TOPICS OF THE DAY.
PREPARING FOR THE GENERAL ELECTION.
Cersimoreas appear to be coming into fashion with constituencies ; a edtural resort at a time when there is no paramount object to It attained, when party distinctions are so much confounded, and when, in the absence of other considerations, constituencies are thrown back so much on the mere calculation of their own return- ing powers. We notice examples in North Cheshire, Cambridge University, the borough of Birmingham, and other places. In its recognition of a community of interest superior to party claims, Lord Brackley's retirement from South Lancashire is equivalent to a coalition • and we may say, by the by, that it is marked by hereditary good taste. We do not observe, however, that there prevails any blind proneness to coalition for its own sake; which is sensible. C..ealition is not in itself an absolute and positive good. It may be mischievous in its effect : a coalition between two useless Members, to save expense by a mutual loan of influence, without regard to any public principle in the union, is a mere fraud on Ott constituency at large.
But there may be many conveniences in coalition. It suits the calmer temper of the day, and avoids many practical evils that attend every contested election. It helps the constituency to look beyond the narrower hounds of party, and to take a wider range in the choice of candidates. A constituency cannot go about, like a multitudinous Diogenes, in search of a good man ; or Zit did, it would very likely be deceived : it must wait for those that offer. But if absolved from party bonds, it is the freer to choose, among all the candidates who do come forward, those who are known to be the most able and honest.
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