The British constitution rarely changes in dramatic leaps. More often it shifts incrementally, one reform at a time, until the cumulative effect is profound.
The latest reform removing the remaining hereditary lords from Parliament’s House of Lords may appear modest in that a few dukes, earls, and marquesses won’t be present at the State Opening of Parliament, the British equivalent to the president’s State of the Union.
In reality, the reform represents the next step in a radical transformation that could eventually make Parliament resemble something far more dysfunctional: Congress.
CONGRESS WASN’T DESIGNED TO WORK THIS WAY
The United Kingdom has long benefited from a constitutional arrangement that avoids the worst democratic excesses. The House of Commons is the democratically elected chamber. In the modern era, governments are formed there. As a result, political accountability ultimately rests there.
The House of Lords plays a different role. It scrutinizes legislation, revises bills, and occasionally delays legislation it believes to be poorly drafted or ill-considered. But it lacks the mandate of the House of Commons. The distinction between a democratically elected chamber and an editing chamber is not merely procedural.
The push to remove hereditary lords is based on the argument that legislative power should not be inherited by accident of birth. Yet the deeper question is what follows next.
Once hereditary lords disappear, pressure for an elected upper house of Parliament inevitably intensifies. And once the House of Lords, or whatever the chamber is called, becomes elected, Britain will find itself confronting the same structural problem that cripples governance in Washington.
Two democratic chambers inevitably produce two democratic mandates.
In the United States, this dynamic was not originally built into the Constitution. The House of Representatives was designed to represent the people with members directly elected from constituencies of equal population. Meanwhile, the Senate was intended to represent the states with senators appointed by state legislatures.
Everything changed in 1913, when the Constitution was amended to require each state’s two senators to be directly elected on a statewide basis. That change more than a century ago has had a profound impact.
Today, both houses of Congress claim equal democratic legitimacy. Each represents “the people.” Add partisan polarization and complicated procedural rules, particularly in the Senate, as the filibuster effectively requires 60 votes to pass legislation, and the result is endless paralysis.
Major legislation dies between the House of Representatives and the Senate. Even passing something as simple as a budget fails. Instead, the budget becomes a showdown, with the government often shutting down until continuing resolutions are passed to extend funding.
Westminster’s strength lies in clarity of authority. Voters choose a government through elections to the House of Commons. That government, if it maintains the confidence of the House of Lords, can implement its platform. Introduce elections to the House of Lords, and the balance of power shifts dramatically.
Members of an elected upper chamber would not consider themselves subordinate. Why should they? If they too possess a democratic mandate, they will claim equal legitimacy.
A government defeated in the House of Lords could argue that the House of Commons represents the people. Members of the other place could respond that their own mandate represents the public just as much, particularly if their constituencies are larger in geographic size and greater in the number of voters or constructed to represent the nations of the realm.
The consequences would be predictable. Different parties or coalitions of parties could control each chamber. Legislative gridlock would become routine. Governments might find their platform blocked not by voters but by paralysis.
What is currently an editing chamber would become a rival body.
Removing hereditary lords satisfies a modernizing instinct, but it also strips away one of the subtle features that help maintain restraint.
None of this is to argue that the House of Lords is perfect. It is large, unwieldy, and unquestionably eccentric.
But constitutional reform is rarely as simple as it first appears. Moreover, it can take years for unintended consequences to emerge.
Britain should think carefully before further dismantling a parliamentary system that, for all its quirks, has largely spared Westminster the paralysis that defines Washington.
Dennis Lennox (@dennislennox) is a political commentator and public affairs consultant.
