On the record
The passions of its members are its rulers; the law-making faculty, the most comprehensive of the imperial faculties, is its instrument; it will take the administration if it can take it.
Said by
Walter Bagehot
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gutenberg.orgWalter Bagehot: “The passions of its members are its rulers; the law-making faculty, the most comprehensive of the imperial faculties, is…”
Editor's note · Context
Bagehot describes the dynamics of a legislative body and its tendency to seek control over administration.
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More from Walter Bagehot
It is natural that those who by special and admirable culture have come to look at all things upon the artistic side, should start back from these queer peculiarities.
Just so the lines of our Constitution were framed in old eras of sparse population, few wants, and simple habits; and we adhere in seeming to their shape, though civilisation has come with its dangers, complications, and enjoyments.
I own that I do not entirely sympathise with the horror of these anomalies which haunts some of our best critics.
These anomalies, in a hundred instances, mark the old boundaries of a constitutional struggle.
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