68 THE PROVINCIAL ASSEMBLIES. 
House was not within the legal powers of the Assembly 
in the absence of express legislation. “The House of 
Assembly of Nova Scotia has no power to punish for any 
offence not an immediate obstruction to the due course of 
its proceedings and the proper exercise of its functions, 
such power not being an essential attribute, not essentially 
necessary for the exercise of its functions by a local legis- 
lature, and not belonging to it as a necessary or legal 
incident: and that without prescription or statute, local 
legislatures have not the privileges which belong to the 
House of Commons of Great Britain by the lex et consuetudo 
Parliament.” 
It may therefore be taken as established :— 
(1) That a Provincial Legislature has, apart from pro- 
vincial legislation, those implied powers and privileges which 
are absolutely necessary for the discharge of its functions. 
(2) That no privileges or powers in the nature of 
privileges beyond such essentially implied powers can be 
exercised in the absence of a statute. The validity of a 
provincial statute defining legislative privileges might be 
supported on several grounds. First, that the Act was an 
amendment of the constitution of the provinces under 
5. 92 (1) of the British North America Act, a view held by 
Sanborn, J. in Ez parte Dansereau. Secondly, that the 
powers and privileges in question were corollaries of the 
other powers conferred on the provinces, and were essential 
to the existence of the Legislatures. Thirdly, that in the 
case of the provinces existing at the time of the Union the 
local Legislatures enjoyed such powers and privileges, and 
that the Union Act cannot be said to have interfered with 
them. 
Acts defining the privileges of the local Legislature 
have been passed by Ontario®, Quebec? Manitoba ® British 
1 0. R. 8, ec. 11, 88. 837-55. 2? 49 & 50 Vie. c. 97, 8. 46—56. 
3 Con. Stat. 1880, o. 5, ss. 86-—41,