nominating a large part of an Executive under these circumstances through a Committee. It is notorious that Committees are, or can be made, more easily accessible to intrigue than larger assemblies. The Chamber itself should be its own Committee for the selection of Ministers, on the recommendation of the President of the Council, with whom they would have to work. This provision still further removes the Executive from the control of the Chamber. And so the order of responsibility is inverted, which the plan of the Constitution elsewhere so constantly emphasises. For the People may at all times, by the Referendum and the Initiative, control the Legislature. But the Legislature cannot, under these provisions, at all times and so simply control the Executive. And so control fails just at the point where authority tends most to arrogate power to itself.
Incidentally, also, the Legislature loses what generally has proved its greatest source of strength. For the best informed critics of any Chamber are those who once were Ministers, who appreciate the responsibility of Ministers, and who temper their words as members with their knowledge and experience. But, under these provisions, a member who is appointed as one of the external Ministers ceases to be a Member. If he therefore finds it incumbent on him to resign, because of disagreement with his colleagues of the Executive (Inner or Outer), he ceases to be both a Minister and a Member, and his service and knowledge are lost to the Chamber—not to speak of the loss of detailed information on the cause of the particular issue of his resignation, on which the Chamber may wish enlightenment. Indeed, such a provision as this seems peculiarly arbitrary and meaningless.
There is, indeed, much virtue in the liberty of the Chamber to appoint as Ministers persons who may be specially qualified, but who may not be members. In the jostle at the hustings to enter a Chamber of but two hundred members it is unlikely that the best ability would always succeed, if it were so much as willing to share the
