and of partisan measures, involves the nation in a serious loss, for the
time and energy of a Parliament may be largely consumed in revising and
correcting, if not in reversing the partisan legislation of its
predecessor. Thus, a considerable portion of the time of the Parliament
of 1906-1909 was spent in attempting to reverse the policies embodied in
the Education and Licensing Acts of the preceding Parliament.

_Loss of prestige by the House of Commons._

Apart, however, from speculation as to the effect of false electoral
methods on the development of public affairs, the serious divergences
between representation and polling strength, to which attention has been
directed in the previous chapter, must tend to the weakening of the
authority and prestige of the House of Commons. Should a Government,
misled by the composition of the "representative" House, make use of
its majority in that House for the passage of measures not really
desired by the country, and should the House of Lords, reformed or not,
guess rightly that the decisions of the Commons were contrary to the
popular will, then inevitably the position of the House of Lords would
be strengthened as compared with that of the Commons. "A House of
Commons which does not represent," said a leading Liberal journal, "may
stand for less in the country than the House of Lords, or the Crown, and
its influence will infallibly decline in proportion. One has only to
take up an old volume of Bagehot to confirm one's suspicions that the
imperfections of electoral machinery, combined with the changes in the
character of the electorate, are already threatening to undermine the
real sources of the nation's power."[1] Sir Frederick Pollock has
declared that our defective electoral system may "yield a House of
Commons so unrepresentative in character as to cease to command the
respect and obedience of citizens."[2]