It seems strange now that this scheme should have received serious
consideration. Mr. Hare was so much under the spell of the apparent
justice of the underlying principle that he was blind to its results.
But it was soon perceived that the electors would not group themselves
as Mr. Hare supposed; that the personal ideal of every class of electors
would be simply men of their own class. It was further pointed out that
cranks and faddists and every organization founded on questions of the
remotest interest would combine to secure representation. Mr. Disraeli
declared it to be "opposed to every sound principle, its direct effect
being to create a stagnant representation ... an admirable scheme for
bringing crotchety men into the House." Mr. Shaw-Lefevre condemned it
as "a vicious principle based upon a theory of classes," and Mr.
Gladstone said that it regarded electors "not as rational and thinking
beings, but merely as the equivalents of one another." Walter Bagehot,
in his standard work on the "English Constitution," opposes the
principle of voluntary constituencies, because it would promote a
constituency-making trade. "But upon the plan suggested," he writes,
"the House would be made up of party politicians selected by a party
committee, chained to that committee, and pledged to party violence, and
of characteristic, and therefore unmoderate, representatives for every
'ism' in all England. Instead of a deliberate assembly of moderate and
judicious men, we should have a various compound of all sorts of
violence. I may seem to be drawing a caricature, but I have not reached
the worst. Bad as these members would be if they were left to
themselves--if in a free Parliament they were confronted with the perils
of government, close responsibility might improve them, and make them
tolerable. But they would not be left to themselves. A voluntary
constituency will nearly always be a despotic constituency."

The practical difficulties in the application of Mr. Hare's scheme are