Proportional Representation - A Study in Methods of Election by John H. Humphreys
page 68 of 508 (13%)
page 68 of 508 (13%)
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Statesmen, moreover, have often lost their seats merely because they
have endeavoured to give electors of their very best. When Mr. John Morley (now Lord Morley of Blackburn), during the election of 1906, received a deputation of Socialists, he, with characteristic courage, explained very frankly the ground on which he could not support their principles.[3] A similar candour on his part in 1895 cost him his seat at Newcastle. Can we wonder then that there arise complaints that our statesmen are deficient both in courage and in ideas? Single-member constituencies are, as Gambetta pointed out more than twenty years ago, inimical to political thinking, and recent General Elections have afforded numerous examples in support of this statement. The courageous and forcible presentment of ideas has time after time been rewarded by exclusion from the House of Commons. _Degradation of party strife._ There is a further and equally serious charge that can be laid against the existing electoral system--it is in no small measure responsible for that increasing degradation in the methods of warfare which has characterised recent political and municipal contests. This debasement of elections cannot fail to contribute to that undermining of the authority of the House of Commons, upon which stress has already been laid. Indeed, there is abundant evidence to show that in conjunction with the imaginary instability of the electorate, the debasement of elections is weakening the faith of many in representative institutions. An efficient bureaucracy is now being advocated by a writer so distinguished as Mr. Graham Wallas, as the best safeguard against the excesses of an unstable and ignorant democracy. There is no need to undervalue the importance of competent officials, but all experience has shown the equal necessity of an adequate check upon the bureaucracy, |
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