Proportional Representation: A Study in Methods of Election

by John H. Humphreys

The rise of a new party.

But the relations which should subsist between the two Houses of Parliament, whether the upper House is reformed or not, is not the only question which is giving rise to a closer examination of the foundations of the House of Commons. To this external difficulty there must be added the internal, and in the future a more pressing, problem created by the rise of a new organized party within the House of Commons itself. The successive extensions of the franchise have given birth to new political forces which are not content to give expression to their views along the old channels of the two historic parties, and the growth of the Labour Party must accelerate the demand for a more satisfactory electoral method. For a system which fails in many respects to meet the requirements of two political parties cannot possibly do justice to the claims of three parties to fair representation in the House of Commons. It is true that some statesmen regard the rise of a new party with fear and trembling; they imagine that it forebodes the bankruptcy of democratic institutions, the success of which, in their judgment, is necessarily bound up with the maintenance of the two-party system. The two-party system must indeed be a plant of tender growth if it depends for existence upon the maintenance of antiquated electoral methods. But those politicians who deprecate any change on the ground that single-member constituencies afford the only means by which the two-party system can be preserved, have failed to explain why this electoral system has not prevented the growth of Labour parties in Australia and in England, or why numerous parties and single-member constituencies go hand in hand both in France and Germany. Single-member constituencies may distort and falsify the representation of parties, but they cannot prevent the coming of a new party if that party is the outcome, the expression, of a new political force.

The new political conditions and electoral reform.

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 of this chapter.

On a more important occasion, when replying to an influential deputation of members of Parliament and others,[10] Mr. Asquith, with all the responsibility which attaches to the words of a Prime Minister, made this further statement: "I have said in public before now, and am therefore only repeating an opinion which I have never ceased to hold, namely, that there can be no question in the mind of any one familiar with the actual operation of our constitutional system that it permits, and I might say that it facilitates—but it certainly permits—a minority of voters, whether in the country at large or in particular constituencies, to determine the representation—the relative representation in the one case of the whole nation, and the actual representation in the other case of the particular constituency—sometimes in defiance of the opinions and wishes of the majority of the electors. The moment you have stated that as a fact which cannot be disputed, and it cannot be contradicted by any one, you have pointed out a flaw of a most serious character, and some might say of an almost fatal character, when your constitutional and Parliamentary system appears at the bar of judgment upon the issue whether or not it does from the democratic point of view really carry out the first principles of representative government. I therefore agree that it is impossible to defend the rough and ready method which has been hitherto adopted as a proper or satisfactory explanation of the representative principle. It is not merely, as more than one speaker has pointed out, that under our existing system a minority in the country may return a majority of the House of Commons, but what more frequently happens, and what I am disposed to agree is equally injurious in its results, is that you have almost always a great disproportion in the relative size of the majority and minority in the House of Commons as compared with their relative size in the constituencies. That is the normal condition of our House of Commons. I have had experience of some of the inconveniences which result." In speaking at Burnley in support of the Parliament Bill during the electoral campaign of December 1910, Mr. Asquith again laid stress upon the need of making the House of Commons fully representative. "It is," he said, "an essential and integral feature of our policy … that we shall go forward with the task of making the House of Commons not only the mouthpiece but the mirror of the national mind."

There can be no doubt that the question of electoral methods must now occupy a prominent place in all discussions which centre around the purpose, efficiency and authority of the House of Commons. John Bright, in addressing the people of Birmingham, on the eve of an election, exhorted them to "bear in mind that you are going to make a machine more important than any that is made in the manufactories of Birmingham … a stupendous machine whose power no man can measure." [11] Can we afford in the manufacture of such a machine to be content with rough and ready methods of election? Accuracy and precision are being demanded with ever-increasing force in all other departments of human activity; on what grounds then can we in the most delicate of all—that of government—refuse to recognize their value? The necessity of ensuring the predominance of the House of Commons in our constitutional system, the problem created by the rise of the Labour Party, the increased recognition of the need of reform, cannot but contribute to one result. The House of Commons will make itself more fully representative by the adoption of more trustworthy electoral methods, and in so doing will not only increase its stability and efficiency, but will render its constitutional position impregnable.

The indispensable preliminaries to any such change are, in the first place, an analysis of the results, both direct and indirect, of existing methods and, in the second place, a careful comparison of the improvements possible. The subsequent chapters will be devoted to both these aspects of the problem, for in the elucidation of the system most suited to British conditions, the experience of those countries which, faced with the necessity for change, have already introduced new methods into their electoral systems, will be found to be of the highest value.

[Footnote 1: The Law of the Constitution, p. 81.]

[Footnote 2: Our constitution is an ever-changing one, and had the country endorsed the action of the Lords in withholding its assent to the Finance Bill of 1909, a great blow would have been dealt to the authority of the House of Commons. The Fabian Society, in its Manifesto to members, issued on the eve of the election of January 1910, put this aspect of the case very forcibly: "It may justly be claimed by the Socialists that they have steadily refused to be misled by idle talk about what is and what is not constitutional, and have recognized that the only real constitution is the sum of the powers that are effectively exercised in the country. If the House of Lords boldly refuses supply and compels a dissolution, and the country, at the election, supports the Lords, that support will make the action of the Lords constitutional in spite of all paper denunciations by the defeated party" (Fabian News, January 1910).

The verdict of the country, as interpreted by the present mode of election, condemned the action of the Lords by a substantial majority. Yet the figures in Chap. II. p. 19, show by how small a turnover of votes that judgment might have been reversed.]