Why should the rise of a new party cause so much uneasiness? Can
democracy make no use of that increased diffusion of political
intelligence from which springs these new political movements? Mr.
Asquith takes no such pessimistic view. He, least, realises that our
present system is not necessarily the final stage in the development of
representative government. He does not imagine that, whilst we welcome
progress in all things else, we must at all costs adhere to the
electoral methods which have done duty in the past. Speaking at St.
Andrews, 19 February 1906, he declared that: "It was infinitely to the
advantage of the House of Commons, if it was to be a real reflection and
mirror of the national mind, that there should be no strain of opinion
honestly entertained by any substantial body of the King's subjects
which should not find there representation and speech. No student of
political development could have supposed that we should always go along
in the same old groove, one party on one side and another party on the
other side, without the intermediate ground being occupied, as it was in
every other civilized country, by groups and factions having special
ideas and interests of their own. If real and genuine and intelligent
opinion was more split up than it used to be, and if we could not now
classify everybody by the same simple process, we must accept the new
conditions and adapt our machinery to them, our party organization, our
representative system, and the whole scheme and form of our government."
This is not a chance saying, standing by itself, for a fortnight later,
speaking at Morley, Mr. Asquith added: "Let them have a House of Commons
which fully reflected every strain of opinion; that was what made
democratic government in the long run not only safer and more free, but
more stable." Mr. Asquith's statements take cognizance of the fact that
a great divergence between the theoretical and actual composition of the
House of Commons must make for instability, and his pronouncement is an
emphatic reinforcement of the arguments contained in the earlier portion