but of the Government, and were responsible for the opinions they gave. He repeated, he could not support this most inconsecutive Motion; and he did not think the Chancellor of the Exchequer could be blamed for treating it with something like levity. In these dull times, and in such hot weather, there was no reason why a man should not speak truth, and laugh while speaking it.

MR. RAIKES

said, that he should give the Motion his cordial support. There had existed some confusion in the minds of some hon. Gentlemen as to what the functions of a Minister of Justice ought to be. He supposed that one of his duties would be to prepare measures of law reform, and to advocate them in Parliament; that he would also appoint the magistracy, and be responsible for its proceedings; and that he would likewise advise the Crown as to the exercise of the prerogative of mercy. At present the distribution of those various duties was very anomalous. The Lord Chancellor was supposed to have charge of law reform; the Home Secretary advised the Crown as to the exercise of the prerogative of mercy; and the Attorney and Solicitor General were required in that House to advocate law reforms, in the preparation of which they might not have been consulted, and to which they were sometimes strongly averse. It seemed to him that the right hon. Gentleman had been guilty of an unusual piece of effrontery in rising in his place and defending such a system; but that he supposed was explained by the fact that the present Government had been distinguished by a spirit of perverse parsimony in relation to the administration of the law. What had been their conduct in regard to the office of Queen's Advocate? The ground on which the Government of the day defended their course in respect to the escape of the Alabama, which had caused all these recent troubles, was, that the then Queen's Advocate was not in a position to advise them on that occasion. However, the Government seemed to consider a time when they most required his counsel to be an opportunity for saving the entire salary of the Queen's Advocate, and had also cut down the salaries of the Attorney and Solicitor General; and now they had to go out into the walks of the profession for an eminent lawyer to represent them at Geneva. The fees they would have to pay, and very properly, to so distinguished a counsel, would, he ventured to say, more than counterbalance the economy effected by the reductions to which he had referred. Yet the Chancellor of the Exchequer told them that the saving of £12,000 a-year was to debar the House from considering that Resolution, the recitals contained in which were accepted, not only by many in that House, but by the almost unanimous feeling of people out of doors.

MR. A. W. YOUNG

said, he had known the Chancellor of the Exchequer both at the other end of the world and in this country, and he believed that no good measure of law reform had ever been introduced into that House which the right hon. Gentleman had not supported; while in the Colonies he was the most celebrated law reformer of his day. The Resolution of the hon. Member for Brighton would prevent the Government from having the choice of the highest legal talent of the country, a result he, for one, should be sorry to see.

