d all must be
identified with the party in power, or, at the least, with an allied
political group. There was a time, when the personal government of the
king was yet a reality, when the House of Commons refused to admit to
its membership persons who held office under the crown, and this
disqualification found legal expression as late as the Act of
Settlement of 1701.[92] With the ripening of parliamentary government
in the eighteenth century, however, the thing that once had been
regarded properly enough as objectionable became a matter of
unquestionable expediency, if not a necessity. When once the ministers
comprised the real executive of the nation it was but logical that
they should be authorized to appear on the floor of the two houses to
introduce and advocate measures and to explain the acts of the
government. Ministers had occupied regularly seats in the upper
chamber, and not only was all objection to their occupying seats in
the lower chamber removed, but by custom it came to be an inflexible
rule that cabinet officers, and indeed the ministers generally, should
be drawn exclusively from the membership of the two houses.[93] (p. 068)
Under provision of an act of 1707 it is still obligatory upon
commoners who are tendered a cabinet appointment, with a few
exceptions, to vacate their seats and to offer themselves to their
constituents for re-election. But re-election almost invariably
follows as a matter of course and without opposition.[94] It is to be
observed that there are two expedients by which it is possible to
bring into the cabinet a desirable member who at the time of his
appointment does not possess a seat in Parliament. The appointee may
be created a peer; or he may stand for election to the Commons and,
winning, qualify himself for a cabinet post.

[Footnote 92: The clause of this measure which bore
upon the point in hand was repealed, however,
before it went into operation.]

[Footnote 93: The one notable instance in which
this rule has been departed from within the past
seventy-five years was Gladstone's tenure of the
post of Secretary of State for the Colonies during
the last six months of the Peel administration in
1846.]

[Footnote 94: On the reasons for the requirement of
re-elect