Chapter VII
A Mad Tea Party —
in the Castle of the
Constitution
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“A law suit is not a tea
party.”
— Mr. Justice Ivan
Cleveland Rand
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There was a table set out
under Lord Sankey's Tree in front of Chief Justice
Antonio Lamer's Grand Entrance Hall to the Castle
of the Constitution. (You can tell it's
Lord Sankey's Tree, there's a little branch
grafted on.) Equality Party Leader, Keith
Henderson, and constitutional law professor
Stephen Allan Scott are having tea at
it. Lawyer, Brent Tyler is fast asleep
between the two of them, who are using him as a
cushion, resting their elbows on him and talking
over his head.
“How very uncomfortable for
Tyler,” thought Alice, “but as he's asleep, I
suppose he doesn't mind.”
The table was a
large one, but all three were crowded down at one
little corner of it. “No room! No room!”
cried Henderson and Scott in unison when they saw
Alice coming.
“There's plenty of
room!” said Alice indignantly. “What have
you three done?” she demanded. Then, answering
herself, “Why, you've partitioned it, haven't
you!” and she sat down in a large armchair at one
whole end of it.
“Have a seat,” said
Henderson, glowering.
“I am
sitting,” said Alice, annoyed at the implied slur
on her height.
“Tart?” said
Henderson – (more rudeness, thought Alice)
– as the Equality Party Leader slid a large tray
towards her with chips of cardboard on it, and
numbers painted on them.
“Those aren't
Tarts,” retorted Alice distastefully,
picking up 44 and examining it forwards and
backwards.
“Same thing,” said Professor
Scott.
“They're just like Tarts,”
said Henderson, “once you get used to
them.”
There were other numbers on the
tray: 41, 38, 45,
91, 39, 42, and a couple of
others with the paint smudged.
“These are
amendments,” said Alice in disdain,
immediately recognizing Part V of the
Constitution Act of 1982 and the federal
residual power, all in a jumble. “You can't
swallow an amendment!”
“Oh, we think you
can,” said Scott.
“That's right,” said
Henderson, “eat up!”
“But, I don't want to
shrink,” said Alice, who thought she would find
the experience very unpleasant of not being able
to reach the table. “It wasn't very
civil of you to offer Tarts when all you have is
cardboard,” said Alice angrily.
“It wasn't
very civil of you to sit down without being
invited,” said Henderson.
“I didn't know it
was your table,” said Alice. “It's laid for
a great many more than three.”
”At this,
Professor Scott gave the tray a nudge, a bit too
hard, and all the cardboard chips went
flying.
For a second, Alice was enveloped
in a swirl of numbers, which, to her surprise,
suddenly all fell upwards into the sky,
twinkling before they vanished.
Alice
couldn't help but clap hands in amazed delight.
She had never in her life seen flying
amendments.
“Where did they go!”
cried Alice.
“Check your feet,” said
Henderson, biting his lower lip smugly and
mumbling rudely under his breath, “-- if you can
find them!”
“I heard that!”
said Alice, casting a severe glance toward the
offending politician. However, she did
look down at her feet, first at the left, then at
the right, and to her amazement, there they
were, just like magic: a whole pile of
amendments... but the federal residual power was
not among them.
“Something's missing,” said
Alice.
“Of course,” said Scott. “It's a
floor, not a ceiling.”
“But, how did
you do it?” insisted
Alice.
At this, Brent Tyler's eyelids
fluttered open (he was somnambulating) and he
muttered: «... quelques promenades à la Cour
suprême.»
“He's practising his French
in a dream,” thought Alice. (If the amendments
worked, he would never need it.)
“Riddles
and magic, I like that,” said Alice,
“and I believe I can guess what that one
means!”
“Do you mean that you think
you can find out the answer to it?” said
the law professor.
“I do, indeed,” said
Alice, and began at once to solve Brent Tyler's
riddle.
“Why, promenade is French
for 'a stroll'. And quelques
promenades means that someone's been
getting plenty of exercise―”
“Go on,” said
Scott―
Alice considered a little, then
brightening, she exclaimed, “The
fourth!”.
“Fourth what?” said
Scott.
“Why, the fourth branch, of
course,” said Alice, glancing up at the bough
grafted overhead as if she were somehow
reminded...”.
“Ah, tree
trimming....” said Henderson. “Is it Christmas
already?” Henderson had taken his watch out of his
pocket, and was looking at it uneasily, shaking it
every now and then, and holding it to his
ear.
“What a funny watch,” remarked Alice.
It tells the day of the month, but not what
o'clock it is.”
