I.—lo

4

IV. Then the candidate or candidates having the fewest first votes, or votes deemed first, shall -be declared not to be elected, with the effect of raising by so much in the order of preference all votes given to candidates after him or them ; and Eule 111. shall be again applied if possible. V. When by successive applications of Bules 111. and IV. the number of candidates is reduced to the number of members remaining to be elected the remaining candidates shall be declared elected-if they have the quota of votes. VI. When the voting results in a tie between two or more candidates, or in the number of candidates required having less than the quota, then a fresh ballot shall be immediately taken, under the provisions of Clause 6, and limited to those candidates having the number of votes nearest to the quota or affected by the final tie.

APPENDIX.

GENEBAL EXTEACTS. The theory on which a party is constructed is this : A special line of policy is considered to be the best for the country. Certain men are deemed capable of giving effect to that policy. To enable them to do so, they must be got into office. To get into office they must have a majority in their favour in the House of Commons. To secure this majority, there must be organised co-operation amongst the supporters of the policy in question. This plan is plausible, but, like everything else in the world, it is not perfect. It has often been abused, and not seldom made the instrument of oppression and injustice. Pope expressed the view common in his day when he described party to be " the madness of many for the gain of the few." Men so dissimilar in character as Defoe, and David Hume, Thomas Paine, and Edmund Burke, the author of Junius's Letters, and Addison, all condemned the party system as being frequently dishonest, not unfrequently corrupt, sometimes disastrous, and always objectionable. . . . The register of the successes and the disappointments, the vices, the follies, and the quarrels of those who engage in contentions for power, is neither a pleasant, a profitable, nor an elevating chapter in the history of this country.— Joseph Cowen's " Speeches," p. 145. I seriously submit to you that parliamentary government is not allowed to have its most complete development in consequence of the frequent and, in many cases, quite unnecessary changes of Ministry, which, so far from constituting or obtaining responsible government, have the effect, in my opinion, of establishing the most thoroughly irresponsible system of administration with which lam acquainted. If greater public evils have not happened than any which have been disclosed, you have to thank the character of the men who serve as Ministers of the Crown, and especially the character of your permanent Civil servants—not the character of the system under which they work.- — Speech of Sir Anthony Musgrave, January, 1878. The drawbacks to the party system are so palpable, and have been so repeatedly set forth, that we may content ourselves with a very general statement of them. One of course, is that Ministers who look to the support of a great political connection are obliged to pay for it in the distribution of patronage, and cannot select the most competent men for the service of the public. Another equally patent objection is that no leader of a party can venture to be very much in advance of the opinions of the rank and file. He must often be obliged to relinquish or modify schemes which he believes to be for the public good, and be satisfied with settling questions for a quarter of a century, when otherwise he might settle them for generations. Such a system is not favourable to the growth of political foresight, and leads to the habit of "patching up," as fatal in public as in private affairs. . . . Party naturally gravitates towards faction, and this tendency is only kept in check by the honourable feeling and political sincerity which for the most part distinguish English gentlemen. Even within the limits thus imposed upon it the exigencies of party do occasionally carry statesmen into measures which, however necessary in themselves, are not recommended to the public by the source from which they proceed ; while, whenever it does happen that these limits are transgressed, and that the hatred of rivals or the thirst of power becomes the primarj' or sole motive of party action, we see wild work indeed, and such as may well cause the most prudent and practical of politicians to speak of party as a monster which ought to be bound in chains and cast into the bottomless pit. Then it is that the most cherished principles, the highest public interests, the most venerable institutions become degraded.— T. E. Kebbel, "Nineteenth Century," 1882. The life of a legislator, who is earnest in his efforts to faithfully perform his duty as a public servant, is harassing and laborious to the last degree. He is kept at work from eight to fourteen hours a day ; he is obliged to incur the bitterest hostility of a body of men as powerful as they are unscrupulous, who are ahvays on the watch to find out, or to make out, anything in his private or his public life which can be used against him.— Practical Politics (Roosevelt). Is there any sane reason why want of confidence, expressed by a majority of the House, in any single Minister, or in the conduct of his department, should involve the downfall of a whole Administration? Can there »be anything Utopian in the proposition that the Ministry should retreat within the old lines of strictly executive service, each Minister being directly and individually responsible, not to the Cabinet, or the Prijne Minister, but to Parliament ? — Matthew Macfie, " Contemporary Review," 1884,