The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1870-07-28
Minority Representation.

Minority Representation. >
A London correspondent of the New
York World chronicles victory won by
its advocates in Parliament. he says:
The principle of the representation Of
minorities turned up very unexpectedly
The other night in the House Of Com
mons, and achieved an equally unexpect-
ed and satisfactory victory. Two years
ago. you will remember, when the House
of Lords were in the very act of making
theii famous 'leap in the dark" by pass
ing the reform bill, they suddenly con-
ceived the idea of breaking their fall by
providing some means for securing the
representation Of minorities, and in their
haste and trepidation, they hit upon tho
most clumsy and least commendnble me-
thod of securing that end-the cxpedi-
ent Of crippling or reducing the voting
power of both minority and minority by
the establishment of ''three -cornered
constituencies. The House of Com
mons have now acted with equal haste,
but with much more wisdom, aud in
providing for the election of school
boards under the new education bill,
they have adopted the rational and sim
ple plan of leaving each man, ns at pre-.
sent, as many votes rs there are Offices to
fill, and conferring on him the new PR
vilege of accumulnting his votes on one
candidate, or distributing them among
oil the candidates, rs he may choose
Hero is the provision: cat every such
election, every voter shall be entitled to
q number of votes equal to the number
of the members of the school board to
be elected; and may give all such votes
to one candidate, or may distribute them
among the candidates, as he thinks fit. ~
Under this arrangement. which certainly
is plain and clear enough, every party
will be able to obtain in each board an
amount Of representation proportionate
to its members in the community. IF n
board is to consist Of nine members, and
the "secularists, " for instance. form one
third Of the constituency, they will be
able, by each Of them dividing his nine
votes equally among three candidates, to
secure one-third of the board, to which,
under the common rule of majorities,
they could not elect even one member
In the same manner, the Roman Catho-
lies, If they form only one-ninth of the
constituency, could obtain one-ninth of
the representation, by each of them Civ
ing nl his nine votes to one candidate
1t is remarkable that although Mr.. Glad
stone and Mr.. Forster have both repeat
edly declared their hostility to the prin-
ciple of minority representation, they
both avowed their conviction of the ex-
pediency of adopting it for this purpose
It is difficult to understand why prin-
ciple that is good in the election of Il
school board should not be equally good
in the election of members of Parlia-
ment. Every one knows, of course, that
even the present clumsy, threc-cornered
system enables the Tories to return
some members whom they wonld other
wise lose; and it is. equally certain that
shonld the principle, now to be adopted
for the election of education boards, be
extended to Parliamentary contests, they
would be able to return still more. If
the present Government were composed
simply Of politicians, this consideration
would be enough to explain their avowed
dislike to the extension of the principle;
but the Government, in fact, is 3ompos-
ed of statesmen, who should be above
such petty and partisan views. How
ever, We shall soon SEQ how the new sys-
tenn works in the election of school
boards, and if it works we'll. its extension
to Parliamentary and municipal elections
will DO all the easier