Proportional Representation: A Study in Methods of Election

by John H. Humphreys

A COMPARISON OF LIST SYSTEMS WITH THE SINGLE TRANSFERABLE VOTE

"Les partis sont une institution de la vie politiquo actuelle. Ils sont une partie, non écrite, de la Constitution."—P. G. LA CHESNAIS

Influence of previous conditions.]

List methods of proportional representation have been favoured on the Continent, the transferable vote in English-speaking countries, and the question naturally arises, whence this difference? It would appear from the history of proportional representation that advocates of the reform have always kept in mind local customs, and have adapted their proposals to them. Thus a list system of proportional representation was adopted in Switzerland because such a system was more easily grafted upon previous electoral conditions. This is the explanation given by Ernest Naville, who for more than forty years was the leading advocate of electoral reform in Switzerland, in a letter[1] addressed to the late Miss Spence of Adelaide, South Australia. "The Swiss Cantons," said he, "have adopted the system of competing lists. I do not think the system is the best, but, as it involved the least departure from customary practices, it was the system for which acceptance could be more easily obtained. My ideal is a system which leaves the electors face to face with the candidates without the intervention of lists presented by parties; that is to say, that the method of voting indicated at the end of the pamphlet[2] forwarded by you has my preference. It is the system which I, inspired by the works of Mr. Hare, first proposed in Geneva, but, in order to obtain a practical result, account has to be taken of the habits and prejudices of the public to which the appeal is made, and the best must often be renounced in order to obtain what is possible in certain given circumstances." In a further letter Professor Naville was even more emphatic. "I consider," said he, "the Hare system preferable to that of competing lists. I have always thought so. I have always said so. But our Swiss people are so accustomed to the scrutin de liste, or multiple vote, that we could not obtain from them the profound modification which would have been necessary to pass to the Hare-Spence system."

Partly the basis of representation in a list system.

The long familiarity of the Belgian electors with the scrutin de liste also paved the way for the adoption of the list system of proportional representation, but there is an additional reason why list systems have found favour on the Continent. Some continental writers consider that parties as such are alone entitled to representation in Parliament, and are not enamoured of any scheme which makes personal representation possible. This view is also taken by Mr. J. Ramsay Macdonald, who, speaking of the Belgian scheme, says that "it makes party grouping the most important consideration in forming the legislative order, and is therefore much truer to the facts of Government than any other proportional representation scheme."[3] The Royal Commission on Electoral Systems also seems to have accepted the continental theory, that "in political elections it is the balance of parties which is of primary importance." In England, however, representation has never theoretically been based upon party. The limited vote, the cumulative vote, the double vote in double-member constituencies, have all allowed the elector complete freedom of action to follow party instructions, or to act independently. The electoral method has not been chosen to suit the convenience of party organizations; parties have had to adapt themselves to the system of voting. The single transferable vote in accordance with these traditions bases representation upon electors, and preserves to them freedom to vote as they please. So much is this the case that some critics consider it unsuitable for a system of proportional representation, and although Mill evidently regarded the Hare scheme not only as a system of personal representation, but as a plan for securing the representation of majorities and minorities in due proportion, the Royal Commission on Electoral Systems took the view that the transferable vote "was not originally invented as a system of proportional representation, but as a system of personal representation to secure the return of men as men, not as party units." Again, Professor Commons says that "the Hare system is advocated by those who, in a too doctrinaire fashion, wish to abolish political parties."[4] But in making this statement Professor Commons himself supplies the answer. "They apparently do not realize," says he, "the impossibility of acting in politics without large groups of individuals, nor do they perceive that the Hare system itself, though apparently a system of personal representation, would nevertheless result in party representation." The more complete organization of parties is a direct consequence of the more democratic franchise now existing. Political action in modern times without organization is impossible. The Johannesburg municipal elections in November 1909, despite the success of two independent candidates, showed that the most effective way of conducting elections with the transferable vote is that of organizations presenting lists of candidates. Indeed, so great a part does organization take in the political life of to-day that it is desirable, if possible, to have some counteracting influence. The transferable vote supplies this by securing for the elector the utmost measure of freedom of action.

