The fights of the ex-Independent Liberals in the three cornered ce) tests had a pathetically archai element. There was the same old trust in the magic of the pre-war party eries, party cries which have Jet them down so often. "Personal charm" was also supposed to be a. telling factor, Most of the Liberals had any amount of it. Mascots and party colours were very much to the fore. One local Liberal candidate was accompanied everywhere—right to the bottom of the poll, in fact,—cly u little boy dressed up to represent Felix the Cat. The Liberal position in the struggle was not un-ike that of a pleasant old gentleman wandering on to a football ground in the middle of a First League match and wanting to play Ludo.
Labour's sharp Parliamentary set~ back is a very different affair. The anti-Labour press is now finding it convenient to forget that Labour has always been a minority party und that it never had a majority the nation behind it, and are picturing it as a discredited Party which has lost the support of the nation. The truth is that Labour went into office with the support of 4,348,370 of the electors and after nine months in office, but not in power, it submitted its record and its grief vanees to the electorate and hi Been returned to Parliament education for the children, and more ample housing accommodation. Labour loudly promised all these things and had never had an opportunity of showing whether it could do them. The women were keen to see if its promises were as worthless as those of the other Enbour in office and confuse office ties. They have now seen power. They have found "it wanting.
The result would have been much more favourable for Labour if the election had taken place shortly after the passing of Mr. Snowden's vote-catching free breakfast-table budget. But since then the price of food has steadily advanced and the budget reduction has long since been swallowed up. Not the least of Labour's shortcomings in the eyes of these realist voters is its ineapacity to cope with profiteering. All its foreign achievements in the way of promoting international reconciliation counted for nothing. There nothing on which the average woman is so ignorant as_ international finance and the anti-Labour press took full advantage of the. fact. MacDonald was pictured as a cunning traitor plotting to strengthen Britain's enemies by _subsidising them with millions of pounds filched from our half-empty pockets. It-is to the credit of the more reputable Conservative papers that they warm ly protested against this campaign of vilification, The Lighthearted Artisan 'The working-class male voter was. little influenced by these stunts. He] is used to buying a daily paper for' its sporting and police court news and ignoring its polities. Ni cent. of them vote Labou continue to do so. Nor was it found Possible to excite the people by abuse of a Government that had. withdrawn a prosecution for sedition commenced against a young man who had a very distinguished military record but hi ¢ fallen on hard times and joltied the Communist Party. One often hears it} said that it is a wonder many more do not join it after what they have gone through and what they got for it. The only section of the Jcommunity whole-heartedly favour of continuing it was the communists, 'They were eager to have public' attention focussed on. the dis-illusionment of some of our ex-combatants. Others saw no. harm in lending a few millions to an axally seeing that we had just, lent a few to an ex-enemy. Labour! counted on about 210 seats in the new Parliament. Ramsay—Mac-Donald toured the country in a motor-ear and aired his grievances to huge audiences of passionate sympathisers, 5,471,000 votes. That with more than it million additional supporters should return with 40. less members is the fault of our imper-feet electoral machinery. Political Labour has lost office and will never regain it on such easy terms, but fits steady advance to actual power is unchecked,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.