Until last week, the tiny (pop. 570) Channel Island of Sark had held only one general election in the 385 years since Queen Elizabeth granted it to Helier de Carteret, Seigneur of St. Ouen in Jersey. Sark's affairs have been administered by a hereditary seigneur and a Chief Pleas (parliament) composed of hereditary landholders. Sark's one gesture toward democracy came in 1922 when the island government took the drastic step of adding twelve elected deputies to its 34-man parliament. Once elected, the new deputies settled into their seats and Sark settled happily back into its old peaceful ways.
Then Henry Head came...
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