PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :--
C.O. 882
9
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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What, then, is of the Executive Council are all members of the Legislative Council. the object of upholding a dignity which does not require to be upheld? The Governor himself sanctions it in the Legislative Council. It appears to me it would be better according to our notions of constitutional law that the word " praying" only be omitted. The section would stand otherwise quite correct and run smoothly without any further alteration whatever. The section now stands as follows.
Mr. RAMANATHAN then read the section with and without the word " praying," and said I simply say, Sir, that if the word praying, which really means nothing here, and which is absolutely needless, if that word be omitted on constitutional grounds upon which I object, would not apply. I, therefore, move the omission of the word praying in that section.
The Colonial Secretary replies.
Sir HUGH CLIFFORD: As Chairman of the Select Committee I should explain that this matter was discussed at some length before the Select Committee and my honour- able friend who has just spoken argued at that time that the word praying was objec- tionable on constitutional grounds. The matter was put to the vote, and I and all my colleagues on the Select Committee, with the exception of the honourable member, were in favour of the words standing-not, I think, because we attached much importance to the word so much as that we understood that at that time the honour- able member's chief contention was that the Governor of Ceylon was not the King's representative in this Colony, and it was that contention which we individually dis- puted and collectively declined to endorse. The matter is one the importance of which I am not prepared to discuss to-day. I must leave that to gentlemen learned in the law like the Attorney-General and my honourable friend who has just spoken.
Practical importance slight.
The actual practical importance, I think, is very slight. It only refers to rules which have been passed by the Governor in Council in moments of emergency, and which would have the force of law only until such time as this Council has had an opportunity of declaring upon them. The Council is declared to have complete power in that matter. It can annul or modify or amend the rules before it by a resolution; and if the Council wished to do so, it has then politely to request the Governor to give effect to its wishes and to declare the rules annulled, modified, or amended, according to the wishes of the Legislative Council. The section does not give the He is the authority who originally frames the Governor any option in the matter. rules, and it seems only polite to that framing authority that he should be requested or prayed to give effect to the modifications or to disallow it in accordance with the wishes of the Legislative Council. Personally, I have no strong feeling in the matter, and if honourable members consider it better to leave that out, I am perfectly ready to accept the proposal; but I do not think we should accept it on the grounds of the original contention that the Legislative Council should not address a prayer to the Governor because he is not the King's representative. That is something which I should be sorry to see subscribed to, and I do not think it is the general feeling or impression in all our Crown Colonies. I do not wish to press for the inclusion of the word, but if an amendment is to be made, I think the resolution should read deciding instead of praying; I do not think it will read well if we have no verb at all.
The Attorney-General.
The ATTORNEY-GENERAL said: I think the principle is perfectly clear, and it is apparent if honourable member will compare the two paragraphs. The first refers to rules, which, if I may say so, are made provisional. The Governor in Council does not make final rules, but makes rules subject to confirmation by the Council. In that paragraph there is no prayer. The rules have no force of law until they are sub- mitted to this Council and confirmed by them. The second paragraph relates to rules which are finally made and promulgated as part of the law of the land, and the word prayer is here appropriate, because the Council is asking the rule-making authority to annul the rule that was made. I think the honourable Ceylonese member was quite correct in one principle, and that is, that the same body which makes the laws should have the power to annul them. I do not think it would be proper that this Council should by a resolution annul a rule made by another body, the Governor in Executive Council. The proper body is the Governor himself. That is entirely in
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I do not accordance with the principles followed in the Imperial Legislature. know whether the clause in the Municipal Councils Ordinance, to which the honour- able member referred, is the first clause of this kind in our statute book. I am not in a position to say that without more exhaustive examination of the legislation of the past years, but in any case it is entirely in accordance with the models of the Imperial Legislature. There, when His Majesty in Council makes a rule, it can be annulled by His Majesty in Council upon an address being presented by the House of Commons. The word praying is used, and I trust the Council would prefer to follow the Imperial principle which it has adopted in the Municipal Councils Ordinance, and in two other Bills now before this Council, and in the Public Performances Ordinance passed by the Council at the last meeting. I cannot see that this Council loses in dignity by following the example of the House of Commons or by adopting a language of polite courtesy and courteous formality.
Pernicious heresy.
I
Mr. BOOTH: The Honourable the Colonial Secretary has stated that he had no
Personally, I have a very strong feeling. strong feeling in the matter. think it would be a very great mistake to give any countenance to what I can only call pernicious heresy, that His Excellency is not the representative It is really an important matter, of His Majesty the King in this Colony. because we know as a matter of fact His Excellency is regarded by every person in the Colony as the representative of His Majesty the King, and he is in fact the representative of the King. It is a position of great value, because the humblest villager derives great comfort from the feeling that he has, at the head of the Island, a representative of His Majesty the King. Therefore, I think it is of importance not so much on account of the actual use of the word, but on account of the indignation which will be involved, and which gives colour to this pernicious heresy.
The Defence.
Mr. RAMANATHAN said he had carefully avoided making any remark on the question as to whether the Governor was the representative of the King or not. He thought he would like to be relieved of the responsibility of stating in public what he felt himself free to state in the privacy of the sitting of a Committee. His honour- able friend, the Controller of Revenue, spoke of it being on his part, perhaps not intentionally, as an exemplification of a pernicious habit. Perhaps his honourable friend did not know that he was standing upon a well-known decision delivered by His Majesty's judges sitting in the Privy Council, and he was also standing upon a judg- ment delivered by their own Supreme Court. The judges in England and the judge of the Supreme Court in Ceylon, following that decision, had observed authoritatively that the Governor of a Crown Colony was not the representative of His Majesty the King. Could he act contemptuously towards His Majesty's judges in Privy Council or contemptuously of a judge of the Supreme Court in Ceylon? Were those judges, eminent in constitutional law, employees of His Majesty the King himself, doing anything pernicious in stating to the world at large, throughout the length and breadth of the British Empire, that the Governor of a Crown Colony was not the representative of the King? He submitted that his honourable friend had been carried away by his most laudable feelings of loyalty to His Excellency the Governor. The King as an Employer.
He appreciated that loyalty, and he, for one, would not yield one inch to him in regard to his being loyal to the Governor as the President of that Council and loyal to his King also. That being so, it seemed to him strange that his honourable friend should speak of popular opinion prevailing throughout Ceylon, and it was also strange to him to hear that he should not be supported in Ceylon by a large class of the people in regard to an opinion-an authoritative opinion expressed by His Majesty's judges themselves that the Governor was not the representative of the King. It was his duty to ask whence that proposition that the Governor of the Island was the representative of the King [came]. He knew where the doctrine came from. It was to be found in one of the rules made by the Secretary of State for the Colonies in regard to all employees of the King. His Majesty the King was not only their Sovereign Lord, but for purposes of Government he was an employer of labour that of different kinds. He was the greatest employer of labour. All the luminaries of his Empire delighted to serve him, and he, himself, the great, powerful personage he was, he might say the holy personage that he was acknowledged to be in every