the case of the Fifty-second Congress, the Democrats, with
50·6% of the votes, returned 71·1% of the representatives;
the Republicans, with 42·9% of the votes, returning
26·5% of the representatives. Lord Avebury (Proportional
Representation, 1890; new ed. 1906) has given various
similar experiences in England; thus, at the general election
of 1886, the Liberals, with 1,333,400 votes, only obtained 176
seats, while the Unionists, with 1,423, 500, obtained 283 (not
counting 99 unopposed returns on the Liberal side, and 111 on
the Unionist). In the general election of 1895, at which 132
Unionist seats and 57 Liberal were unopposed, the result in the
481 seats contested was the return of 279 Unionists and 202
Liberals; yet the actual votes given were 1,800,000 for the
Liberals, and 1,775,000 for the Unionists. Again, in 1906, the
Unionist vote, though 44% of the total cast, returned only
28% of the members, and the Liberal majority, which in
strict proportion would have been 68, actually was 256.
The establishment of mere party majority rule, which is characteristic of a representative system, is a necessity, no doubt, in popular government; but the way in which a substantial minority of voters may only obtain a contemptible minority of members, and may in practice be tyrannized over in consequence, somewhat detracts from its blessings, and leads to extreme party measures. The division of the whole electoral body into constituencies is, after all, only a device for getting over the difficulty of the electors voting en bloc, and it does not seem to justify the conversion of a real majority in the country into a minority as represented in parliament, nor the complete exclusion of a substantial number of the electorate from parliamentary representation—so far as their views are concerned—at all. Yet under the English system such results are possible as the capture of every seat in Wales (34), in 1906, by the Liberal party, with 217,462 votes, the 100,547 Unionist voters having no representation in parliament; while in Warwickshire, though 22,490 votes were given to the Unionist candidates against 22,021 for the Liberal, three Liberals were returned against one Unionist.
The attempt to rectify this flaw in the representative method has led to the suggestion of various devices by the adoption of which the elected members may correspond more equally to the divisions of opinion in the electorate. Under the plan of scrutin de liste (or “general ticket”) larger districts are created, each returning several Proportional representation. members, and each voter has as many votes as there are members to elect; but while this system apparently provides the opportunity for the return of candidates with different views, it only requires a solid party vote to capture the whole of the representation for a majority. What is known as the “limited vote” is a form of scrutin de liste by which the elector has less votes than there are seats to be filled; with (say) three to be elected, the elector has only two votes. Systems of “limited vote” are in force in Portugal, Spain and Japan. A somewhat better plan is the “cumulative vote,” which gives each elector as many votes as there are members to be elected, but allows him to divide them as he pleases (instead of giving only one vote to any one candidate). This enables an organized minority, by concentrating their votes, to elect at all events some representative; but the “cumulative vote” works rather capriciously, and is commonly defeated by careful party organization,
A more elaborate plan, but depending like the “limited” vote and the “cumulative” vote on the formation of constituencies returning three or more members each, is that of the transferable vote.” By this device an elector can indicate on his ballot paper not only his first choice, but also his second or third, &c. To ensure election a candidate need not obtain a majority of the votes polled, but only a certain number, so fixed that it can be obtained by a number of candidates equal to the number of seats to be filled, but by no more; this number of votes is called the “quota.” At the first count first choices only are reckoned, and those candidates who have received a “quota” or more are declared duly elected. If all the seats have not then been filled up, the surplus votes of those candidates who have received more than the “quota” are transferred according to the names marked (2) on them. If these transfers still do not bring the requisite number of candidates up to the “quota,” the lowest candidate is eliminated and his votes transferred according to the next preferences, and so on till the seats are filled This system, which is the one usually associated with the term “proportional representation” was first suggested by Thomas Hare, who published in 1857 a. pamphlet on The Machinery of Representation, and in 1859 a more complete scheme in his treatise on The Election of Representatives. John Stuart Mill, in Representative Government (1861) warmly endorsed Hare’s proposal. Hare wished to treat the whole country as one constituency, but by later supporters of the “transferable vote” that plan was abandoned as impracticable; and the principle will work so long as the constituencies adopted each return several members. Lord Courtney, in his evidence before the British Royal Commission in 1909, said that his minimum constituency would be a three-membered one, but he would create a fifteen-membered constituency without hesitation. The simple “transferable vote” has been adopted in Tasmania for all elections (1907), after experimental adoption in the constituencies of Hobart and Launceston in 1896–1901, and in the election of the Tasmanian members of the Commonwealth legislature in 1900. It was proposed in the draft of the South African constitution, but abandoned. The principle has also been adopted in the “list systems” of Belgium, some Swiss cantons, Sweden, Finland and parts of Denmark, Württemberg and Servia, where candidates are grouped in lists and all votes given to individual candidates on the list count first as votes for the list itself, the seats being divided among the lists in proportion to the total number of votes obtained by the list. The use of the general term “proportional representation” for all of these is, however, somewhat misleading; people often suppose that only one identical system of voting is meant, whereas in fact some 300 possible varieties have been proposed, and each of the states mentioned has a different one from all the others. The only common element is the device of the “transferable vote,” i.e. the method of having an “electoral quota,” and the filling up of seats, where a quota is not provided by the first choices, by votes transferred from the second choices, and so on. It may be noted here that the “transferable vote” is calculated to multiply candidates to a point at which the minds of the electorate may well be embarrassed as to their preferences (the largest Belgian constituency returns 22 members), and, while undoubtedly providing for “minority representation,” to encourage what may be called “minority thinking” and particularist politics. The “transferable vote” is commonly objected to as puzzling to the electors and too complicated for the scrutineers, while it is not much favoured by “machine” party organizations, which generally prefer the simpler plan of rough-and-ready majorities; but it has received a growing amount of theoretical support, as well as success in practical experiment, in recent years.
The “second ballot” is a device for securing absolute majority, instead of relative majority, representation. Where the two-party system prevails, it is usual for only two candidates, one for each party, to stand for each single-member constituency. But there is nothing to prevent a third or even a fourth candidate standing, The second ballot. and this multiplication of candidates becomes the more common in proportion as parliamentary organization is split up into groups. The consequence is that the candidate who heads the poll may well have only a relative, not an absolute, majority of votes, and to meet this objection the “second ballot” has been introduced, and is in operation in Austria-Hungary, France, Germany, Italy and Russia. Under this system, if no candidate receives an absolute majority of all the votes, a second election is held, at which, as a rule, only the two candidates compete who received most; or in cases where more than one seat is to be filled, twice as many candidates compete as there
