326 TRANSACTIONS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. [VoL. II, 



year. They might, however, be eligible for re-appointment. The prin- 

 ciple of retirement by rotation may indeed be applied with advantage 

 to Parliament itself. If one-fourth or one-fifth of the representatives 

 retired annually for re-election or to be replaced by others, Parliament 

 would be regularly renewed from year to year, and by this means the 

 Government and Parliament would continually be brought into direct 

 touch with the people, and thus enabled faithfully to interpret the 

 national mind. 



Bearing on the proposal to rectify Parliament, it may be confidently 

 affirmed that the present method of electing members does not furnish a 

 correct reflex of the national mind. If the two parties into which the 

 country is politically divided be evenly balanced, and if at a general 

 election one of the parties, by skilful tactics or other means, succeeds in 

 many of the constituencies in gaining the upper hand, however slightly 

 in each case, the opposite party may be almost excluded from repre- 

 sentation in the assembly. How misleading, therefore, it is to assume 

 that the majority in Parliament represents the aggregate public opinion 

 of the nation ! and yet many are apt to do so until undeceived at the 

 next general election by the movement of the political pendulum to the 

 other side. The consequence of these administrative revolutions is often 

 extremely unfortunate for the country, as each party on accession to 

 power endeavours generally to reverse as much as it can the policy of 

 its predecessor. This condition of unstable equilibrium, inseparable from 

 party government, would, :'t is believed, be obviated, while continuity of 

 policy, subject only to desirable modifications from time to time, would 

 be secured by the plan suggested. 



Election by majorities, it is obvious, is the immediate cause of this- 

 instability. Experience everywhere goes to show that elections are 

 often carried by exceedingly narrow majorities, so that a compara- 

 tive handfnl of electors, distributed over the constituencies, could, 

 by reversing their votes, transfer the majority in Parliament from 

 one party to the other, and entirely change the character of the 

 administration. 



This phase of election by majorities has been examined by Mr. H. R. 

 Droop, in a paper read before the Statistical Society in 1881, in connec- 

 tion with the general elections of the United Kingdom of 1868, 1874, 

 and 1880. Mr. Droop points out that in 1868 it would have been possible 

 by the change of only 1,447 votes to have transferred 66 seats to 

 opposite sides. In 1874, if but 1,269 voters had reversed their votes, 64. 

 seats might have been changed ; and in 1880 if 1,929 electors had reversed. 



