¹ Manchester Guardian, October 28, 1931, in an editorial that said: “What prospects are left of anything but the triumph of a bleak, harsh reaction? The mischief cannot be undone. The electorate has been swept away by panic and fear. By the side of the scare about the pound, the cry ‘Hang the Kaiser’ and the Red Letter appear almost respectable. … Even if we ignore the fact that the election was entirely unnecessary and was forced on by the Conservatives for their own ends, there was not the slightest justification in reason for interpreting it as the last struggle for civilization.”

² For the background, see (with the deference due, but with allowance for its understandable bitterness) a review by Webb, Sidney (Lord Passfield), “What Happened in 1931: a Record,” in 3 Political Quarterly, 1–17 (January-March, 1932)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, in which it is said: “The session of 1931 opened with the Parliamentary Labour party seriously discontented with itself, the several ministers out of touch with one another, struggling separately with their departmental difficulties, the cabinet unable to find solutions for problems in the circumstances actually insoluble, and the back-benchers at loggerheads with themselves and with the front bench. The Prime Minister—very much aware of the shortcomings of each one of his colleagues, and of the party to which be belonged, as well as (may it be said?) perhaps incessantly rather too conscious of his own superiority—was not in a condition to withstand the temptation of flattering suggestions that began to be made from more than one quarter.”

³ The Manchester Guardian, in its leader on election day, October 27, said: “It is perhaps easier to see what the election is about if we look at its origins. We are told now by Mr. Baldwin and most of the soberer Tory elements that it is not primarily about tariffs. But historically there is no doubt that it is. I t was tariff enthusiasm alone which set going the movement within the Tory camp to force an immediate general election.”

⁴ See below, p. 337. Note also, for example, the following from an editorial in the Evening Standard (part of the Beaverbrook press) on October 22: “Sir Herbert Samuel's last despairing efforts at Darwen may be taken as epitomizing the last despairing efforts of the opposition to the rising tide of Empire Free Trade.”

⁵ In an editorial on November 23, the Daily Herald (Labor) remarked: “Labour has never been a rigidly doctrinaire Free Trade body of opinion. Its policy of imports boards shows clearly its understanding that foreign trade must be dealt with on an organized basis.” During the campaign, some attempts were made to advance the idea of import boards as a formula that might assuage two sources of anxiety at once. More typical, however, was a poster (noted at Oldham, Lancashire): “Workers, beware. The Tories want to cut your wages by food taxes. Vote Labour and defend your wages.” Much was made of the depression in the United States. “A city of death,” read a dodger, referring to conditions in Detroit; “What happens in tariff-ridden America. … Prevent Birmingham from becoming a city of death by voting Labour.”

⁶ In these 451 constituencies, the Liberals (who won in only 41, 39 being plurality victories) were last in 248, second in 162. Where Labor won by a plurality, Liberals were second in only 17 instances, third in 99; whereas where Conservatives were elected by plurality vote, Liberals were second in 79 instances, third in 68.

⁷ This calculation, it should be noted, disregards the Independent Liberals and also the candidates of minor parties (Communist and New Party) and independents. Altogether, there were in 1931 at least 112 constituencies in which more than two candidates appeared for each seat. This total may be compared with analogous figures for elections in recent years—1918, 234; 1922, 233; 1923, 253; 1924, 225; 1929, 470 (given in Pamphlet No. 66, 2nd edition, September, 1929, a publication of the Proportional Representation Society).

⁸ In 19 of the 55 eases, the successful candidate was elected by a minority. Considering also constituencies in which the conflict was rendered multi-lateral by the presence of minor parties and independents, 33 seats in 1931 were won by less than a majority: 21 by Conservatives, six by Liberals, four by Labor, and one by an independent.

⁹ In addition, the parliamentary secretary to the ministry of health in the National Government, Mr. E. D. Simon, was defeated in a district in Cornwall previously held by a Liberal (paymaster in the National Government) who did not run again. It is fair to add that, of the 55 districts in question, 28 had been held by Conservatives, of whom 25 were standing for reëlection. In 28 other constituencies, Liberals and Conservatives were involved in dual combat; Conservatives took 26 of these. The other two were won by Independent Liberals. In 1929, moreover, there had been triangular contests, with Labor involved, in 24 of the 28 constituencies. These facts suggest the relative inability of Liberals, even in the absence of Labor competition, to profit by the drift of 1931. In 46 other districts (29 of which had been held by Labor, the others by Liberals of one stripe or another), Liberals and Labor were alone engaged in 1931, Liberals winning in 38 cases. In addition, there were nine constituencies (four of which had been held by Labor) in which the Liberal prerogative of opposing Labor was invaded only by minor parties or independents, and in all but one Liberals (including one Independent Liberal) were elected.

¹⁰ It must be remembered that 67 seats were uncontested, and that of these, 61 were Conservative, 6 Labor. This fact explains the decline of the total vote cast, which amounted to 73.5 per cent of the electorate, whereas in 1929, with 7 uncontested seats, it had been 78.5 per cent; in 1924, with 32 uncontested returns, 76.5 per cent; in 1923, with 50 uncontested, 67 per cent; in 1922, with 57 uncontested, 67.2 per cent. The booklet issued by the London Times, The House of Commons, 1931, p. 140, estimated that (with allowances for the uncast votes in uncontested constituencies) the total vote for candidates supporting the National Government might be regarded as 16,687,701, the combined opposition vote (Labor, Independent Liberal, Communist, and New Party) 7,676,638—in all 81.4 per cent of an electorate of 29,487,711.

