Parliament's Week

The Lords:

P: Sympathized with the 6y-year-old Baron Buckmaster of Cheddington, a sponsor of the Liquor Control Bill, when he received a savage tongue-lashing from the 56-year-old Earl of Birkenhead, famed Secretary of State for India.

"The noble lord," sneered the sarcastic Earl, "has condemned the present management of public houses in London on the basis of his penetrating observation. . . . I am not interested in the noble lord's personal perambulations of the metropolis. The noble lord happened to be in a neighborhood of wretched public houses, full of disorderly people. Every man chooses his promenade.

"I have not happened to find myself in such a neighborhood recently "At his age the noble lord ought not to borrow from the ebullitions of the younger peers."

P: Chuckled wickedly when a crimson blush of shame suffused the countenance of the young Edward Southwell Russell, Baron de Clifford. His mother-in-law, Mrs. Kate Merrick, "Queen of London Night Club Keepers," has been sentenced to six months in jail for selling liquor after hours. Therefore the young Lord blushed and visibly perspired when the scathing Earl of Birkenhead remarked: "We hear of Peers denouncing drinking in the slums. But they seldom say a word about the evil caused by night clubs ... in connection with which the mother-in-law of two members of Your Lordship's House recently incurred the public censure of the courts" (TIME, July 2).

The other son-in-law of Mrs. Kate ("Mother") Merrick is the Earl of Kinnoull. He, shameless, did not blush.

The Commons:

P: Lavished most of the week on the Finance Bill, debating for 16 hours and finally approving a tax on "buttons imported for fastening purposes."

P: Received their chief vicarious thrill of the week when David Lloyd George delivered before the Welsh Church Union in London a fiery and thoroughgoing reprimand to Christians.

"Christian monarchs, statesmen, and soldiers were responsible for the World War!" cried Mr. George. "The blame does not rest on pagans, infidels, agnostics or atheists! . . .

"I say--as British Minister* when the World War broke out--that if all the churches in Christendom had said in 1914, 'Halt. This murder must not begin,' not a monarch nor minister in Christendom would have dared start it.

"You have now the declaration of one Christian country to other Christian countries on the outlawry of war. They are all going to sign. And the same people who are going to sign will attend meetings of cabinets in America, in Great Britain, in France and throughout the world to determine how to spend millions of dollars on the mechanism of slaughter. They are increasing their cruiser strength in America and here.

"If the Christian churches of the world united they could force disarmament. You never will get peace by declarations outlawing a war. What better declaration could there be than that of the galaxy of angels on Christmas morning:

"Peace among us; good will among men.'

"That is better than anything Kellogg or Chamberlain ever said."

*When the War broke out Herbert Henry Asquith was British Prime Minister; David Lloyd George was Chancellor of the Exchequer.