LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE CAMBRIDGESHIRE ELECTION.
[TO THE EDITOR OF TICE SPECTATOR.']
Sin,—Will you allow a constant reader of your paper to ask you, with reference to the Cambridgeshire election, whether you are not a little hard on Lord Blandford ? His retiring address indicated, and the article in the Cambridge Independent (quoted by the Pall Mall Gazette on Saturday last) proves, that he was not in the least unwilling or unready to fight, but that want of money was the sole cause of his retirement. I speak from experience in the matter, having been placed in precisely the same relation to the Liberal Party in East Sussex last year. I had written to the late lamented Mr. W. P. Adam, to ask whether there was an opening anywhere. He replied, suggesting East Sussex, I being the grandson of the Lord-Lieutenant of that canuty. Nothing was said by the Liberal Central Office about money, and I was afterwards informed that it was not the etiquette for the Whips or their assistants to say anything about expenses, unless application was made for assistance in that way, the function of the Central Office being to introduce can- didates where it was thought they were in request, not to inter- fere in any details of electioneering.
It might be thought, perhaps, that it was easy to ascertain the probable cost beforehand. I reply that it was not so easy, in the first place, to ascertain this by correspondence ; and in the next place, it was impossible to ascertain without actual conference with the leaders of the party whether all or any part of whatever sum was deemed requisite could be raised by subscription.
There seems to be an unfortunate etiquette which forbids one gentleman to hint to another that he is not wealthy enough to meet the cost of " his " election, as it is termed, though I should have thought an election belonged primarily to the con- stituency, not to the candidate. All I could learn beforehand was that it was thought the financial part could be arranged without, as I stipulated, any begging from my relations in Kent or Sussex. But when I got down to Lewes, I was told that the agents had "really looked into the thing," and, found that it "could not be done" under £5,000 for one candidate, £6,000 for two. One very able legal gentleman went so far as to say that there ought to be "no cheeseparing," to which I replied that if I had the management of the cheese, I would cut it in half ! Finding that the figures, 25,000, were firmly rooted in men's minds, and being privately informed by an eminent East-Sussex politician that a subscription would not " work " in East Sussex, I at once wrote to the papers that I was obliged, by pecuniary reasons, to withdraw my candi- dature; and, of course, the Press, on the other side, expatiated on my niggardliness and the "Liberal fiasco."
What I wish to ask you, Sir, is why it should be taken for granted that the present system of heavy electioneering ex- penses, extorted from the candidate himself, is part of the eternal fitness of things ? Both in Cambridgeshire and East Sussex, the pertinent question might have been asked, "Why did not the Liberals first decide to return their candidate free of expense, and then cut their coat according to their cloth ?"
If Mr. Duckham was returned in Herefordshire for 2443, why should not Tory strongholds like Cambridgeshire and Sussex be attacked for a like sum P I do not know what Lord Bland- ford thinks, but I know I take no small credit to myself for having drawn some attention in Sussex to the present scanda- lous cost (to candidates) of county contests.-1 am, Sir, (54c., Cobham Hall, Gravesend, September 12th. CLIFTON.
[The single reason for not reducing county expenses, say,. to- £500—which could be easily done by placing a polling-place in every parish or in every post-office, and prohibiting convey- ance—is that cheap county elections would let in tenant- farmers. If they knew their own interest, they would make- the reduction of expenses their first demand.—En. Spectator3
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