The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-02-03
ELECTION LAW DEFECTS.
Remedies Proposed for the stlortcom- ings of Present English Methods.

Remedies Proposed for the Sllortcom-
 tngs of Present English Methods.
 The following is part of an article on the British election law defects and their remedies prepared by a legal writer for the London Times:
 Since the Corrupt and Illegal Prac- tices Prevention act of 1883, no really substantial addition which could be called new departure has been made to the statutory provisions for the con duct of Parliamentary elections. The Corrupt and Illegal Practices Proven tion act of 1895-otherwise known as with one special point of election prac- tiee. The result of this absence of re- cent legislation is that in a rapidly advancing age the election of men- conditions and subject to regulations laid down nearly quarter of cen- tury ago; and. if theseregulations are closely inspected, it will be found that they could hardly have been more dras- tic if the desire for a seat in the House of Commons were criminal ambition instead of praisworthy as- piration.
 At the very outset the Parliament tary candidate is faced with the fact that, so far as the law is concerned, no definition of an election" is provided. He is warned that a given sum is all that he will be allowed to spend on election expenses" and that If ne ex- ceeds it his election will be void But he is not told when the election le- gally begins, and he is left entirely to hisown judgment in deciding when 1t ends An expense incurred three months before an election may not be an election expense, whereas the judges may take the opposite view of one in cured three years previously The re- suit of this state of things is that a candidate or his election agent must construct his return of election expen- ses more or less at haphazard. It may be answered that if a candidate has any doubts in this matter he should take counsers opinion. But counsers opinion is not infallible, and, in the case of election law, the fact that it has been taken makes a candidates po- sition worse rather than better
 Another point of gravest importance to Parliamentary candidates arises from the existence of numerous propa- gandist organizations, independent of the central offices of both sides. These organizations consist of persons who lay special stress upon particular items in the current political programmes, such as temperance and Prtestantism, As soon as an election becomes immi- nent many of these organizations dis patch their agents to the scene of &C., tion, open committee-rooms, and let loose an arnly of workers and flood of literature upon the constituency The unfairness of the whole thing arises from the fact that these organil cations are not under statutory obliga- ticns to make return of the expenses which they incur nor are the expenses themselves tue subject of any statu- tory limit. So far as the law at pres ent goes, candidate may be tied down to maximum expenditure of, say 1DUU IFOlH lHS Sltll lo thS iiiAoll " his election fight, while he may find in | the field against him a/powerful or ganization which is at liberty, if 1t chooses. to spend e20,0oO on the econtest It seems only fair that these organiza- tions should be placed under the same kind of statutory obligation and limita- ted in the same way as the respective | candidates