Evening star., 1924-10-30
LABOR|TES OUSTED,
LIBERALS CRUSHED
IN BRITISH ELECTION
Conservatives Swept in on
One of Biggest MaioritieS
in Century.
TORIES HOLD OWN LINES
AND CUT IN ON OTHERS
Show Gain of IA Seats, While
Liberals Lose 104 and
Labor, Al.
Dy the Associated Press.

LONDON, OCTOBER ou.-lne people
OF Great Britain have put crush
ing end to their first experiment with
a Labor government by returning
the Conservative party to power in
Parliament with one of the strongest
majorities recorded in the last CEN
tury.
The standing of the parties at
O'Clock was: Conservatives, 3S7 (gain
40; Labor, 14S 0oss. 4D Liberals, 40
Ooss, 104: other parties, Is, total, 5SS.
The total membership of the House
IS 615.
In this sweeping political change
the Liberal party has sunk to the
weaknest position it has experienced
since the realignment of British
political parties more than 80 years
ago at the time of the reform bill.
Tory Tide Strong.
During the day the Tory tide ran
stronger and stronger. The Con-
servatives kept gaining more seats
which the Liberals and Laborites had
held in the last Parliament, and, more
over. they held firm in the territory
which had always been theirs.
The strength of the swing toward
Conservatism was indicated even
where the Conservatives failed to
oust their opponents Most of the
seats which the La aboriteS and Liberals
retained. they held with reduced ma
. jorities, while in the country districts
the Conservatives were getting
greater majorities than in the pre-
vious election.
Unlike the Labor government,
which has just fallen. the Conserva-
ttves will be able to rule as we'll as
to govern and perhaps thus to stay
fixed in the governmental saddle for
the full legal parliamentary lifetime
of five years. if they want to. so
strong was the tide that has carried
them to triumph.
Cut Wide Swath.
There was no extensive part of the
country in which the Conservatives
did not increase their strength. They
recaptured long-lost seats in cities
and rural districts alike.
The thickly populated Industrial
centers of the North midlands aban-
doned both Liberals and Laborites to
get under the Tory banner as did the
great shipping centerS and the small
towns and villages, almost without
exception, in every farming area of
the nation.
Labor held tight its grip upon most
urban centers such as Glasgow and
London, but even some of these shift |
ed from Socialism to Conservatism.
The luck that put many 1aborites |
into Parliament last year through !
minority polls on three-sided fights /
left them out of the house this year |
Many Liberals stepped down to per- i
NIT Conservatives to have straight |
fights with Labor opponents, and a |
great majority of the Liberals who |
did not step down were put down |
when the ballots were counted. Their
famous leader, H. S. Asquith, fell with
his cohorts, losing to Labor a seat |
that had been Liberal for nearly !
century. Former Premier David !
Lloyd George got one of the greatest |
maJoritieS of his career at Carnarvon,
but elsewhere in the British Isles his
followers were deserted by the cleo
torate in depressing droveS
Aged observers of the ebb and flow
OF party power in British politics ex-
pressed the opinion that the whole
sale flight of voters away from the
Liberal party was due to a great ex-
tent to the popular fear that, by
votes for the Liberals, especially in ;
three-slded contests, the Socialists
under the banner of Labor might be
enabled to gain the seats. Because
of this fear, countless thousands of
voters are said by these political OBJ
servers to have abandoned lifelong
allegiance to the Liberals and to have
voted for the Conservatives to make
doubly sure that the Laborites would
be kept out in the cold
Losers Gain Strength.
Despite their huge majority in num-
Der of seats. the Conservatives had
polled only seven votes to each of |
Labor's five in the $40 contests which |
had been fully tabulated late this |
evening.
The total of popular votes even then
was almost one million greater than
the total for all of the contests last |
year, Labor having increased it's
strength by about 10000 votes, al |
though losing seats
In the $40 contests fully tabulated |
up to this evening the total vote was |
OF 19,276359. OF these 7.172,16S !
voted for Conservative candidates. |
5.l36,45O voted for Labor, 2,S19,692 !
voted for the Liberals, while more |
than 100000 votes were scattered to |
candidates other than those of the |
three main parties.
In the general election of 1923 the |
total number of votes polIed was IA
457,4S5, of which the Conservatives
polled 5.4S3.277, the Laborites 1885, |
Ts7 and the Liberals 4,299,121.
No Leaders Lost.
The Labor party, unlike the Lib
eral party, did not suffer the loss of /
any of it's generals. Prime Minister |
Ramsay Macdonald, j. r. Clynes |
lord privy seal; J. H. Thomas, colonial |
secretary; Philip Snowden, chancellor |
of the exchequer; Noel Buxton, min
lister of Agriculture; Sidney Webb,
president of the board Of trade, and |
John Wheatley, minister of health, !
were all returned, although they lost |
some of their principal lieutenants.
Mr.. Thomas and Mr.. Clynes ex-
pressed the opinion that the row
raised over the alleged Zinovieff let
ter and the attempts to frighten the |
electorate away from the Socialists
because OF it, made during the Con-
servative campaigning, had been ma
terial factors in Labor's loss of
strength.
Five of the eight women who had
seats in the last Parliament lost re-
election fights and the other three
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