Los Angeles herald., 1910-01-26

lAxEzEs canvassing campaigns are
not exceptions to the rule. The right
little, tight little islands are so small
that they can be covered with spell
binders to an extent impossible in the
United States, and every advantage of
the natural opportunities is taken.
Premier Asquith and Mr.. Lloyd
George. for the Liberals, and Mr.. Bal
four and Lord Lansdowne, for the
Conservatives, are the chief spellbind-
ers. and each of them spoke nearly
everv night during the campaign.
Every one of the $40 parliamentary dis
tricts had several meetings a week
during the campaign, and in many of
them a dozen meetings were held every
night. Four hundred peers were on the
stump, more than 600 members of par
lament 100 women and not less than
1000 ordinary speakers. This does not
take into account the volunteers, but
only those spellbinders who spoke I'M
der the direction Of the national head
quarters of the two principal parties.
1t may not be out of place to note
that the two parties, Liberal and Con-
sentative. have no such compact or
ganization as Americans are familiar
with in the Republican and Democratic
parties. There is no national organ
ization having any authority over the
party at all. The sole party authority
lies with the voters of each constit-
uency. For purposes of convenience
these small associations, represented
by central committees, delegate certain
powers to the national organization.
In the Liberal party the central body
is called the National Liberal fedora
ton. 1t is a permanent institution,
maintaining a publishing house and
keeping up party campaign of educa-
ton in season and out without regard
TO the campaign. When the campaign
comes on this publishing house sells
enough literature at a profit to make
expenses for the next few yearsl I'm
agine such a condition in the United
States.
The National Union of Conservative
and Constitutional associations is the
headquarters of the Conservative
party. 1t maintains publishing house
and a political library Just across the
street from the house of lords. This
institution enjoys the patronage of the
highest classes of the British public,
and it's publishing house is operated on
a self-supporting basis.
While the election battle is waged
between the Liberal and Conservative
forces, 1t must not be understood that
these two parties meet each other in
clearly aDgned forces as 90 Cne RepuD-
licans and Democrats in the United
States. The Liberals have the largest
party organization, but in the last par
lament their 376 members were allied
with SO Irish Nationalist and 81 Labor
party men.
The Conservative members find the
greater number of their party leaders
in the ranks of another party, the Lib
eral Unionists, which has a national
fo1 ion Of &c RnIfn1Jf
and his chief supporters are known by
their friends as Unionists. By the
Radicals all Conservatives of every
type are called Tories. The Liberal
Unionists are the political heirs or
those Liberals who seeded from their
party when Mr.. Gladstone made home
rule for Ireland a party issue. They
insisted upon keeping the name Liberal
and upon declaring their preference for
the maintenance of the United King
dom. Joseph Chamberlain has been
the chief Liberal Unionist and from
his sickbed he has directed the Con-
sentative fight in this campaign. He
has compelled an unwilling party to
adopt his scheme of tariff reform, be-
cause that party had to have some
issue with which to combat the Lloyd
George socialistic tendencies.
In this campaign the Conservatives
and Unionists were absolutely ANAL
gamated. as they have been for several
years. The Liberals, the Nationalist
and the Labor party made separate
campaigns, but were careful not to OPP
pose each other. In a constituency
where the Laborites were stronger the
Liberals supported the, Labor candi-
date, and so on.
There were a great many indepen--
dent candidates of various types, and
many trades union candidates indie
pendent of the Labor party. or the
$40 constituencies 81 went into the
elections with three cornered races.
In seventeen constituencies the Tory
candidate was unopposed, in one the
Liberal was the only candidate and in
Ireland over forty Nationalist had no
opposition.
1t strikes an American as amazing
that some of these unopposed races are
the result of courtesy. Mr.. Joseph
Chamberlain is i'll, and therefore, out
of courtesy, the Liberals refused to
nominate a man against him. The