The Day the Mace Flew out of the Window. Chapter 13

Transcription

1 The Day the Mace Flew out of the Window Chapter 13

2 323 CHAPTER XIII THE DAY THE MACE FLEW OUT THE WINDOW On Thursday, April 16, 1965 about three o clock in the afternoon, the House of Assembly had resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole to consider the draft order providing for the new constituency boundaries under Section 63 of the 1964 Constitution. In the chair was Dr. Raymond W. Sawyer, the Deputy Speaker; on the floor Brother Milo Boughton Butler, the member for the Western District. Mr. Chairman, shouted Milo Butler, this Constituency Commission has done a wicked thing in cutting up New Providence and the Out Islands in a damnable way in order to give themselves the minority government a distinct advantage in the next general elections. Milo developed this thought into a theme without end. As the last grain of sand filtered through the quarter hour glass, Dr. Sawyer, the Chairman, turned in the direction of Brother Butler and said, I am very sorry but the member s time has run out. It s very kind of you to remind me, replied Brother Butler, but I intend to talk on. I ain t going to let any grain of sand stop me from talking. Don t throw sand in my mouth. I ain t dead yet. The Deputy Speaker, who was acting as chairman while the Committee of the Whole Milo Butler House was in session, realizing that he had reached an impasse, suspended the proceedings and reported this incident to the Speaker, the Honourable Robert (Bobby) Symonette.

3 324 The Speaker, having been informed, ascended the stairway to his elevated bench. On his observing Milo Boughton Butler still standing he said, Will the Member for the West kindly address his chair. The Speaker was really asking Brother Butler to sit down but Milo misunderstood the finesse of parliamentary language. I am not addressing my chair. I am addressing this House, he replied, while at the same time banging his powerful right fist on the table. Will you please sit down, pleaded the Speaker. I will not, countered Brother Butler. Therefore the Speaker named Brother Butler under Rule 37 for wilfully disregarding the rules of the House. The Premier, Sir Roland T. Symonette, quickly came to the rescue of his son (the Speaker). Mr. Speaker, he said, I move that the Member for the West (Milo) be suspended for the remainder of this meeting. This motion was duly seconded by the Honourable Geoffrey A. D. Johnston and then passed. The Speaker then turned to Milo and said, Will the member please withdraw. Milo, becoming more impatient by the minute, replied, I will not withdraw, by grabs! he continued, I am getting tired of this darn foolishness! The Speaker suspended proceedings for a short time. During this interval, the Sergeant-at-Arms, William Malone, bearing the majestic mace, marched toward Milo. Mr. Butler, will you please leave this House of Assembly! I refuse to leave! came the thunderous reply, his right fist pounding on the table and this time scattering all the papers on it. If I leave Mr. Speaker, you are going to have to take me out, Milo added as an afterthought. Upon this last refusal, two police sergeants approached Milo. They looked at his large physique and tried to lift him out of the House but were forced to conclude that this giant of a man was just too much for them to handle. Deputy Superintendent of Police, Salathiel Thompson, on observing the quandary of his officers, dispatched two more policemen to the scene of action. There was nothing small about Milo. In those days he weighed close to five hundred pounds. He had big limbs, a big body, a big face, a big mouth and a big heart all of which he placed in the service of his people.

4 325 In the next few minutes, there were four policemen on the traditionally greencarpeted House of Democracy. They approached Milo gingerly. Suddenly, two dashed under the table and each one grabbed a leg while, at the same time, each of the other two officers seized an arm of Milo. Slowly they disentangled his legs from under the table and succeeded in lifting him out of the chair and carrying him bodily in the direction of the stairway. On his way down Milo, in formal morning suit with tails, shouted, If you tear my clothes or my skin somebody is going to have to pay for it. TOO HEAVY Two officers try in vain to carry Milo Butler out of the House of Assembly. Two more were needed to evict the determined parliamentarian. With Milo out of the way, the Speaker reconvened the meeting. But as soon as it was called to order, another of Her Majesty s loyal opposition, Brother A. D., Hanna, was on his feet debating the gerrymandering of the Boundaries Commission. He too exhausted his fifteen-minute time bar. He too, refused to stop talking. So the Speaker named him and summoned two policemen to carry him out. Brother Hanna was only a flea weight. One of Milo s thighs weighed more than the whole of Hanna; yet, when only two policemen came to lift him out of the ancient and honourable House, he became indignant. Stop! he shouted. How dare you give Milo four policemen, and me only two? I demand equal rights Mr. Speaker, equal rights.

