Chapter X 
THE TREASURY AND THE CIVIL SERVICE 
THE first kind of regulation applied to offices in the 
Civil Service generally appears to be that dealing 
with the qualification of the holders to sit in Parlia- 
ment. The original restriction in this respect 
seems to have been the outcome of a fear of the 
power of the Crown to control Parliament by 
distributing paid offices and pensions among the 
members. The Act of Settlement of 1700 (12 and 
13 Will III, c. 2) provided that after the accession 
of the House of Hanover no person holding an office 
or place of profit under the Crown should be capable 
of sitting in the House of Commons. But the 
disadvantages of excluding from the House all the 
great officers of State were soon realised, and the 
provision was modified by the Act 6 Anne, c. 41, 
so as to shut out only the holders of certain specified 
offices already existing, of offices of profit created since 
October 25th, 1705, or of new offices. The holders 
of certain offices declared not to be * new offices ” 
within the Act were to lose their seats, but to be 
capable of re-election. Officers of the Army and 
Navy were exempted from the operation of the Act. 
As time went on, the general trend of legislation 
was to draw a broad distinction between political 
officers who could sit in the House of Commons 
and non-political officers who could not. When a 
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