“It's a lawyer's
watch,” said Scott, “we use it for
billing. Have you guessed the riddle
yet?”
“Of course,” said Alice. “It means
the Tarts are gone because of all
that partying over at the Fourth
Branch. ... And now, there's nothing
left for me but a few chips of cardboard―
how very impolite! This table was laid
for many more than three... but some hog has
helped himself to all the
refreshments.”
“Wrong,” said Scott,
becoming impatient with Alice. “Pogg, not
Hogg.”
“I don't know what you mean,” said
Alice.
“That's the answer to the
riddle: Pogg,” said
Scott.
“Pogg?” said Alice, “Never heard of
it, what does it mean?”
“It means whatever
the Fourth Branch wants it to mean,” said
Scott.”
“And what is that?” asked
Alice cautiously.
“Don't
know!” chipped in Henderson
guiltily, “but as the Fourth Branch said
it, it must mean something.” Henderson was
eyeing Alice very intently.
“Well, I
wish they would say what they mean,”
said Alice. “You can't just invent words as you go
along, no one will know what's going
on.”
“That's the whole point,”
leered Henderson.
“Well, what else
could it mean, then, if it's not the Court
Party?” said Alice.
“Ask Warren J. Newman,”
interrupted Scott. “He'll tell you what he
thinks they meant it to
mean.”
“Well, I never,” said Alice. “If it
only means whatever they want it to
mean, and Warren J. Newman has to guess it for all
of us, then, it can't mean anything.
Why don't they just say what they
mean?”
“They mean what they
say,” said the law professor. “That's the
same thing you know.”
“Oh, no, it's
not!” said Alice. “They might just as well say
that I make the law is the same thing as
The law makes me.
“Or, they might
just as well say, chipped in Henderson: “that a
hole in one is the same thing as one in
a hole”.
“Or, they might just as well
say,” interposed Scott, “that minority
right is the same thing as the right
minority!'”
“Do you always say
what you mean?” said Henderson, gloomily.
He was still fiddling with his
watch.
“Always!” said Alice, and then:
“What time is it? This party's gone on long
enough without refreshments.”
“Dunno,” said
Henderson, dipping his watch in his cup of tea and
checking it again.
“That's no way to tell
time,” said Alice. “It'll stop the
works.”
“That's the whole point,” said
Henderson.
Alice felt dreadfully confused.
Henderson's remark seemed to have no sort of
meaning in it, and yet it was certainly English.
“I don't quite understand you,” she said, as
politely as she could.
“Tyler is asleep,
again,” said Henderson, ignoring Alice, and he
poured a little hot tea upon his
nose.
Tyler shook his head impatiently, the
drops flying, and said without opening his eyes, «
Mais OUI, bien sûr, c'est ça que je voulais
dire! »
Alice sighed wearily, “I think
you might do something better with the time,” she
said, “than waste it asking riddles that have no
answers.”
“If you knew Time as well as I
do,” said Henderson, “you wouldn't talk about
wasting it. It's him.”
“I
don't know what you mean,” said Alice.
“Of
course you don't,” said Henderson, expelling a
snort. “I dare say you never even spoke to
Time.”
“Perhaps not,” Alice replied
cautiously, “but I know I have to beat time
when I learn music.”
“If you don't
beat time, you'll face the music,” smirked
Henderson.
(How ominous! thought
Alice.)
“For instance,” continued
Henderson, “suppose it were nine o'clock in the
morning, just time for the Judge to enter, and
your proceedings weren't ready. You'd
only have to whisper a hint to Time, and
round the clockhand goes in a
twinkling! Half-past one, time for
recess.”
“Time for a song,” interrupted the
law professor: “Do you know it? — ”
Twinkle, twinkle,
forty-five!
Purpose,
pith, and matter fi!
Up
above the fourth you
fly,
Twinkle,
twinkle-- ”
Here,
Tyler shook himself, and began singing in his
sleep: “Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle,
twinkle-- ” and went on so long that they had
to pinch him to make him stop.
Alice was
very hungry now, she hadn't even had her
breakfast. “When can we hand 'round the
refreshments?”
“There are none,”
said Scott and Henderson, speaking in unison
again. Alice seemed to detect a slight aura of
guilt about the two of them.
“No
Tarts?” she said, more in disbelief that in
disappointment.
« Parties! Parties!
Parties! » said Tyler, rousing from his
dream and just as quickly falling back asleep
again, with his mouth open. Scott
reached over and snapped Tyler's lips
shut.
“He's right,” said Alice, let's get
on with the party.
