PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION AND THE SECOND. BALLOT.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] SIR,—Advocates of Proportional Representation will welcome the support of the Spectator. Proportional Representation was never more necessary than now if Parliamentary institu- tions are to be saved. May I add one word of comment ? In a sentence of your article of last week you speak of the second ballot as the "Continental system." This is no longer an accurate description. France, Italy, and Germany, after long experience of the second ballot, have now rejected it with dis- gust. Never was a system devised which produced such a crop of intrigues and electoral anomalies. Italy and Germany have now list systems of Proportional Representation; France has not yet Proportional Representation, but it was the popular resolve at all costs to get rid of the second ballot which enabled the present French electoral system to be carried into law. It is not over-sanguine to say that we shall not have long to wait before Proportional Representation conquers France.—I am,
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