Generally speaking, in an electioneering country (I mean in a country full of political life, and used to the manipulation of popular institutions), the election of candidates to elect candidates is a farce.
Bagehot criticizes the practice of electing candidates to choose other candidates in politically active countries.
Share
More from Walter Bagehot
I own that I do not entirely sympathise with the horror of these anomalies which haunts some of our best critics.
It is natural that those who by special and admirable culture have come to look at all things upon the artistic side, should start back from these queer peculiarities.
The casual line was traced according to the strength of deceased combatants; succeeding generations fought elsewhere; and the hesitating line of a half-drawn battle was left to stand for a perpetual limit.
These anomalies, in a hundred instances, mark the old boundaries of a constitutional struggle.
Other voices in this conversation
