[220] _The Times_, September 12, 1904, denominated this episode "a melancholy and even ominous illustration of the process of democratic degeneration." In the same issue Mr. S. W. Belderson writes that 130 Members of the House signed the paragraph in question. [221] _The Times_, August 10, 1904. [222] _Report of the Inter-Departmental Committee on Post Office Establishments_, 1897; q. 13,804; Mr. S. Walpole, Permanent Secretary of the Post Office. [223] _The Times_, March 17, 1906; and _Who's Who_, 1905. [224] _Fifty-first Report of the Postmaster General_, 1905. CHAPTER XIII THE HOUSE OF COMMONS SELECT COMMITTEE ON POST OFFICE SERVANTS, 1906 The Post Office Civil Servants' Unions demand the adoption of the Bradford Committee Report. Lord Stanley, Postmaster General, applies the words "blackmail" and "blood-sucking" to the postal employees' methods. Captain Norton moves for a House of Commons Select Committee. Mr. Austen Chamberlain, Chancellor of the Exchequer, in vain asks the Opposition Party's support for a Select Committee to which shall be referred the question of the feasibility of establishing a permanent, non-political Commission which shall establish general principles for settling disputes between the Civil Servants and the Government of the day. Captain Norton's Motion is lost, nine Ministerial supporters voting for it, and only two Opposition members voting against it. Mr. J. Henniker Heaton's appeal to the British public for "An End to Political Patronage." The Post Office employees, in the campaign preceding the General Election of January, 1906, induce nearly 450 of the 670 parliamentary candidates who succeeded in being elected, to pledge themselves to vote for a House of Commons Select Committee on Post Office Wages. Immediately upon the opening of Parliament, the Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman Liberal Ministry gives the Post Office employees a House of Commons Select Committee. On September 17, 1904, the Postal Telegraph Clerks' Association unanimously resolved: "That this Conference expresses its indignation that the Postmaster General, having appointed a Committee of his own choosing to inquire into the Post Office wages ... now, for no good reason, has rejected the Report. This Conference, therefore, calls upon the Postmaster General to adopt immediately, as dated from May 9, 1904, the whole of the ameliorative recommendations contained in the Bradford Committee's Report; but the Postal Telegraph Clerks' Association reserves to itself the right to object to, and protest against, any recommendations which may be considered by this Association to be of a restrictive and retrograde character."[225] [Sidenote: _A Merchant in Politics_]