44 THE TREATY OF WASHINGTON. 
Great Britain. I think the absolute reverse of all 
this is the truth. 
In Great Britain the political institutions of the 
country are indefinite, unwritten, unfixed, without a 
positive stand-point any where, shifting from day to 
day; consisting, in form, of Kings, Lords, and Com. 
mons, without any visible lines of limitation between 
them, and resolved to-day into an omnipotent Parlia- 
ment, one branch of which, the House of Commons, 
arrogates to itself the character of a constituent na- 
tional convention to impose on King and Lords any 
change in the national institutions it sees fit, and as- 
suming to itself the function, by means of a guasé 
committee of its body, to control absolutely the ad- 
ministration, both foreign and domestic, of Great 
Britain. 
This quasi committee of the House of Commons, 
to be sure, has associated with it another guas? com- 
mittee of the House of Lords: which, all together, 
formerly called Ministers of the Crown, now take to 
themselves, in the very text of treaties as well as in 
domestic affairs, the revolutionary title of the “ Brit- 
ish Government.” 
But, while the theoretical power of the Crown is 
nominally exercised by a joint committee of both 
Houses of Parliament, it is vested, in fact, in the com- 
mittee of the House of Commons, which, upon all oc- 
casions, whether of ordinary administrative matters 
or of the frequently recurring radical changes in the 
political institutions of the country, constantly and 
loudly defies and overbears the House of Lords. 
