- THE SPANISE PUZZLE.
WE are not going to say much about the Spanish elections. In fact, when once the figures have been given nothing more can be said. What they mean or why. they are 'what they, are seem likely to remain mysteries to Englishmen. They know something about elections. They know what it is to give a Govern- ment an enormous majority or an unmistakable defeat. But in each case the decision of the electorate is the decision of the nation. There is always a percentage of each constituency remaining unpolled, but it is a per- centage that can be accounted for. So many are ill or absent, so many cannot make up their minds which way to vote, so many more dislike the candidate chosen by their party or have a grudge against the chairman of his committee. But with these exceptions the electors know well enough which party it is that they wish to see in office, and what the means are by which it can be put in office. It might be thought that in countries where there is universal suffrage electoral activity would be still greater than it is among ourselves. When every man has a vote, it will be the nation itself that goes to the poll. There will be no one left outside and uninterested. Every man has his share of influence, fractional though it may be, and will be eager for an occasion of exerting it. Enthu- siasm is catching, and the more voters there are, the more active and interested they will become.
• If we turn to Spain, we see how completely these ex- pectations can be defeated. Here is a country enjoying universal suffrage, yet the one permanent feature of its elections is that the majority of the electors do not care to go to the poll. We are familiar with electoral absten- tion in England, but it is only in municipal contests. Englishmen cannot bring themselves to care seriously about local government. There is a curiously general im- pression that whichever way they go the result is pretty much the same. One party may demand a liberal ex- penditure of public money for the public good, the other may dwell on the fact that public money comes out of private pockets. But the municipal elector is apt to think that whether he votes for one side or for the other the rates will remain the same, and so he does not trouble himself to vote at all. The Spanish elector seems to be in Much the same position as regards the affairs of the nation. In his belief all these Ministers, Deputies, and candidates are playing their own game and looking after their own interests. These a may and do mean a great deal to those who are working the machine, but they do not con- cern him. Governments come and go, but he is neither the better nor the worse. He knows that their promises will not be kept, that neither the good. nor the evil that he has been told to expect from their success will come to pass. Why, then, should he go a yard out of his way to vote for either party? This is to some extent the reasoning Of all the Latin nations. France and Italy show large traces of the same indifference on the part of the electors. But it is in Spain that abstention touches its utmost bound, and that the recovery from it seems most completely past praying for.
Perhaps the two facts that do most to explain the attitude of the Spanish elector are that the elections always go in favour of the party in power, and yet that the same party does not remain in power longer than in other countries. In England a Government does not ordinarily hurry on a Dissolution unless it thinks that it is likely to benefit by the elections. But in Spain the Government never seems to feel any doubt upon this head. If it post- penes a Dissolution it is simply because it is strong enough to do without one. If it is weak, if it is losing its hold over the Chamber, or finds a difficulty in carrying its measures, it seems to dissolve as a matter of course. Otherwise it might be defeated and forced. to retire, and then the Opposition would manage the elections, and Manage them for their own purpose. The electors see that the machinery of government is freely used to secure a majority for the Government, and. they leave the voting to those to whom the Government is an object either of hope or of fear. They are so well accustomed to see Ministerial pressure freely exerted that they have come to regard it as a necessary element in the Conduct of politics. If it stood alone, however, this fact might possibly tempt them to try to get some- thing out of the - Government for themselves. If the determining force in an election is always the hope of getting something if they vote for the Government— Oppositions, for the most part, having nothing to give away—or of losing something if they vote against it, why do not more Spaniards take their share in the game ? Possibly because the other fact just mentioned has con- vinced. them that politics are entirely a matter of intrigue. If the elections always go in favour of the Government, why is not the same Government always in power ? We have seen this week that the present Ministry has secured a large majority in the new Chamber. But this does not make it at all certain that the Ministry will be in office when the next General Election comes round. The majority expressly returned to support it will dwindle away, for no apparent reason, and in the end a new Cabinet will "make" the elections, and be returned by a similar majority, to suffer sooner or later the same fate. Thus the function of the electorate is reduced to the mere registration of results obtained by a process with which the electors have nothing to do. Cabinets are made and unmade by an in- trigue at Madrid. The country is only expected to confirm the change which that intrigue has effected. This is not a function to excite enthusiasm, or to tempt a man away from his business or his pleasure.
To forecast the political future of a country the political situation of which can be thus described is impossible. We know the general conditions of good government, and we know that, though different nations may possess them in very unequal degrees, their presence in any measure is an earnest of their ultimate growth. But in Spain these con- ditions hardly seem to mist. There is the form, the framework, of a constitutional and Parliamentary system, but the motive power is wanting. The people have the franchise in its fullest measure, but for any good it does them they might as well be without it. In fact, they might be better off if the majority of them were without it. Under a limited franchise the actual possessors are usually active politicians, while those who do not possess it see the excitement it creates in those who have it, and so become eager to gain it for themselves. If this were the condition of Spain we should be hopeful as to its future. All that would be needed to make Spaniards the architects of their own political edifice would be to put the tools into their hands. The will to use them would be there already, generated by the activity of the few to whom the posses- sion of them had hitherto been confined. But with the Spaniards it is just the will that is wanting. The tools are in every man's hand, but they neither know nor care how to use them. They are content to see election follow election and one Ministry give place to another without so much as a thought of doing their part in the shaping of events. They have no real wish in the matter, no belief that anything can come of their in- tervention, no object which suggests even a wish to make the interest of the public -their own. The dry bones may yet live, indeed, and. Spain once more take her place among self-governing nations. All we can say is that at present there is no symptom of any such change. Parliamentary institutions are excellent things when those who live under them know how to turn them to account. But when they are left to lie unused they are but as salt which has lost its savour, or as a drug which disagrees with the patient to whose disease it is at the same time the only antidote. The commonplaces of the political physician have no application here. All his remedies have been applied, and all have failed to work a cure.
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