ABSTRACT
The British House of Commons differs from all similar legislative bodies, except that of Eire, in containing representatives of the universities of the nation. This is, abstractly considered, a form of functional representation and might be expected logically to lead to the representation of other professional bodies. It is, however, a peculiarity and an exception to the rule that the House of Commons is devised to represent the populace in general. Like many other English political institutions university representation is more easily explained by the fact than by the theory, by history rather than by doctrine. It is not, as the customs of our Parliament go, a very ancient device. It was not until 1603, just after the union of the Crowns of Scotland and England, that universities were given the privilege of returning members to Parliament. King James the First, a Scotsman and a scholar, issued writs, as he was quite free to do, to the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, bidding them each to send two members (styled burgesses) to Parliament. Oxford and Cambridge were then the only universities in England and had already been, the first for three centuries, the latter more recently, amongst the most celebrated in Europe. It was not quite so strange as it might seem that these two great corporate bodies should be asked to return Members to the House of Commons. The older theory of the constitution of the House was corporate. The Commons were often referred to as the communitas communitatum, the community of communities. A member was supposed to represent not a given number of electors but a shire or borough, Cumberland or Cornwall, Coventry or Carlisle. The two universities were two additional ‘communities’.
