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National Geographic : 1947 Nov
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Exploring Ottawa AP from Press Ass'n Prime Minister King Shows President Harry S. Truman Around Ottawa Chimes in Peace Tower played the "Missouri Waltz" as the President visited Parliament last June 11 to address a joint session. Members gave him "three cheers and a tiger." To Canadians, a tiger is one extra, loud cheer. "Never in my life," the President said later, "have I received such a cordial reception." He re marked that Canada and the United States no longer regard each other as foreign countries but as friends. with dark oak galleries, the woodwork carved richly like the oak of old English cathedrals. The Speaker's chair, with fretted wooden can opy, is a replica of that long used in the Mother of Parliaments. Only the golden garnishings of the ceiling break the grim beauty of this room. Besides the physical contrast between this and the legislative chambers at Washington, there is a contrast of conventions and of tempo. Congress meets promptly at noon. The Commons, in more leisurely fashion, takes plenty of time for lunch and does not start work until 3 o'clock, but it works usually until 11 at night. The Commons is far more formal than the House of Representatives or the Senate-and more formal, or at least more restrained, than its ancient mother at Westminster. This invariably astonishes the visitor, who has found the Canadian people themselves as free and easy as their American neighbors. The reason for Parliament's stiff decorum would be hard to find, but there are few "scenes" here, seldom an angry shout, no sen sational outbursts to make copy for the long press gallery behind the Speaker's dais. Business proceeds slowly but steadily on a fixed agenda, and the Government, being present in the House and commanding a ma jority of members, can concentrate discussion on its own essential legislation. The Order of the Day, the routine of the daily session, is varied only in sudden emergency. Speaker Needs No Desk or Gavel Members are free to speak as they please, so long as they hold their speeches to forty minutes, but in all major debates the party whips, by friendly agreement, arrange the order of speeches. The Speaker commands 567
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