of a single locality; (2) that the _scrutin d'arrondissement_
facilitates corruption through the temptation which it affords
candidates to make to voters promises of favors, appointments, and
decorations, and (3) that the prevailing system augments materially
the more or less questionable influence which the Government is able
to bring to bear in the election of deputies.[481] It does not appear
that in the period 1885-1889 when the _scrutin de liste_ was in
operation the very desirable ends now expected to be attained by a
restoration of it were realized; indeed the system lent itself more
readily to the menacing operations of the ambitious Boulanger than the
_scrutin d'arrondissement_ could possibly have done. It is but fair,
however, to observe that the trial of the system was very brief and
that it fell in a period of unusual political unsettlement.

[Footnote 481: L. Duguit, Traite de droit
constitutionnel, I., 375-376.]

*348. Proportional Representation.*--In the judgment of many reformers a
simple enlarging of the electoral unit, however desirable in itself,
would be by no means adequate to place the national parliament upon a
thoroughly satisfactory basis. There is in France a growing demand for
the adoption of some scheme whereby minorities within the several
departments shall become entitled to a proportionate voice in the
Chamber at Paris. And hence a second programme of reform is that which
calls not merely for the _scrutin de liste_, but also for proportional
representation. Within the past two decades the spread of the
proportional representation idea in Europe has been rapid. Beginning
in 1891, the device has been adopted by one after another of the Swiss
cantons, until now it is in use in some measure in upwards of half of
them. Since 1899 Belgium has employed it in the election of all
members of both chambers of her parliament. In 1906 it was adopted by
Finland and by the German state of Wuerttemberg. In 1908 Denmark, in
which country the system has been employed in the election of members
of the upper chamber since 1867, extended its use to elections in (p. 321)
the municipalities.[482] In 1907 an act of the Swedish parliament
(confirmed after a general election in 1909) applied it to elections
for both legislative chambers, all parliamentary committees, and
provincial and town councils. In France there was organized in 1909,
under the leadership of M. Charles B