Note (return) — Chapter II

Lord Courtney, in speaking on the second reading of his Municipal Representation Bill in the House of Lords,[78] contrasted his proposed system with that used in the London Borough Council elections, according to which a number of seats are assigned to each ward and the voter may give one vote each, without indication of preference, to that number of candidates. It is true that the electoral machinery for the London Boroughs is the worst to be found anywhere in the world outside of America. I have before me my party ballot-card instructing me how to vote at the last Council election in my present borough. There were six seats to be filled in my ward and fifteen candidates. I voted as I was told by my party organisation giving one vote each to six names, not one of which I remembered to have seen before. If there had been one seat to be filled, and, say, three candidates, I should have found out enough about one candidate at least to give a more or less independent vote; and the local party committees would have known that I and others would do so. Bach party would then have circulated a portrait and a printed account of their candidate and of his principles, and would have had a strong motive for choosing a thoroughly reputable person. But I could not give the time necessary for forming a real opinion on fifteen candidates, who volunteered no information about themselves. I therefore, and probably twenty-nine out of every thirty of those who voted in the borough, voted a 'straight ticket.' If for any reason the party committee put, to use an Americanism, a 'yellow dog' among the list of names, I voted for the yellow dog.