overnment of
India. The Act of 1919, it is true, transfers to the Indian Legislature
no direct or complete statutory control over revenue and expenditure,
and powers are still vested in the Government of India to override the
Assembly in cases of emergency and to enact supplies which it refuses if
the Governor-General in Council certifies them to be essential to the
peace, tranquillity, and interests of India. But the fact that there was
a deficit which could only be met by increased taxation offered
exceptional opportunities which might easily have been used for
embarrassing obstruction by a young and immature chamber naturally
concerned for its own popularity. Even a direct conflict between the
Government and the Assembly might not have been impossible, and the
consequences would have been lamentable. For if the Government of India
had been driven to use its statutory powers to impose taxation and
secure supplies in opposition to the Legislature during its very first
session, all the hopes of friendly co-operation based on the new
constitution would have been wrecked far more disastrously and
permanently than by any "Non-co-operation" movement. The Legislative
Assembly was wise enough to exercise its rights with sufficient
insistence to show that it was conscious of them, but never to strain
them. It did not refrain from criticism of almost every department in
turn or from motions to reduce the official estimates for them. Many of
the criticisms were sound, and some of the reductions were accepted by
Government. Mr. Hailey handled a delicate situation with unfailing
patience and skill. Even in regard to new taxation he endeavoured to
meet, as far as the exigencies of the Budget allowed, the objections of
the Assembly to such increases as, for instance, higher postal rates,
which press most heavily on the least well-to-do classes. Nothing,
however, helped him so much to get his Budget through without a serious
conflict as the decision of the Government to seek in an increase of the
import duties over two-thirds of the new revenue to be raised to meet
the deficit. For there Government took up common ground with Indian
opinion on fiscal matters and carried into effect the principle laid
down by the Select Joint Committee on the Reforms Bill, and endorsed by
the Secretary of State, that the Government of India must be granted the
same liberty to devise Indian tariff arrangements on a consideration of
Indian interests as al