THE DUNDEE ELECTION.
(TO THE EDITOR OF 1115 "SPECTATOR.")
Sin,—In a natural feeling of disappointment with Mr. Fitzjatnes Stephen's defeat at Dundee, you seem, besides being a little unfair to the electors, to give countenance to a political doctrine which 1 think should not be allowed to pass without a word of protest. This is nothing less than that Liberal electors are bound in duty to vote for the candidate standing in the Liberal interest whom they perceive to be the ablest man. No one will question Mr. Stephen's splendid abilities ; indeed you notice the circumstance that even "the stupid citizens of Dundee" were clever enough to recognise these. But the fact that a candidate with whom I find myself fundamentally at variance on almost everything except the name of the party to which we belong is a man of extreme ability, makes me only the more anxious to keep him out of Parliament, at all events as my representative. Is it not just possible that this has been the cause of what so sur- prises you at Dundee, "the number of men, including the local journalists, who, while frankly admitting Mr. Stephen to be the beat man [not representative] by far, fought against him tooth and nail"? Mr. Stephen, I trust there is no impropriety in say- ing, is an aristocrat at bottom, although a Liberal politician. The Spectator once described him as "despising freedom sincerely and thoroughly," and said that he would be a Tory, but for his brains. That was the view of the electors ; the workmen at any rate felt assured that on all social questions, on all questions between employer and servant, landowner and peasant, in everything in fact which concerned them as a class, Mr. Stephen's sympathies would be dead against them. And so did the women—for there is no use in blinking facts—and it is a fact that women are beginning to be a force in politics.
Liberal electors perceive now that there is as much difference between Liberals and Liberals as between Liberals and Tories, and when they stand by their colours so far as to return a man who will give a general support to a Liberal Ministry, they are surely entitled to please themselves for the rest.
You think it preposterous that Mr. Stephen's book should "cost him Dundee ;" I fail to see why, " Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" is not at least as trustworthy an index to the author's future political conduct as are his election speeches, " noble " as these may be. There appears to me something presumptuous in your correspond- ent " A. J. W.'s " assertion (an assertion incapable, of course, of proof or disproof,) that "the clear-thinking few of all classes stood by him." It is possible that people who are not fools may consider Mr. Stephen's political principles more dangerous to the Liberal party than even his services would be valuable to it.—I am,
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