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Religious Affiliation and Electoral Behaviour: A Case Study*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2014

John Meisel
John Meisel*
Affiliation:
Queen's University
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Extract

In many countries of the Western Hemisphere the nineteenth century witnessed the gradual expansion of the franchise. This development was made possible in the English-speaking world by the fact that the political creed of the power élite—liberalism—created a climate of opinion favourable to a belief in the inevitability of progress and the perfectability of man. The decision about who was to govern, and in general terms the way in which government was to be carried out, was to be made by the majority of the adult population. The necessity of deciding such important matters would, it was thought, induce the voters to rise to the occasion demanded by their new responsibilities: they would, on the whole, become politically educated, informed, and wise. In casting their ballots men were expected to bear in mind the public good, not private gain. John Stuart Mill, for example, in opposing the secret ballot, argued that a person's vote

is not a thing in which he has an option; it has no more to do with his personal wishes than the verdict of a juryman. It is strictly a matter of duty; he is bound to give it according to his best and most conscientious opinion of the public good. Whoever has any other idea of it is unfit to have the suffrage; its effect on him is to pervert not to elevate his mind. Instead of opening his heart to an exalted patriotism and the obligation of public duty, it awakens and nourishes in him the disposition to use a public function for his own interest, pleasure, or caprice. … In any political election … the voter is under an absolute moral obligation to consider the interest of the public, not his private advantage.…

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science/Revue canadienne de economiques et science politique , Volume 22 , Issue 4 , November 1956 , pp. 481 - 496
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1956

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Footnotes

*

This paper was presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Political Science Association in Montreal, June 6, 1956. The surveys on which it is based were made possible by two grants from the Arts Research Committee, Queen's University.

References

1 Representative Government (Everyman's Library, London, 1910), 229, 300.Google Scholar

2 Stoke, H. W., The Paradox of Representative Government, cited by W. E. Binkley in American Political Parties (New York, 1947), 3.Google Scholar

3 McCallum, R. B. and Readman, Alison, The British General Election of 1945 (London, 1947)Google Scholar; Nicholas, H. G., The British General Election of 1950 (London, 1951)Google Scholar; Butler, D. E., The British General Election of 1951 (London, 1952)Google Scholar, and The British General Election of 1955 (London, 1955).Google Scholar

4 For an annotated bibliography on studies of voting behaviour, see Dupeux, G., “Le Comportement électoral: revue des recherches significatives et bibliographie,” Current Sociology, III, no. 4, 1954–5, 330–44.Google Scholar See also Lipset, S. M. et al., “The Psychology of Voting: An Analysis of Political Behavior” in Lindzey, Gardner, ed., Handbook of Psychology (Cambridge, Mass., 1954), II, 1170–5.Google Scholar

5 Proust, Marcel, Time Regained (London, 1944), 249.Google Scholar

6 Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics, Ninth Census of Canada (Ottawa, 1953), I, Table 42.Google Scholar

7 John A. Macdonald: The Young Politician (Toronto, 1952), 301–3.Google Scholar

8 D.B.S., Ninth Census of Canada (Ottawa, 1953), I, Table 35.Google Scholar

9 Kingston has not only a somewhat larger turnout at elections than comparable cities, but it is one of the few cities in Canada in which one of the parties (the Liberals) has been able to own its permanent headquarters—the Liberal Hall. A further indication of the seriousness with which many Kingstonians regard the political battle is found in municipal elections. Here party ties are important in the mayoralty contests, although the party organizations do not participate formally.

10 In 1935, Kingston, which had been Conservative since 1911, behaved in a unique manner. In electing Norman McL. Rogers, the future minister of labour, and later of defence, it sent to Ottawa not only a Liberal, but more astounding still, a professor of political science.

11 Lipset, et al. in Lindzey, , ed., Handbook of Psychology, II, 1128. For an excellent discussion of cross-pressure see pp. 1133–4.Google Scholar

12 D.B.S., Ninth Census of Canada, I, Table 41.

13 Lazarsfeld, Paul F. et al., The People's Choice (2nd ed., New York, 1948), 24.Google Scholar

14 For a brief reference to another instance of the somewhat unique electoral behaviour exhibited by the professional and managerial group see Campbell, Angus et al., The Voter Decides (Evanston, Ill., and White Plains, N.Y., 1954), 74.Google Scholar

15 In 1953 the residents of this hospital were part of a polling station where the Liberal candidate polled 79 per cent of the votes and the Conservative 21 per cent. The returns for the 1955 provincial elections were as follows: Liberal, 35 per cent; Conservative, 62 per cent.

16 For a useful discussion of this idea see Heberle, R., “The Problem of Political Generations” in his Social Movements (New York, 1951), chap. VI.Google Scholar

17 Herberg, Will, Protestant, Catholic, Jew (New York, 1955).Google Scholar