Note 22 — Chapter XII · POLITICS

So clearly is this recognised on all sides, and so impossible does political honesty on the part of the rich appear to Spaniards, that the Heraldo, the leading moderate-Liberal paper, in the course of its comments on the rejection by the English House of Lords of the Budget of 1909, said that if the Lords permitted the people to vote as they pleased, this action on their part would have been justifiable, but that naturally they would take the usual means to secure the suffrages of those over whom they had control, and with the immense wealth at their command would easily influence the elections in the direction they desired.