Letters to the Editor
Conscience and Constituents Lord Altrincham Secret Police Powers Berm W. Levy The 'Mail' and the Guards William Hardcastle Bread and Flour Sidney Dark Oxford Divided T. C. W. Stanton, F. V. Pickstock
Rev. W. E. J. Lindfield
Church and Trade Union Rev. Dennis Cooper
CONSCIENCE AND CONSTITUENTS
SIR,—It was charitable of Pharos to use no stronger word than 'dubious' when con?. tnenting on the constitutional aspect of M. Nigel Nicolson's statement to his constituents. This statement, indeed, raises an issue of the first importance, far transcending the imme- diate question whether or not capital punish- gnent should be abolished.
If, as Mr. Nicolson implies, it were the duty of an MP to prefer the wishes, known or !unposed, of his constituents to the prompt- logs of his own intellect and the dictates of his Nn conscience, we should have to revise all Nr long-cherished notions of parliamentary government. We should not only be at the mercy (as we already are) of a party pro- gramme, mystically described as 'a mandate trod the people' and enforced by the Whips; we should also be exposed to the tyranny of uninformed mass opinion, such as has re- really been seen in all it: nastiness at Black- , ene.0
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