This freedom of action is greatly appreciated by electors. A voter, asked after the Johannesburg elections to give his impressions of the new method of voting, stated that "the new system had put him on his mettle. He had never experienced so much pleasure in the act of voting; he had had to use his intelligence in discriminating between the claims of the various candidates." Voting with the single transferable vote ceases to be a purely mechanical operation, the voter becomes conscious of the fact that in voting he is selecting a representative. It is of little value to ask electors to exercise their intelligence if on the day of the poll they have no means of doing so. There was some complaint in Sweden after the first proportional representation elections because the new system compelled an elector, if he wished to use his vote with effect, to act rigidly with his party. With the transferable vote party action has sufficient play. Electors can freely combine and vote as parties, and effective organization will reap its legitimate reward. But the elector will not be constrained to act against his wishes. He will play an effective part in the election. In view of the great freedom conferred by the single transferable vote on electors, it is not surprising that the Royal Commission on Electoral Systems reported that the "Belgian system is foredoomed to rejection by English public opinion," and Mr. J. R. Macdonald states that "the British mind would not submit to this (the Belgian) simplest and most efficient form of proportional representation."

The freedom of the elector within the party.

Even when representation is based, as in the list systems, upon parties as such, it becomes necessary to determine the degree of liberty that shall be allowed to the individual elector in the exercise of the franchise. If a party has obtained five seats and the party has nominated seven candidates, how are the five successful ones to be selected, and what part is the elector to take in the selection? There is considerable dissatisfaction in Belgium with that part of the system which enables the party organizations to arrange the order in which the names shall appear upon the ballot paper, although this order may have been arrived at by a preliminary election among members of the party. In the election of 1910 there was a considerable increase in the number of voters who exercised their right of giving a vote of preference to individual candidates. The extensive use of this right resulted at Brussels in the alteration of the order of election as determined by the party organizations, and Count Goblet d'Alviella points out that this will demand the consideration of the political parties.[5] Some device such as that of making the vote transferable within the list will be required in order to ensure that the majority within the party shall obtain its full share of the representation. As stated in the previous chapter, the French Parliamentary Committee felt it necessary to provide for the elector a greater freedom of action than is possible under the Belgian system. In the report issued by this Committee in 1905 the use of the limited vote was recommended; in the report of 1907 the cumulative vote, which confers still greater freedom upon the elector, was proposed. In the Swedish system electors not only have full power to strike out, to add to or to vary the order in which candidates' names appear upon the ballot papers issued by the party organizations, but they have the opportunity of presenting a non-party list. The Finnish electoral law was deliberately framed so as not to interfere with or to check the liberty of the voter in making up the lists.[6] This law not only allows the names of candidates to figure on more than one list, but permits the voter to prepare a list of his own composed of any three of the candidates who have been duly nominated. In a list system two problems, the allotment of seats to parties and the selection of the successful candidates, have to be solved and the solution must in each case respect the personal freedom of the elector. With the single transferable vote the same mechanism solves both problems; it gives to each party its due proportion of seats, it determines in the most satisfactory way which of the candidates nominated by a party shall be declared elected, and it does not encroach in any way upon the elector's freedom of action. There is one point in which the single transferable vote differs essentially from the list systems. With the former the vote never passes out of the control of the voter, and the returning officer can only transfer the vote to some candidate whom the elector has named. With the list systems adopted in Belgium, Switzerland, Sweden and Finland, or with that recommended by the French Parliamentary Committee, a vote given for any one candidate is also a vote for the party which has nominated the candidate, and the vote may contribute to the success of some candidate of this party whose election the voter did not desire to advance. This fact explains the difficulties which have been associated with the formation of cartels in Belgium. A cartel is an agreement between two parties to present a common list, and if, as has taken place in some of the Belgian constituencies, Socialists and Liberals present a combined list, a Liberal by voting for one of the Liberal candidates of the cartel may contribute to the success of one of the Socialist candidates. The Socialist voter may, on the other hand, contribute to the return of a Liberal candidate. For this reason some Liberals and some Socialists refuse to support cartels. In Sweden it is possible that the elector's vote may, if he make use of a party ticket, contribute to the return of some candidate whom he may have struck off the list. If two parties agree to place the same motto at the head of their respective lists, which may be quite distinct, a member of one party may help to elect an additional candidate of the other party. Yet a list system affords no way by which votes can be transferred from one party to an allied party save by a cartel; if transferred at all they must be transferred en bloc from one party to another party, and not from one candidate to another candidate, in accordance with the expressed wishes of the elector. Mr. J. R. Macdonald states that "proportional representation seeks to prevent the intermingling of opinion on the margins of parties and sections of parties which is essential to ordered and organic social progress." The statement is in no sense true of the single transferable vote which affords every facility for the intermingling of opinion on the margins of parties and sections of parties, whilst even in Belgium groups within a party have always presented a common list.

Comparative accuracy.