Commonwealth Act says that when the Chambers differ they shall meet
together, and that the majority shall decide, measures being taken,
however, that the numbers of the Upper Chamber shall not be such as
to swamp the opinion of the Lower Chamber. Imitating them, and
following in their footsteps, we have adopted such a plan in the
Transvaal and Orange River Colony Constitutions.

The Leader of the Opposition asked us yesterday whether the people are
not often wrong, and he proceeded characteristically to suggest that
he always considered them wrong when they voted against him. I am not
prepared to take such a rough-and-ready test of the opinion and of the
mental processes of the British democracy as that. I should hesitate
to say that when the people pronounce against a particular measure or
Party they have not pretty good reasons for doing so. I am not at all
convinced that in 1900 the electors were wrong in saying that the war
should be finished--by those who made it. Even in the last election I
could, I daresay, find some few reasons to justify the decision which
the people then took; and if we should be so unfortunate in the future
as to lose that measure of public confidence now abundantly given to
us, then I shall not be too sure that it will not be our own fault.
Certain am I that we could not take any step more likely to forfeit
the confidence of the people of England, than to continue in office
after we have lost the power to pass effective legislation.

I will retort the question of the Leader of the Opposition by another
question. Has the House of Lords ever been right? Has it ever been
right in any of the great settled controversies which are now beyond
the reach of Party argument? Was it right in delaying Catholic
emancipation and the removal of Jewish disabilities? Was it right in
driving this country to the verge of revolution in its effort to