Weekly Commercial Herald

THE PRIMROSE LEAGUE
INTERVIEW WITH LADY RANDOLPH CHURCHILL—HER CAMPAIGN.

A Well-Disciplined Phalanx of Lady Canvassers—The Various Methods of Political Work—The Grand Council—Titles—Badges.

It is evidently no freak of fancy that has induced Lady Randolph to throw herself with such ardor into the breaches of Birmingham politics, nor from any desire to emulate the famous campaign of the duchess of Devonshire, but a serious and carefully-directed effort. Lady Randolph is the general of a well-disciplined phalanx of lady canvassers, who are helping to return her doughty lord to the pedestal of power. "Only a fortnight ago," she informed me, "I opened a habitation here in Birmingham, and our forces now include 500 ladies. From this 500 a number of ladies are active canvassers, making a house-to-house visitation. The way of it is this: Each lady proposes to be responsible for a certain section of a certain ward or of a certain street, and each has a little book in which she jots down her memoranda. I mention the fact that we have 500 ladies enrolled on our staff, but of course the men are numerically a much stronger body. I myself? I work very hard, and without having any special section visit doubtful cases;" "doubtful cases" no doubt being synonymous with waverers.

USEFULNESS OF THE LADIES' LEAGUE.

"It is only within the last few weeks the usefulness of our league has been recognized. We were laughed at by candid friends who now"—this was heaping coals of fire on their devoted heads—"appeal to us for help. We have visited some of the poorest houses in Birmingham, and encountered some of the roughest of its people, but we have only one case in which a lady was received with anything but the greatest courtesy and politeness, even by our opponents. They listen to us, they hear our arguments, even if they do not always carry conviction."

"Would you tell me, Lady Randolph, what arguments you use?" "Well, I tell them what our side thinks of the questions of the day—it may be the church, it may be free trade, or it may be the landlord, and as I say, they agree with me or not, as the case may be. I trust that they agree." Lady Randolph has also visited some of the principal factories of the town. "The masters were good enough to allow me to speak to their employes, whether they were of our persuasion or no. And I found by this means that I was able to get over the ground with a greater rapidity." "I presume that lady canvassers have many good qualities which a man possesses not?"

Without committing herself to any statement which might be rash, Lady Randolph is decidedly of opinion that "a woman perhaps evinces more tact than a man" in many cases; and this no doubt is true enough, and Lady Randolph regards the personal house-to-house visitation and the little chats with the electors or their wives as a means toward a political education.

AN ENGINE FOR EDUCATING.

"We have no colors," replied Lady Randolph to my question, "but we have a badge, and one firm has manufactured 40,000 within a short time." Lady Randolph Churchill then explained the organization of the league, producing from a dainty velvet-covered volume some of the primrose "leaflets" or "cardboards," for, "to avoid the proved waste and uselessness of political leaflets and pamphlets, printed in the ordinary manner, the Ben Primrose issues are all on cardboard." But how much more sumptuous is the exterior of a "Ben Primrose Election Talk," with its admirable portrait of the talker within a garland of the flower that blooms in May. "The league is called into existence to bring Conservatives in friendly and united work for the advancement and maintenance of those constitutional principles which have made England what she is. Also to maintain the cause of religion and monarchical government, as against atheism and republicanism," and as the duchess of Marlborough (who was present) tersely and aptly put it, "as an engine for educating the masses." That the organization is widespread may be judged from the following particulars set forth by Lady Randolph Churchill in a recently-written introduction to the rules and regulations of the body:

The primrose league, a conservative association much derided in its infancy, can well afford to be laughed at now, although only in its third year, as it numbers many thousands of members, and is enrolling thousands per week, not to speak of its "habitations" or "branches," which are springing up in all parts of the empire—even as far as India, New South Wales and Canada—close on 800 habitations having been opened since June.

In view of the general election, a ladies grand council was formed, which is in direct communication with the central office. The committees in the various towns are called habitations—a habitation being much like a Masonic lodge, except that its operations are by no means secret. The ladies are "dames," the gentlemen "knights," "companions," "almoners," or "harbingers," and the badges are jewels, probably of Birmingham manufacture. And Lady Randolph concludes by remarking the fact "that women who have no vote should help largely to contribute to their influence in canvassing, as proving their disinterestedness, and should lend weight to those powers of argument which they are known to possess, and in which they can infuse all the persuasive characteristics of their sex"—Pall Mall Gazette.