¹¹ A reconsideration of electoral methods was a price of Liberal cooperation after 1929. The conference on electoral reform, of which Viscount Ullswater was chairman, dividing on party lines, 13 to 8, with Labor in the negative, recommended that “any change in the present system of parliamentary elections should include the adoption of proportional representation with the single transferable vote.” See Command Paper 3636, 1930. In the face of Labor's continued disapproval, the scheme of the alternative vote was offered instead and accepted by Liberal spokesmen. A bill that embodied it, among other features, was read for the second time in February, 1931, passed third reading on June 2, 278 to 228, was mutilated in the House of Lords, and was inertly pending in the House of Commons at the end of the Parliament.

¹² Humphreys, John H., “A Lesson of the General Election,” Contemporary Review, no. 792, pp. 705–6, December, 1931Google Scholar. Mr. Humphreys estimates: “Under a proportional system, Mr. MacDonald might well have found his Government supported by 270 Conservatives, 110 Liberals, and some 50 National Labor members, a total of 430 confronting a total Opposition of some 185 members.” From the standpoint of leadership, he points out the significance of the fact that, of all the members of the former Labor cabinet, George Lansbury alone survived the chances of a system of single-member districts.

¹³ It has already been suggested that almost sardonic humor could be found in the probability that the reputed partial trade revival, stirring the optimism of some important industrial areas, was due in part to the fall of sterling and the appearance of a pound more suited to exporting manufacturers than to rentiers.

¹⁴ Two of these five candidates were in the Rhondda, where Communists were the sole opponents of Labor, receiving 10,359 to Labor's 22,086 and 4,296 to Labor's 23,024; two were in Scotland, at Greenock and Fife West; and one was in Bethnal Green, London. Since the election, the Communist party has claimed a growth in its membership, which in the spring was 2,711.

¹⁵ The size of the Communist vote may be used, incidentally, to put in proper proportions the effort of Sir Oswald Mosley's New Party, preaching “action” and the “corporate state,” which, with 24 candidates (22 of whom forfeited their deposits), polled a total vote of 36,377. The glamorous Sir Oswald, with a reputed body-guard, was provocative as well as persuasive, and was arraigned and exonerated on charges of disturbing the peace in Birmingham. His standard-bearer in Whitechapel, London, Mr. T. (“Kid”) Lewis, formerly world's middleweight champion, received only 154 votes where the Communist candidate polled 2,658.

¹⁶ Regarding the personnel of the new House of Commons as a whole, the New Statesman and Nation of November 7, 1931, vol. 2, no. 37 (new series), p. 563Google Scholar, presents some statistics prepared by Harold J. Laski, listing the following occupations among the members: rentiers, 165 (of whom 150 are Conservatives); business men, 111 (of whom 73 are Conservatives); lawyers, 136 (of whom 111 are Conservatives); bankers and financiers, 47 (44 being Conservatives); soldiers and sailors, 43; farmer-landowners, 15; journalists, 15; doctors, 14; teachers, 11; accountants, 8; brewers, 5; retired civil servants, 5; trade unionists, 32; others, 8. “By ‘rentier’ is meant a person who lives on inherited wealth and follows no occupation.”

¹⁷ In a post-election statement, Philip Snowden perhaps expressed the extreme of the other point of view when he said: “This is not the end of the Labor party. It will rise again, but only with new leaders who have vision and courage. But it must be based on a citizen's and not a class outlook.” London Times, October 29, 1931. It may be added, at the risk of irrelevance, that only one member of the Coöperative movement was elected, whereas nine sat among the Labor members in the last Parliament.

¹⁸ In his broadcasted address on October 17, in which a sick man into whom the iron had entered to a degree that seemed pathological said: “I hope you have read the election programme of the Labor party. It is the most fantastic and impracticable ever put before the electors. … This is not socialism. It is bolshevism run mad.” Speaking of broadcasting, the policy of equality amounted to treating each element in the National combination as a party (with an extra speech each for Mr. MacDonald and Mr. Baldwin), confining Labor to three speeches.

¹⁹ Sidney Webb, in the article cited in an earlier note, remarks: “In Great Britain, in 1931, for the first time, the women are considered to have voted differently from the men, and to have contributed to the National Government majority in a much greater percentage than the men. A combination of patriotism and apprehension as to the safety of their little hoards of savings certainly sent an unusual proportion of women electors to the poll, many of them for the first time.”

²⁰ In view of the importance to Labor of the coöperation of local councilors in aiding the parliamentary candidacies (a feature of Labor organization that impresses any observer), as well as the rôle of local governments in carrying out any central program, it was unfortunate from Labor's standpoint that municipal elections followed so quickly, on November 1 in England and Wales and on November 3 in Scotland. On the primary issue of economy, incarnadined by the after-glare of the general election, Labor dropped 203 seats in the councils of the London boroughs, losing its majority in five of the eight boroughs it had controlled, retaining only Poplar, Bermondsey, and Deptford. In some eighty of the cities and larger boroughs in the provinces, Labor lost 206 seats and gained five. In Scotland, however, it showed a net gain of six. The total vote was down; in London, for example, it was 31.3 percent of the electorate, the lowest since 1919.