5 326 His objection was well taken. Two additional policemen came forth and together the four carried this featherweight midget down the stairs and threw him out of the front door to the open-mouthed amazement of the spectators. TALKED TOO MUCH A.D. Hanna is carried out of Parliament for exceeding his fifteen-minute allotment of time. After this second expulsion the Speaker was tired; the government members, bewildered; and the policemen, weary. So, one of the second oldest parliaments in the western hemisphere adjourned to allow tempers to cool. But the recent events in the House did not discourage our brothers and sisters. The P.L.P. and the B.F. of L. had an appointment with destiny and we intended to keep it. The Bahamian masses were no longer content with leaders who used them only as pawns in their games of chess. They wanted to possess the Promised Land now; and any leader who had first put his hand to the plough and later turned back because of the storms and vicissitudes of life was not fit for the kingdom. It was about this time that Henry Milton Taylor and Cyril St. John Stevenson severed ties with the Progressive Liberal Party, the organization they had founded in H. M. s blunder was fraternization with the U.B.P. s Minister of Tourism, Stafford L. Sands, during his promotional tours in London, England.

6 327 The remark at private and public meetings that assigned Stevenson to the political bone yard was, Black people will never follow a black man. They must always have a white or a mulatto to lead them. Of course the parliamentary leadership of the P.L.P. and the B.F. of L. gave the lie to Stevenson s statement. Thereafter, the Committee for Positive Action made it uncomfortable for Stevenson to remain in the party and so he elected then to become independent. With Taylor and Stevenson gone, the P.L.P. became, to all intents and purposes, the party of the black people. As for me? I liked the P.L.P., but I loved LABOUR more because LA- BOUR means all who work without distinction as to race, place of origin, political opinions, colour, creed or sex. The next session of the House of Assembly on Tuesday, April 27, was a replay of the April 16 meeting with variations. In the Speaker s elevated chair was the Honourable Robert H. Symonette. On the Speaker s right hand side was his father, the Premier, Sir Roland T. Symonette and his U.B.P. mountain of power. On the Speaker s left was the Leader of the Opposition, Brother Lynden O. Pindling and members of the P.L.P. Further down on the left hand side of the Speaker was I, the seed faith of Labour struggling at times against the mountain and the little hills but in search for more bread, peace and freedom for the poor and oppressed. Milo Boughton Butler was a bad man in the best sense of the word and the other P.L.P. s were no better or worse. They opened the windows in the debating chamber when the room was adequately air-conditioned; they stamped their feet and beat on the table; they objected to and opposed anything the U.B.P. proposed; they ranted and raved until in one defiant gesture against the draft constituency order, Brother Pindling arose from his chair. While speaking the Queen s English, pure and undefiled, he lifted the ancient mace from the bracket on the Speaker s desk. This mace, he said, is the symbol of authority, and the authority for the islands belongs to the people, and the people are outside of this House and so this mace belongs outside too. So said, Brother Pindling flung the mace through the window which had been previously opened. At the same time Milo Boughton Butler snatched the two quarter-hour glasses off the Speaker s desk and flung them out of the opened window also. Then all of the P.L.P. s stormed out of the House. When they made their grand entrance to Bay Street they were granted a heroes welcome by a crowd of their followers who yearned to breathe free. The Speaker, the Honourable Robert (Bobby) Symonette, strove mightily to maintain order and would have continued the proceedings had I not stopped him with the remark, But Mr. Speaker, the mace, the symbol of your authority, is not with you. Surely we shall not continue our proceedings without it? This brought a halt for an hour or so. Later two police constables returned to

7 328 the House with a broken head and globe of the mace and replaced same on the Speaker s desk. The U.B.P. s mountain of white power laboured long and hard and finally passed the Draft Constituency Order into law notwithstanding the official opposition s absence. But the people s demonstration against the minority government had not yet AFTER THE FALL The remains of the original mace. run its course. Outside the House of Assembly, placard-carrying men and women defied the arms and armour of The Royal Bahamas Police Force. Magistrate John Bailey read the Riot Act and in the name of the Queen, called upon all and sundry to disperse peacefully and to depart to their habitations and their lawful businesses upon the pains contained in the Penal Code for the prevention of tumultuous assembly. Peace was restored after the arrest of thirteen persons.