SCIENTIFIC PARLIAMENTARY REFORM 369 



serving all of its utility, for members, thus protected against 

 unfair pressure, would not hesitate to vote against the arbitrary- 

 suppression of reasonable criticism, and could be relied upon 

 to co-operate with the Chair in checking merely vexatious 

 opposition and in putting down actual obstruction. 



Though the Whips are apt to regard private members as 

 mere voting machines, and party organisations too often look 

 upon them as delegates, it cannot be in the best interests of 

 the State that members should accept either position, nor do 

 the electors, apart from the Machine, desire or expect them 

 to do so. The obligation of an honourable man who accepts 

 election as the candidate of a Political Party, is to support, 

 in all its essential principles, the policy of that Party ; using 

 his intelligence to determine, in each individual case, whether 

 or not a particular measure is in harmony with those principles. 

 Such a reform as is here suggested would ensure greater care, 

 as well as greater freedom, in the selection of Parliamentary 

 candidates, would exclude from the House of Commons persons 

 who could not be trusted to fulfil implicitly the honourable 

 obligations which they undertook, and would open up the 

 possibility of a Parliamentary career to many distinguished 

 men who, under present conditions, are unwilling or unable 

 to enter the House. 



It may, of course, be argued that neither the election of 

 Parliament for a fixed term nor the introduction of voting 

 by ballot into the House of Commons would, in itself, 

 provide a complete remedy for all the ills that Parliament is 

 heir to ; but while this may be admitted, it is contended that 

 as these reforms are at once simple in themselves, easily 

 understood, and strike at the roots of a tyranny which has been 

 shown to be the chief cause of Parliamentary decline, their 

 adoption is a matter of urgent necessity and ought not to be 

 postponed. It may be well, however, to emphasise the fact 

 that while the election of Parliament for a fixed term and 

 voting by ballot in the House of Commons would, operating 

 together, afford valuable protection against the undue pressure 

 and improper influence now brought to bear upon members, 

 neither of these reforms would, by itself, be adequate for that 

 purpose ; for, as the secrecy of the ballot would not rob the 

 threat of dissolution of its terrors for members nervous as to 

 the retention of their seats, neither would the removal of the 



