where, at the
instance of Lord Morley, a small official majority has been retained
which Lord Minto himself was willing to dispense with, there will no
longer be any official majority. The regulations determining the
electorates and the mode of election have been framed with praiseworthy
elasticity in accordance with local requirements, and care has been
taken to provide as far as possible for an adequate representation of
all the most important communities and interests. In view of the
manifold and profound lines of cleavage which exist in Indian society,
it is extremely improbable that all the elected members will ever
combine against the official minority except in such rare and improbable
cases as might produce an absolute consensus of Indian opinion, and in
such cases it is even more improbable that Government would ignore so
striking a manifestation. Nevertheless, as a safeguard against the
possibility of factious opposition, the right of veto has been reserved
to the Provincial Executives and in the last resort to the
Governor-General in Council.

Thus the Indian Councils Act of 1909 cannot be said to have actually
modified the position of the Indian Legislatures. With regard to the
most important of them--viz., the Imperial Council--Lord Morley was
careful to make this perfectly clear in his despatch of November 27,
1908, in which he reviewed the proposals put forward in the Government
of India despatch of October 1. "It is an essential condition of the
reform policy," the Secretary of State wrote, "that the Imperial
supremacy should in no degree be compromised. I must therefore regard it
as essential that your Excellency's Council, in its legislative as well
as in its executive character, should continue to be so constituted as
to ensure its constant and uninterrupted power to fulfil the
constitutional obligation that it owes, and must always owe, to his
Majesty's Government and to the Imperial Parliament." The Indian
Executive therefore remains, as hitherto, responsible only to the
Imperial Government at home, and the Imperial Council can exercise over
it no directly controlling power. The same holds good, _mutatis
mutandis_, of the Provincial Executives and their Councils.

Indirectly, however, the Indian Councils Act of 1909 materially modifies
the relations between the Legislative Councils and the Executive by
giving to elected and non-official members opportunities which they have
never enjoyed before o