ion through
centuries of deliberately adopted regulations, interwoven and overlaid
with unwritten custom, the code of procedure by which the conduct of
business in the House of Commons is governed is indeed intricate (p. 139)
and forbidding. Lord Palmerston admitted that he never fully mastered
it, and Gladstone was not infrequently an inadvertent offender against
the "rules of the House." Prior to the nineteenth century the rules
were devised, as is pointed out by Anson, with two objects in view: to
protect the House from hasty and ill-considered action pressed forward
by the king's ministers, and to secure fair play between the parties
in the chamber and a hearing for all. It was not until 1811 that
business of the Government was permitted to obtain recognized
precedence on certain days; but the history of the procedure of the
Commons since that date is a record of (1) the general reduction of
the time during which private members may indulge in the discussion of
subjects or measures lying outside the Government's legislative
programme, (2) increasing limitation of the opportunity for raising
general questions at the various stages of Government business, and
(3) the cutting down of the time allowed for discussing at all the
projects to which the Government asks the chambers' assent.[204]

[Footnote 204: Anson, Law and Custom of the
Constitution, I., 253.]

*146. Rules.*--The rules governing debate and decorum are not only
elaborate but, in some instances, of great antiquity. In so far as
they have been reduced to writing they may be said to comprise (1)
"standing orders" of a permanent character, (2) "sessional orders,"
operative during a session only, and (3) "general orders,"
indeterminate in respect to period of application. In the course of
debate all remarks are addressed to the Speaker and in the event that
the floor is desired by more than one member it rests with the Speaker
to designate, with scrupulous impartiality, who shall have it. When a
"division" is in progress and the doors are closed members speak
seated and covered, but at all other times they speak standing and
uncovered. A speech may not be read from manuscript, and it is within
the competence of the Speaker not only to warn a member against
irrelevance or repetition but to compel him to terminate his
remarks.[205] A member whose conduct is reprehensible may be ordered
to withdraw and, upon vote of the Ho