HOW I PUT UP FOR M.P.
By this time people have got sick of electioneering. It is a great
privilege to be an English elector--to feel that the eyes of the world
are on you, and that, at any rate, your country expects you to do your
duty. But to the candidate an election contest is, at any rate, fraught
with instruction. Human nature is undoubtedly a curious combination, and
a man who goes in for an election undoubtedly sees a good deal of human
nature. I was put up for a Parliamentary borough--I who shudder at the
sound of my own voice, and who have come to regard speechmakers with as
much aversion as I should the gentleman in black. A borough was for the
first time to send a member to Parliament. It had been hawked all over
London in vain, and as a _dernier ressort_ the Liberal Association of the
borough--a self-elected clique of well-meaning nobodies--had determined
to run a highly respectable and well-connected gentleman whose name and
merits were alike unknown. Under such circumstances I consented to fight
the battle for freedom and independence, as I hold that our best men
should be sent to Parliament irrespective of property--that candidates
should not be forced on electors, and that unless our Liberal
Associations are really representative they may be worked in a way
injurious to the country and destructive of its freedom. At my first
meeting, like another Caesar, I came, I saw, I conquered. The chiefs of
the Liberal Association had assembled to put me down. I was not put
down, and, amidst resounding cheers, I was declared the adopted
candidate. The room was crowded with friends. I never shook so many
dirty hands in my life. A second meeting, equally successful, confirmed
the first, and I at once plunged into the strife. I am not here to write
the history of an election, but to tell of my personal experiences, which
were certainly amusing. The first result of my candidature led to a
visit from an impecunious Scot at my suburban residence, who had read my
programme with infinite delight. He came to assure me of his best wishes
for my success. He was, unfortunately, not an elector, but he was a
Scotchman, as he was sure I was, and sadly in want of a loan, which he
was certain, from my Liberal sentiments, I would be the last to refuse to
a brother Scot. I had hardly got rid of him before I was called upon by
an agent of one of our great Radical societies--a society with which I
had something to do in its younger days before it had become great and
powerful, but which, like most people when they got up in the world,
forgot its humble friends. Ah, thought I, the society is going to give
me a little aid to show its appreciation of my ancient service, and I
felt pleased accordingly. Not a bit of it. Mr. P. was the collector of
the society, and he came to see what he could get out of me, assuring me
that almost all the Liberal candidates had responded to his appeal. "Do
you think I am going to buy the sanction of your society by a paltry
fiver?" was my reply; and the agent went away faster than he came. My
next visitor was a pleasant, plausible representative of some workmen's
league, to assure me of his support, and then, with abundance of promise,
he went his way, leaving me to look for a performance of which I saw no
sign. Then came the ladies. Would I give them an interview? Some of
them wanted to set me right on Temperance questions; others on topics on
which no right-minded woman should care to speak, and on which few would
speak were it not for the morbid, sensational, hysterical feeling which
often overcomes women who have no families of their own to look after, no
household duties to discharge, no home to adorn and purify. As I had no
town house, and did not care to invite the ladies to the smoking-room of
my club, I in every such case felt bound to deny myself the pleasure of
an interview. But my correspondents came from every quarter of the land.
Some offered me their services; others favoured me with their views on
things in general. It was seldom I took the trouble to reply to them.
One gentleman, I fear, will never forgive me. He was an orator; he sent
me testimonials on the subject from such leading organs of public opinion
as _The Eatanswill Gazette_ or _The Little Pedlington Observer_, of the
most wonderful character. Evidently as an orator he was above all Greek,
above all Roman fame, and he was quite willing to come and speak at my
meetings, which was very kind, as he assured me that no candidate for
whom he had spoken was ever defeated at the poll. I ought to have
retained his services, I ought to have sent him a cheque, or my thanks.
Doubtless he would have esteemed them, especially the latter. Alas! I
did nothing of the kind.
But oh! the wearisome canvassing, which seems to be the only way to
success. Meetings are of little avail, organisation is equally futile,
paid agency simply leads the candidate into a Serbonian bog, where
Whole armies oft have perished.
