TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE REFERENDUM AND THE SUFFRAGE QUESTION.
T"proposal that the extension of the Parliamentary suffrage to women shall be referred to the electors of the United Kingdom, advocated by the Westminster Gazette and the Daily Chronicle, is clearly making great progress. It is felt by a. very large number of men in i both political parties that the matter is one which cannot be decided except by a direct reference to the wielders of the sovereign authority in the country, i.e., the electors. We need hardly say that we view this fact with no small satisfaction. We have for many years past urged that in matters of prime importance a veto over legislation should be exercisable, not indirectly, but directly, by the electors. Further, we have urged that, whatever may be thought of the Referendum on general grounds, the tremendous revolution involved in the grant of the Parliamentary franchise to women ought not to take place without the direct assent of the electors—ought not, in fact, to be allowed to be carried into law by the adroit manipulation of Parliamentary groups. But though we are glad to see the Referendum thus brought within the region of practical politics, we desire to say at once that we fully recognize that many members of the Liberal Party who propose that the suffrage question should be submitted to a poll of the electors are as strongly opposed as ever to a general use of the Referendum. They consider that such general use would be deeply injurious to the nation. That being so it would be most unfair to attempt to use their consent to a Referendum in an exceptional case to further the proposal to make the Referendum a part of our normal constitutional machinery. It is, then, the imperative duty of those Unionists who favour the Referendum generally to make it absolutely clear that no man who advocates or consents to the use of the Referendum in regard to votes for women is thereby committed to any extension of its use. The general 9uestion remains, and is open for dis- cussion exactly as it was before. The opponents of the Referendum must be held free to declare that because a man takes a dose of strychnine or some other potent drug once in his life, he must not be regarded as an advocate of strychnine for daily use. Ho remains at liberty to denounce it as in most cases a deadly poison.
What makes it particularly easy for those who, as a rule, condemn the Referendum to assent to it in this case is the fact of the wholly exceptional circumstances surrounding the suffrage question. Owing to the fact that this question divides both parties in the State, it is undoubtedly true, as has been so often urged by the Westminster Gazette, that the ordinary party machinery is not capable of dealing with it. Though the House of Commons may be a machine capable of grinding every other kind of meal efficiently, it is not capable of grinding this. Further, it is impossible to point to any other capital question which divides parties exactly in this way. Therefore undoubtedly Liberal enemies of the Referendum are entitled to say that the use of the Referendum to get over the suffrage difficulty cannot be pleaded as a precedent in regard to other questions. No man can fairly be taunted with the question : " Since you allowed a Referendum on votes for women why will you not allow it on Home Rule ? " If he is so taunted he can make what, from his point of view, is the perfectly reason- able reply "The two questions are not on all fours." Though we are so strongly in favour of votes for women being referred to the electors, we desire to point out that it is of the utmost importance that the country should realize that there is a wrong way and a right way of applying the Referendum, and that in the present case great care must be used to secure that the right way is adopted. To begin with we must be most careful that when we mean to apply the Referendum we are not adopting a perfectly different, nay, an opposite thing— the Initiative. The Referendum when truly applied is always in essentials the submission of a particular measure to the veto or assent of the electors. The electors must not be asked to express an opinion on an abstract question or to have three or four questions put to them and thou be asked to choose one for their approval. What must be demanded is one plain answer, Yes or No, to one plain question. "Is it your will that a Bill entitled, &c., &c., passed by the Legislature, shall come into operation ? " That is a question to which any sane person can always say Yes or No. A moment's reflection will show that an abstract question when put to the electors is not capable of a straight answer, Yes or No. The abstract question is always liable to be met by the further perfectly legitimate question : " Tell me first how you mean to carry out your proposal." Take a concrete example. If you were to ask the electors whether they were in favour of universal insurance against sickness for all persons with incomes under £160 a year, the wise part of them must clearly say: " We cannot answer you that question till we know how you propose to carry it out. All depends upon that." If, however, a man is asked : " Do you want the Insurance Bill which has just been passed by Parliament to come into operation ? " he can, for good or evil, say Yes or No—say, that is, whether on the whole he likes the Bill enough to wish it to be law, or dislikes it enough to desire that it shall not come into operation. If, then, the question of votes