John Dafoe -- Winnipeg newspaperman, editor of the Winnipeg Free Press from 1901 to his death in 1944
Alfred Sifton -- federal cabinet minister in the WWI wartime Union government led by Conservative leader Robert Borden
Dafoe wrote Alfred Sifton on Nov. 10, 1920 on the local political situation.
A part of Sifton's lengthy letter states:
"The coming municipal elections are giving me a good deal of concern. ...
A victory for Labour a year ago would have had a very detrimental consequences and I think we [the Winnipeg Free Press] did the right thing in doing our bit to defeat Labour. This year the situation is not quite so bad.
For one thing, Pro-Rep has been adopted in all Manitoba elections [at the city and provincial levels in Winnipeg]. This was really the result of a Free Press crusade. It will enable us to keep pretty well out of the aldermanic contests because under pro-rep Labour is entitled to a percentage of the representation and will get it almost automatically.[*]
The difficulty arises over the mayoralty. The influence of moderate labour is beginning to revive and the moderates made an effort in the nominating conventions of the DLP to control the nomination for mayor. They put up Mr. Puttee but he was defeated by Mr. Farmer who was the Red candidate last year. [If Mr. Puttee had been chosen the Free Pres would have been neutral or even supportive of him]... however the result of the nomination makes it only too clear that the radical element element are still in control of the machinery of the Labour party. I know Farmer well. He is an impractical doctrinaire, and I should regard his election as mayor with great concern.
Citizens' Committee putting up Edward Parnell... as the head of a big business concern and a man with presumably some money and also as president of the Board of Trade, He is just a natural target not only for Labour but for thousands of other people who are discontented with present conditions....
We shall have, at least in the later stages of the campaign, to oppose Mr. Farmer on his record, even if we do not care to directly support Mr. Parnell."
(from the Dafoe-Sifton Correspondence 1919-1927, Nov. 10, 1920)
* Dafoe took notice of the way STV puts to rest the excitement and nail-biting live-or-die suspense of a FPTP election and the sharp antagonism it arouses.
The election saw Parnell win the mayors' chair with 52 percent of the vote. Farmer, the Labour mayoralty candidate, took 48 percent. There was no proportionality as the contest filled only one seat.
As well, eight Business and three Labour candidates were elected as councillors.
There seems to have been confusion within the Labour camp, in-fighting or manipulation by election officials. One Business candidate won a seat by acclamation, while three Labour candidates ran for just one seat in Ward 2.
This being Winnipeg's first STV city election, it was taken as test of STV. According to one report, the campaign was devoid of the bitterness that had marked the previous city election. (EB, Dec. 3, 1920)
It is not known whether Labour was barred from possibly taking a majority of seats through the kind of accidents that occur under FPTP or would not have done as well as they did under STV. But it is known that in the districts where Business candidates and Labour candidates competed, each side got the number of seats that reflected its popularity as parsed by the quota - 25 percent of the vote - and as determined by transfer of votes where necessary.
The result was more fair to either side than had been the previous city elections conducted under FPTP.
=============================================================
Comentarios