Psephology, as guessing elections is called in Britain, is about as inexact an art as playing the football pools. Faced with a general election this year or next, the experts last week studied a rich crop of auguries with unusual diligence and the usual results: they disagreed.
Certainly, there was little to encourage Prime Minister Harold Macmillan's Conservatives in the outcome of 401 local borough elections. With 2,973 seats at stake, the Tories lost a total of 550; the Labor Party gained 544, winning control of local governments in such major cities as Leicester, Liverpool, Bradford, Bristol and Nottingham. Labor...