MR. GLADSTONE

Sir, for my own part—and I believe I may also say for my Colleagues—I should not be unwilling to go at once to a division on this question, having reference either to the general tone and purport of this debate, or more especially to the answer given by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer to the speech of the Mover of this Motion. But I certainly should not be content that it should be supposed that we are prepared to acquiesce for a moment in the description given of my right hon. Friend's speech by the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. V. Harcourt)—a description which I think was very inequitable, as well as very inaccurate. I was glad to see the objection that there was something of humour and wit introduced into the discussion by my right hon. Friend met by a lively protest from various parts of the House. We are not, I think, in much danger of losing the balance of the mind and judgment of the House through the enormous and intolerable redundancy of those qualities: on the contrary, it is supposed by some that the Goddess of Dulness, with leaden wings, is more apt to brood over our deliberations. We have even known the hon. and learned Member for Oxford himself, on propitious occasions, endeavour to bring his artillery of that kind into the field when circumstances favoured. But the hon. and learned Member, in his zeal for law, has a little forgotten justice. As regards the Government at large, were the charges of the hon. and learned Member fair? What is the exact purport of the Motion on which we are called to vote? The practical and operative part of it is— That it is inexpedient that the Treasury Minute should continue in operation beyond the time when the present Law Officers of the Crown remain in office. The hon. and learned Member for Oxford says it is not a fair representation of the Motion to quote these words; but that it is really a Motion that the Treasury Minute should be cancelled in order that the whole subject may be re-considered. If these words, "in order that the whole subject may be reconsidered" be part of the Motion, they are written in invisible ink. But even if these words were there, would they mend the matter? Is it really true that plans of the large description which the hon. and learned Member desires—and which as regards some important plans I think he is right in desiring—would it be true to say that this Minute ought to be abolished in order that the Government may produce those plans? What is the real difficulty in the way of the introduction of measures of law reform? It is not the want of ability or of readiness to prepare them; it is the crippled position of this House—crippled, I mean, relatively to the enormous other demands on its time and attention. What measure of law reform is there that we could have introduced to the House with a fair prospect of doing justice to it by carrying it into law. The hon. Member for Brighton does not adopt the enlargement of the terms of his Motion as suggested by the hon. and learned Member for Oxford. His complaint against the Government is, that we have too much legislation—that we submit to the House measures greater in number and magnitude than can possibly be passed. If that be so, why does the hon. and learned Member for Oxford think it worthy of him to enter into these complaints—unjust towards the Government and futile as regards the House—that we have no measures of law reform passed in this House? He knows that it is the duty of the Government to prepare from year to year, and to introduce into the House, those measures which are the subjects of the liveliest and most pressing public interest, and which, in the view of the public opinion of the country, are most urgently demanded. But more than that, the hon. Member for Brighton has pointed to no great measure submitted to the House by the Government which ought to have been cast aside in order to deal with this question of law reform. Therefore the accusation, whether against the Chancellor of the Exchequer or against the Government, is wholly devoid of foundation. The Motion further suggests that— It would be inexpedient for the Treasury Minute relating to the remuneration of the Law Officers of the Crown to continue in operation beyond the time when the present Law Officers of the Crown should remain in office. Now, that as it stands would land us in a difficulty if it were carried. In the course of affairs it does not usually happen that the Attorney General and Solicitor General pass out of office together; but the Motion appears to be framed upon the supposition that they are political twins, born into the world at the same moment, and likewise passing out of it at the same moment. Supposing the ordinary state of things to prevail, and if it were the misfortune of the Government to lose the present Attorney General before they lost the Solicitor General, I will call the attention of the House to the singularity of the fate which will attend the destiny of the present Solicitor General. The present Solicitor General has the honour of being the first Law Officer who has come into office on the reduced scale. According to the Motion of the hon. Member, if the House passes it, the Treasury Minute will cease to exist; and, supposing the Government were thereupon to lose the Attorney General, the Solicitor General would be promoted to the post, and his successor would be appointed upon the old scale of remuneration. The present Solicitor General will then enjoy the new and accumulated honour of being the first low-paid Attorney General with a high-paid Solicitor General. That would be the practical result of the Motion as it stands upon the Paper. But I am anxious to call attention to a matter which is very imperfectly understood, but which should be made plain in justice to all Law Officers. An impression has gone abroad that it is only a limited portion of the time of the Attorney and Solicitor General that the Government secures. I am not surprised that the impression should exist, seeing how distinguished a part the Law Officers usually bear in conducting the business of the Courts; but, after a very long experience in many Governments and in association with many sets of Law Officers, I find it difficult to conceive of a misconception more complete. Enormous as are the powers of labour generally displayed by our distinguished lawyers, there is no question as to the relative nature of the claims upon their time. There is a limit to their powers of exertion and to their time; but upon that limited quantity the Government is authorized and entitled to draw—and does draw habitually—without any stint whatever, except what is dictated by a regard for human strength. The Government pays no regard whatever to the demands of the private practice of the Attorney or Solicitor General, and no Attorney or Solicitor General has power to obtain from the Government the slightest allowance on that account. My hon. Friend says we have not had the advice of the Attorney and Solicitor General in the matter of the Alabama negotiations. That is not a very good argument in support of his case, because Treaties cannot be dealt with as a matter in which legal advice is required at every turn; but we have had no difficulty in obtaining the advice of my hon. and learned Friends whenever we required it in connection with the negotiations between this country and the United States. I do not believe that the whole of our administrative history affords a single example of the Government being in a real difficulty from the want of legal assistance owing to the demands made upon the time of the Law Officers by their private practice. My hon. Friend thinks we have only the dregs and leavings of the time at the disposal of the Law Officers; but the fact that the Officers continue in private practice is a direct gain to the Government, because it is the means of preserving the freshness of their knowledge, and insuring that when we want their assistance it shall be not only complete as regards learning and ability, but in accord with the thought and feeling which prevails at the moment when their opinion is given. It is easy to criticize the distribution of the duties appertaining more or less to the law among the various Members of the Government. Let it, however, be remembered that the administrative system of this country and the construction of the Executive Government is just as much a peculiar and characteristic part of our institutions, although not as vital and fundamental a part as the legislative system itself. And it is utterly impossible that any good can be done by mere piecemeal attempts to amend that which, if it is considered at all, must be considered as a whole. The hon. and learned Member for Oxford, indeed, has been careful to state that a Motion dealing with a portion only of this great question does not command his approval; he votes for the Motion as a protest against the existing state of things, and justifies himself by attaching a meaning to the Motion which it does not really convey. Many changes are required in our system of judicature which I hope will be seriously considered before attempts are made to alter the position of our Law Officers. The position of the Law Officers of this country has been decided by their character from generation to generation, and the fame which they have earned has been no scandal, but an honour and credit to the country. Who are the distinguished men that, as lawyers, have earned a name and place in the history of their country, and have lived to us through fame as a portion of our national patrimony? I do not know whether nine-tenths of them, but certainly very nearly the whole of them have been Law Officers of the Crown. I do not wish at all to enter into the particulars of this question; but I think it is a pity that the efforts of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the remuneration of the Law Officers, should have been disparaged, and that attempts should have been made to thwart those efforts by Motions such as that now before the House. The hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. Fawcett) has given Notice that he will invite the House to deliver judgment upon the terms of his Motion. I believe that he will find no large proportion disposed to accompany him upon those terms; but if he should, it is not merely in our interest as a Government, not merely in the interest of all those who will vote with us on this occasion, but it is in the interest of law reform that I feel bound to utter an emphatic protest against the assumption that those who are unwilling to adopt this crude, most impolitic, and most mischievous proposition are therefore hostile or indifferent or lukewarm in the matter of an amendment of the law.

Question put.

The House divided:—Ayes 101; Noes 24: Majority 77.