Note 467:1 — Chapter XXVII

By 1837 Conservative registration societies had become common throughout the country. (Publications of the National Union of Conservative Associations, 1868, No. 4.)

By far the best, and in fact the only comprehensive, work on the party organisations in Great Britain is Ostrogorski's "Democracy and the Organisation of Political Parties," Vol. I. His description is very complete, but, while accurate, is likely to mislead a superficial reader, who might easily get an impression that the extreme cases were typical, although the writer takes pains not to say so. Mr. Bryce's caution in the preface should, therefore, be borne in mind. Mr. Ostrogorski appears to look on democracy, and on party machinery in particular, from the outside, as something artificial and weird, rather than the natural result of human conduct under the existing conditions. He does not seem to put himself quite in the shoes of Mr. Chamberlain, Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Schnadhorst, Lord Randolph Churchill, Lord Salisbury, Captain Middleton, or other men who have come into contact with the party organisations, and ask what he himself would, or might, have done in the same position. Hence his analysis has a slight air of unreality, and does not wholly approve itself as a study of ordinary political motives. But apart from this criticism, the work is admirably done, and is an invaluable contribution to political science.