Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-07-11

that London business people are SO largely
conservative that in the Parliamentary divt-
sions which embrace the thoroughfares
named, there are nowadays seldom any con-
tested elections The sitting members are
| usually returned without opposition. When
| there is fight its result is SO much fore
| gone conclusion that no one but the candi-
dates and their active friends take any
serious interest in the matter
An American visitor staying just now In
any of the great hotels near Charing Cross
and desiring to see what an English con-
| tested election is like, and to note the mode
of procedure at an English political meet
| ing in order to compare it with that OF an
American meeting, would have to 60 q
good distance afeld. He would have TO
cross the Thames at Westminster Bridge
and get into Southwark, where there are
several contests in the constituencies
largely occupied by the poorer class OF
voters; or 60 westward to Chelsea or north
ward to st. Pancras or 1slington, where
some of the best fought contests in the
whole of the 60 metropolitan divisions are
being waged. If he chose St. Pancras or
Islington, he would begin to note signs OF
the contest as soon as he got north of Hol-
born. In Journey on the top of a street
car from Gray's Inn Road to Hampstead or
Highgate he would pass the committee
rooms of half dozen Parliam entary candi-
dates.
How TO Locate the Headquarters.
There is no mistaking these places. There
are no large-sized portraits dangling across
the streets, but the part of the house used
as the candidates headquarters is usually
covered from sidewalk to roof with election
eering literature in colored ink or on COL
ored paper. The oh and color printer still
1or of rArr hnfr1 nat
nearly SO much as he did before Sir Henry
James, when Attorney General in Mr.. Glad
stones 1SS0-1SS5 government, passed the
corrupt practices at elections act. This
measure strictly limits the amount of money
which candidate may spend upon a con-
tested election. 1t is regulated on rigidly
fixed scale according to the number of voters
on the electoral roll. and under the pro-
visions of the act every penny which a can.
didate spends while he is in the constitu-
ency contesting an election has to be sched-
uled and submitted in sworn statement to
the returning officer within few days after
the election takes place.
Before this act was passed, the candidate
with long purse had immense advantage
over the candidate who was not equally
wealthy, even though the richer candidate
did not resort to bribery. There was no
limit to candidates printing bill, and
prior to 1885 the proprietors of newspapers
and of job printing establishments made
small fortunes out of a contested election.
Nowadays a candidate has to apportion at
the outset of his contest the amount he can
expend in printers ink, and having once
made that apportionment, he has to adhere
to it. And the amount a candidate may
thus expend does not go SO far as it did
three wears ago, for at the present time
street advertising in London has been de-
veloped and systematized to such an extent
that there haruly exists boarding or a
blank wall anywhere upon which a Parlia-
mentsry candidate can post placard with
out having to pay heavy toll for the priv
ilege.
Badges Find Little Favor.
1t is this fact, coupled with the limited
printers bill allowed under the corrupt
practices act, which accounts for the great
profusion of electioneering literature in the
candidates committee rooms and the thin
ness of the display up and down the constit-
uency.
English people are little disposed toward
the wearing of election badges; the men,
of the Primrose League are the only people
who donned them so far in this campaign in
London; but Londoners show their loyalty
to party and to their political candidates by
means equally noticeable with the wearing
of badges, and in way which must have
impressed itself on visiting Americans.
Although Londoner does not care to wear
political badge when he is about on busi-
ness or pleasure, he will stick placard half