140 



The Review of Reviews. 



loss to the House of ^Commons and to 

 tlie Labour world. In both spheres his 

 genial personality and conciliatory temper 

 will be much missed. The electoral sequel 

 adds to the tragedy. Mr. Edwards was 

 elected in the first instance as a Liberal- 

 Labour Member, and the Liberal Associa- 

 tion had carried through his election. 

 When the Miners' Federation decided 

 to join the Labour Party, Mr. Edwards 

 naturally considered that his duty to the 

 Federation must stand before his tie to the 

 Liberal Party. The seat, which had thus 

 become a Labour seat, was on his death 

 claimed by the Hanley Liberals and their 

 candidate, Mr. Outhwaite. As the Labour 

 Party could not sacrifice the seat without a 

 struggle, Mr. Finney was put forward by 

 the miners as their candidate. 



It is a great pity that 

 Electoral sufiicient pressure from 



Results. Liberal headquarters was 



not brought to bear upon 

 the Liberals in Hanley to avoid this struggle, 

 and to allow the Labour seat to remain 

 a Labour seat still. True, the result in 

 Hanley was a complete electoral justifica- 

 tion of the Liberal policy, inasmuch as 

 Mr. Outhwaite was returned by a majority 

 of four to one for the Labour candidate. 

 But this deliberate capture by the Liberals 

 of a Labour seat was bound to involve repri- 

 sals. The election at Crewe followed. The 

 Labour Party put forward a candidate who 

 obtained a much larger vote than fell to his 

 comrade at Hanley. The result was that 

 the Unionist went in at the head of the 

 poll. The Liberals were thus ])unished for 

 their cajjture of a Labour scat by the loss 

 of a Liberal seat. And the majority for 

 Home Rule and Manhood Suffrage has 

 been corresjKjndinglv reiluced. The votes 

 cast in both elections scarcely justify much 



01 

 Parliament. 



Unionist exultation. For the majority of 

 votes cast against the Unionist candidate 

 was in Hanley 2,348, and in Crewe 3,451- 

 In the election at Ilkeston the pojjular 

 cause sustained a much more serious 

 reverse. For there, in a straight fight 

 between Liberal and Unionist, the Liberal 

 majority fell from 4,044 to 1,211. But 

 this drop is also attributed, rightly or 

 wrongly, to the alienation of Labour, votes 

 from the Liberal cause. As the cause 

 neither of Labour nor of Liberalism is 

 likely to advance by these estrangements, 

 a better understanding would conduce to 

 the advantage of both. 



The Canadian Premier has 

 The Decline told US that the British 

 Parliament is no longer an 

 Imperial body, and we arc 

 grateful to him for the information. It is 

 wholesome to have news about Parliament 

 occasionally from outside, because in this 

 country nobody really knows or cares any- 

 thing about the doings at Westminster. 

 The vision of party machines, working 

 more or less in unison, does not onlv not 

 enthuse the average man, it does not 

 interest him. He sees the party system 

 changing, the members becoming more 

 and more grouped under the heads of Con- 

 servati\e - Liberals and Radical- Socialists, 

 and he knows that the same change is taking 

 place all over the world. What .used to 

 be great political measures are no longer 

 allowed to ruffle the serenity of everyday 

 life — a supreme laissezfaire has fallen upon 

 us all, because it is no use doing anything. 

 Home Rule may or may not be attacked 

 for party purposes, but it will not be 

 repealed, nor much changed. Time will 

 show the Irishman that it oft^ers a chance 

 of securing more real representation of the 

 mass of the people than does the present 