for women is submitted to the electorate, it must not be in the form of an abstract question, or, again, in the form of three questions, as, for example : (1) "Are you in favour of women having the vote on the same terms as men now have it ? " (2) " Are you in favour of women who are householders being put on the Parliamentary Register ? " (3) " Are you in favour of all women over twenty-one having the vote ? " Such a submission could not but result in a great deal of confusion and misunder- standing. The proper way to obtain a satisfactory Referendum is to let a specific Bill be introduced into Parliament and discussed — whether it be the Conciliation Bill or an amendment to a Manhood Suffrage Bill which, though nominally an amend- ment, would in reality be a Bill for conferring the Parliamentary suffrage on all women. Let that Bill or that amendment when it has reached the Report stage be submitted to the electors by means of the plain question : " Are you in favour of the Bill conferring the Parliamentary suffrage on women who are householders coming into opera- tion " Or, again, if the House of Commons takes action which puts an end to the Conciliation Bill : " Are you in favour of the amendment to the Manhood Suffrage Bill which confers the vote on women on exactly the same terms on which it is conferred on men ?" To either of these questions when put by itself it is possible to give a plain answer, Yes or No, because in both cases the question is not an. abstract one. The practical form in which it is.. intended to confer the suffrage on women is declared. The question cannot be countered by an elector with the ques- tion : " How do you propose to confer the suffrage upon women ? I must know that before I vote."
Another point remains to be dealt with. It is quite clear that the persons to whom the question is to be referred must be the Parliamentary electors and no others. This we are sometimes told is an unfair suggestion. "You arc begging the question of whether women ought to have the Parliamentary voteby consulting only the men." Surely those who make this a grievance have not thought the matter out very clearly. With one voice they tell us that a House of Commons composed solely of men and elected solely by men is competent to deal with the question, and that the men who elected this same House of Commons are not competent to decide the matter. To say that it is an outrage to refer the question to the existing electors, but not an outrage to refer it to the persons elected by those electors is utterly illogical. The sovereignty of the country is at present lodged in the hands of the Parliamentary electors, and they, and they alone, either through their representatives or by a direct vote, are competent to alter the law and bestow a portion of that sovereignty upon others. No one, when the question of extending the franchise to the agricultural labourers was under discus- sion, would have ventured to suggest that the matter should be decided not by the existing electors, but by taking a poll of the persons sought to be enfranchised. For good or ill the decision, if it• is to be by law and not by revolution, must be given by the existing Parliamentary electors. We say this not because we think that the decision, if the women of the country could be polled as well as the men, would be different—we are convinced that it would not-
• This question at the present moment can only be worded tentatively, for the terms of the amendment are not yet known.
but solely on the grounds of law and reason which we have just set forth. Before we conclude we may point out that it is no longer open to opponents of the Referendum to say that a poll of the electors cannot be taken because there is no means of carrying it out. The Bill introduced last spring by Lord Balfour of Burloigh affords a complete answer to this objection. That Bill, which was very carefully drafted, supplies machinery which could with perfect fairness and with a scrupulous observance of the well- tried principles under which our Parliamentary elections are conducted be applied to a direct poll of the electors. If the leaders of both political parties should come to the conclusion, as we hope they may, that any Bill con- ferring the suffrage on women which passes the Report stage in the Commons ought to be referred to the country before it goes further, all that will be necessary is to take the machinery provided in Lord Balfour of Burleigh's Bill and to enact it, not, of course, as a permanent institu- tion, but for this special occasion. The Act would declare that " as it is desirable to take the opinion of the electors directly on the Bill entitled, &c., &c., be it enacted that such a poll of the electors shall be taken on the . . . day of . . . in the manner hereinafter set forth." All that the draftsman would then have to do would be to "lift " the machinery from Lord Balfour of Burleigh's Bill, subject to such alterations as a Select Committee of the House of Commons might consider necessary. We venture to say that such a Committee of electoral experts chosen from both parties would find very few mistakes or omissions in Lord Balfour of Burleigh's Bill. They would, of course, have nothing to say to the suggestions in Lord Balfour's Bill as to when the Referendum ought to be applied. They would confine themselves solely to the machinery. Further, the setting-up of that machinery for a special occasion would be clearly understood to form no precedent.
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