COMMONS REJECT THE PROPORTIONAL VOTE.

HOSTILE MAJORITY 56.

So far as the next General Election is concerned, the fate of Proportional Representation is finally sealed. The House of Commons yesterday rejected the scheme of the recent Royal Commission. That is the end of the matter for the present Parliament. After a comparatively short debate, the House voted on a motion of rejection moved by Mr. Burdett Coutts, with the following result:

For the rejection 166

Against 110

Majority against “P.R.” 56

Neither the House nor the discussion – with the exception of two notable speeches – was worthy of the occasion. And the result was just as little creditable to Parliament. For, apparently, “the rigidly impartial scheme” of the Commissioners, as Mr. Fisher described it, had not made a single convert among the of opponents of “P.R.” It was once said of Gilbert Wakefield that he hated Greek accents as much as he hated the Athanasian Creed. Mr. Austin Chamberlain, who is the leading anti-proportional Representationist, hates “P.R.” as much as he used to hate Cobdenism. There was no pretence of open-mindedness about him and his followers yesterday. They were out to slay, and they slew. The scheme of the Commissioners did not, indeed, touch the sacred cities of Birmingham or Westminster. But that made no difference. As Sir Mark Sykes truly observed, Mr. Chamberlain did not mean to leave “P.R.” the ghost of a chance. Because the City Councils of Glasgow and Portsmouth had passed resolutions against it, it was monstrous to force an experiment upon them. But the vote of City Councils, which were favourable to the experiment, was dismissed as the vote of cranks.

THE BIRMINGHAM CAUCUS.

“No man on earth,” said Mr. Chamberlain, would understand how the results of a “P.R.” election had been obtained. Then, thinking that that was perhaps rather a strong assertion, he corrected himself to “Not one man in ten.” He preferred the Alternative Vote. But most of all he preferred his Birmingham caucus, his well-oiled, smooth-running, result-producing Birmingham caucus! There was doubtless great joy among all the Caucuses last night, and among Party Agents of all colours. And Liverpool may well rejoice above most cities, for, according to Mr. Pennefather, if “P.R.” had been carried, Orangemen and Papists would have been at one another’s throats in a twinkling!

Mr. Asquith spoke in favour of the scheme, but he only pretended a lukewarm personal interest, and as he put it no higher than that “the time had come when the House might permit the experiment” – elsewhere than in East Fife – his interposition was not of great value. There was an admirable speech from Sir Mark Sykes, in which, with consummate skill and with an exquisite lightness of touch, he probed and explored the real reasons for the fanatical opposition which has been brought up against this just and reasonable experiment.

A BRILLIANT SPEECH.

Sir Mark spoke of the party agent’s dislike of complexity, and of anything which encourages a voter to think for himself. He spoke of the Party Whips and their objections to the presence of cranks in the House, “wealthy men who don’t want knighthoods, and aged men who don’t aspire to be Under-secretaries.” He spoke of the outside political machine and that wonderful Birmingham Caucus, where never a wheel gets clogged. He boldly compared it – with Mr. Chamberlain sitting sombrely below him with folded arms – to Stuart royalty and Venetian oligarchy, both very interesting and picturesque, but each had been better had it never been. The strokes of this irony fell so lightly and agreeably that the House was delighted, and it laughed consumedly when Sir Mark said that he did not want to see the Conservative noblesse of England vainly spending their time in the Carlton Club writing epitaphs on the club windows, because there was no place for them in Parliament. Here lay the whole pith and marrow of the speech, Sir Mark believes that the new democracy and the new régime, after the war, will be utterly different from the old, and he, as he said, was not sorry to have it so. He desires that Conservatism shall have its place and exercise its due influence! Hence his support of “P.R.” But the big majority of those whom he was addressing yesterday believe that things will go on pretty much as before with Tadpole and Taper in full strut as usual, but sharing ‘the boodle with some third party, and possibly even with a fourth – in petticoats’. Sir Mark set the House laughing lightheartedly. But his speech was a scathing satire.