“No, no,” said
Scott, he means “Gone! Gone!
Gone!”
“Aw,” said Alice, “he's speaking
French again. But what does he
mean?”
“He means no
Tarts,” said Henderson, “but, of
course, that was
predictable.”
“What was?”
said Alice?
“The outcome,” said the law
professor (and Alice thought, a bit too
matter-of-factly).
Straightaway, she
glanced at the sky in search of a twinkle: but
there was none. Hopeful, she looked down at her
feet, first at the left, then at the right, but
again, nothing. Not even an empty
tea-tray.
“I don't understand,” said
Alice, emphatic. “Why would anyone wish to ruin a
lovely tea party? You can't have a real tea
party without the Tarts.”
“Well, said
Scott,” apparently out of context, “I'd hardly
finished the procédure introductive when
the Queen jumped up and bawled out, “He's
murdering the time! Off with his
head!”
“How savage!” said
Alice.
“And ever since that,” went on
Scott, mournful, “he won't do a thing I ask. It's
always recess.”
“How dreadful!” she
sympathised. “Is that why there are so many
tea-things out here?”
“That's it,” said
Henderson with a sigh. “It's always
tea-time now, and we've no time to plead between
whiles.”
An idea occurred to Alice: “But
can't you appeal?”
“Tried that,” said
Scott, “same problem. That court's always
in recess, too.”
“Then you must keep moving
'round, I suppose?” said Alice, referring to the
many unused seats around the table set out under
the Tree at the Grand Entrance Hall to the Castle
of the Constitution.
“Exactly so,” said
Henderson: “as things get used up.”
“But
what happens when you come to the beginning
again,” Alice ventured to ask.
“Suppose we
change the subject,” interrupted Scott, yawning
conveniently. “I vote the young lady tells us a
story.”
“I'm afraid I don't know one, said
Alice,” alarmed at the proposition.
“Then
Tyler shall!” cried Henderson and Scott,
once more in unison. “Wake up, Tyler!” and they
pinched him on both sides at once, for the sake of
Equality.
Brent Tyler slowly
opened his eyes. “I wasn't
asleep,” he demurred feebly:
“I heard every word you fellows were
saying.”
“Then tell us a story,” said the
law professor.
“Please do,” begged
Alice.
“And be quick about it,” said
Henderson, “or you'll be asleep again before it's
done.”
“Once upon a time in Canada,”
Tyler began in a great hurry, “there were three
sisters, and their names were Crown, Commons and
Senate; and they lived all together at the bottom
of a well ―”
“― Hole,”
interrupted Henderson.
“― What strange
names!” declared Alice, and then, “But what did
they live on at the bottom of a well?” for Alice
had always taken a keen interest in questions of
eating and drinking.”
“They lived on
Pepper,” said Tyler, after thinking a
minute or two.
“They couldn't have done
that, you know,” said Alice gently. “They'd have
been ill.”
“And so they were,” said Tyler;
“very ill.”
Alice tried to imagine
what such an extraordinary way of living would be
like, but it puzzled her too much, and so she went
on: “But why did they live at the bottom of a
well?”
“Hole,” reminded Henderson:
“Well and hole aren't the same thing, you know. Or
else you might as well say that a hole is a
well means the same thing as a well is a
hole.”
“He has a point,” said
Scott.
“Take some more tea,” said Henderson
to Alice, somewhat earnestly.
“I've had
none yet,” replied Alice, exasperated, “so
I can't take more.”
“You mean you
can't take less,” said
Henderson.
“Not so,” said Scott, “You have
less and less of anything as time goes
by.”
“I
haven't had
anything, either,” said
Alice, determined to make her point, “and I never
saw Time go by,” she mused, “but I think I
once did see a White
Rabbit―” And then, with some resolve, Alice
excused herself from her place at the
Table.
“This
isn't any fun,” she said. “The magic was nice, but
the riddle is inadequate, and of all things, to be
serving cardboard chips in place of
Tarts.”
“Don't say goodbye,” said Scott and
Henderson, a tad resentful. Tyler had already
fallen asleep again, face-down this time, with his
nose in the bread and butter plate.”
So off
went Alice, in a bit of a huff, towards the green
horizon, which apparently was an endless golf
course spreading out in all
directions.
Alice could see that in the
distance, players were already teeing up. Golfers
worked up a good appetite, she thought. Maybe
there she would find a Tart. Or possibly,
even the White Rabbit. After all, there were all
those holes about. And she didn't mean
“wells,” either.
TO BE
CONTINUED.
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