Bribery-by-Belly?

There is a wind all around the world that whispers to politicians what bills will pass, what bills will fail, long before votes are counted. It sighed in the round pink ear of the Rt. Hon. Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill last week, and told him that, despite his burning Tory opposition, the Reform Bill, granting a considerable measure of self government to India, was very close to passage. But all his life the Rt. Hon. Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill has been a fighter. Sprawled on the front row Ministers' Bench last week he suddenly arose and addressed the Speaker.

"Sir," said he, "I rise to a point of privilege. I claim a, violation of Sessional Order No. 4."

Like a great swarm of bees, the House of Commons suddenly buzzed into life. No institution in the world is so jealous of its prerogatives as the British House, where neither king nor peers may enter without due permission. Sessional Order No. 4:

If it shall appear that any person has been tampering with any witness in respect to any evidence to be given in this House or in committee thereof, or directly or indirectly, has endeavored to defeat or hinder any person from giving evidence, the same is declared to be a High Crime and Misdemeanor, and the House will proceed with the utmost severity against such offender.

To wreck the Indian Reform Bill, Tory Churchill was counting heavily on the report of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce relative to British exports of cotton to the Far East and the menace of Japanese rivalry. The report when it finally broke "turned out to be only a feeble pop.

The High Crime and Misdemeanor that Tory Churchill charged last week was that, before this report was presented, Sir Samuel Hoare, Secretary of State for India, and the rotund Earl of Derby, member of the parliamentary committee on Indian reform, had invited the Manchester men to dinner at Lord Derby's London house, had filled them full of soft words, turtle soup and tawny port, had persuaded them to rewrite the report that they were about to submit.

Fundamentally this seemed no great crime. Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover were never accused of bribery-by-belly when they hauled hollow-eyed politicians out of bed to attend early breakfasts at the White House and listen to Presidential persuasion. But Britain took the Churchill charge seriously. Grave under his wig, Speaker the Rt. Hon. Captain Edward Algernon Fitzroy allowed the resolution to be passed, without vote, to the Committee on Privilege for investigation.

"Let me point out." said he, "that in permitting the resolution to be introduced I am not agreeing that there has been a breach of Privilege, but merely ruling that the Right Honorable Member from Epping in Essex has made out a prima facie case to that effect."

Charged with chief responsibility for the famed Manchester dinner, Sir Samuel Hoare spoke sharply in his own defense.

"I welcome the chance," said he, "to prove once again that Mr. Churchill has found a mare's nest. Practically every one of the statements he has just made are without foundation. . . . Because of the unfortunate effect it would have upon negotiations in progress in India between a Lancashire cotton mill delegation and Indian cotton interests regarding the problem of Japanese competition, the Lancashire delegation cabled the Manchester committee from India to change its evidence."

Even so the committee on privilege assembled with snowy-crested Ramsay MacDonald as its chairman. In the House of Lords paunchy Lord Derby begged his peers' permission to testify before it. Should the charge be substantiated, the mildest punishment that the House can inflict will be to summon both Sir Samuel and Lord Derby to the Bar of the House, there to receive a good round scolding from the Speaker.

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