It is house-to-house visitation that is the true secret now. As far as I
carried it out I was successful, though I did not invariably embrace the
wife of the voter or kiss the babies. The worst of it is, it takes so
much time. Now and then your friend is supernaturally wise. You must
stop and hear all he has to say, or you make him an enemy. Some
people--and I think they were right--seemed to think a candidate has no
business to canvass electors at all. One highly respectable voter seemed
really angry as he told me, with a severity worthy of a judge about to
sentence a poor wretch to hanging, it was quite needless for me to call,
that he was not going to disgrace his Baptist principles. Passing a
corner public one Saturday I was met with a friendly recognition. "We're
all going to oblige you, Sir," said the spokesman of the party, in a tone
indicating that either he had not taken the Temperance pledge, or that he
was somewhat lax in his observance of it, "and now you must oblige us
will you?" Him I left a sadder and a wiser man, as I had to explain that
the trifling little favour he sought at my hands might invalidate my
election. One female in a Peabody Building was hurt because I had in my
haste given a postman's rap at the door, instead of one more in use in
genteel society. In many a model lodging-house I found a jolly widow,
who, in answer to my appeal if there were any gentlemen, seemed to
intimate that the male sex were held in no particular favour. The
Conservative female was, as a rule, rather hard and sarcastic, and I was
glad to beat a retreat, as she gave me to understand that she was not to
be deceived by anything I might say, and that she should take care how
her husband voted. Now and then I was favoured with a dissertation on
the evil of party, but I could always cut that short by the remark, "Oh,
I see you are going to vote for the Conservative candidate!"--a remark
which led to a confession that in reality such was the case. The newly
enfranchised seemed proud of their privilege. It was not from them I got
the reply which I often heard where I should have least expected it, "Oh,
I never interfere in politics." People who had fads were a great bore.
One man would not vote for me because I was not sound on the Sunday
question; others who were of the same political opinions as myself would
not support me because I laughed at their pet theories. But the great
drawback was that I had come forward without leave from the party chiefs,
and hence their toadies, lay or clerical, sternly held aloof. Barely was
I treated uncourteously, except when my declaration that I was a Radical
led to an intimation on the part of the voter that the sooner I cleared
out the better.
I would suggest that all canvassing be prohibited--you want to get at the
public opinion of the borough, and that you do not obtain when you extort
a promise from a voter who has no definite opinion himself. Public
meetings and an advertisement or circular should be sufficient; but there
are many voters who will not take the trouble to attend, and a public
meeting, even if enthusiastic, is no criterion of what the vote will be.
It is easy to get up a public meeting if a candidate will go to the
necessary expense; and it is easier still to spoil one if the opposition
committee can secure the services of a few roughs or an Irishman or two.
Democratic Socialists I also found very efficient in that way, unable as
they would have been to carry a candidate, or to hold a public meeting
themselves. One of the funniest performances was, after you had had your
say, to reply to the questions. As a rule, the questioner thinks chiefly
of himself. He likes the sound of his voice, and he sits down with a
self-satisfied smile--if he be an old hand--as if he had made it
self-evident that he knew a thing or two, and that he was not the sort of
man you could make a fool of. But heckling, as it is called, is a
science little understood. It is one of the fine arts. A candidate, for
instance, likes to make a statement when he replies to a question. The
questioner, if he is up to the mark, will gain a cheer, as he denounces
all attempts at evasion, and demands a straightforward, Yes or No. A man
asks you, for instance, Have you left off beating your wife yet? How are
you to answer Yes or No in such a case? As a rule, the questioners are
poor performers, and ask you what no one need ask who hears a candidate's
speech, or reads his programme. One thing came out very clearly--that
is, the terror platform orators, lay or clerical, have of any body
calling itself a Liberal Association, whether it is really that or not.
You can get any number of orators, on the condition that you have an
association at your back. But they dare not otherwise lend you a helping
hand. Liberalism is to have the stamp of Walbrook on it. It must be
such as the wirepullers approve. I said to a Radical M.P.: "I am
fighting a sham caucus." "Ain't they all shams?" was his reply. There
is a danger in this; even though there are still men left in this age of
mechanical organism who value the triumph of principles more even than
that of party.
My experience is anybody can get into Parliament if he will keep pegging
away and has plenty of money. Let him keep himself before the public--by
writing letters to the newspapers, and by putting in an appearance at all
public meetings, and by promising wholesale as to what he will do. If he
can bray like a bull, and has a face of brass, and has money or friends
who have it, he may be sure of success. As a rule, the best way is to
get yourself known to the public in connection with some new development
of philanthropic life. But a little money is a great help. Gold touches
hearts as nothing else can. The biggest Radical of two candidates
naturally prefers the richer. Men who can crowd into all meetings, and
shout "Buggins for ever," are useful allies, and men of that stamp have
little sympathy with the poor candidates. Once in Parliament you are
useless, at the beck and call of the whipper-in, a slave to party; but
you are an M.P. nevertheless, and may not call your soul your own.