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Category Archives: Elections
Vaccination and the Vote: a Victorian dilemma
With mass vaccinations underway across the nation, spare a thought for the Victorian pioneers of the UK’s first major vaccination programme, against smallpox. As well as battling against all sorts of safety fears and logistical problems, they unwittingly found themselves … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, Local government, Uncategorized
Tagged Boards of Guardians, Poor Law, Registration, vaccination, Voting rights
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Small borough politics in County Cork, 1832-1868: Bandon, Kinsale, Mallow and Youghal
This post from our research fellow Dr. Stephen Ball was originally published on the History of Parliament blog as part of a Local History series on electoral politics in Ireland. The county of Cork was widely referred to as ‘the … Continue reading
Elected without his consent: William Wilshere (1804-67) and the venal electors of Great Yarmouth
The huge financial cost of Victorian elections, especially in venal constituencies, has been a recurrent theme in some of our more recent blogs. It’s tempting to think of the MPs associated with bribery, treating and other forms of electoral corruption … Continue reading
Posted in Biographies, Constituencies, Corruption, Elections, Images of MPs, MP of the Month
Tagged bribery, corruption, election corruption
1 Comment
A Highland canvass in a ‘pocket county’: Ronald Gower (1845-1916) and the 1867 Sutherland by-election
In the fourth blog of his series on Lord Ronald Gower (1845-1916), Dr Martin Spychal, uses Gower’s diaries to provide some rare insights into mid-Victorian electioneering in the ‘pocket county’ of Sutherland. This blog was also posted as part of the … Continue reading
A ‘pocket’ borough or a borough needing deep pockets? Abingdon’s elections in the nineteenth century
In this blog, originally posted on the main History of Parliament site, Dr Philip Salmon examines the parliamentary representation of Abingdon in the 19th century. Abingdon was widely regarded as an easily managed ‘pocket’ or ‘nomination’ borough during the 19th … Continue reading
Representing Glamorgan, 1832-85: Mr. Talbot and his colleagues
This post originally appeared on the History of Parliament’s blog as part of a Local History series on Glamorgan and Monmouthshire. The earlier posts in the series looked at elections in the 1640s and the 18th century. In the 19th … Continue reading
From duelling to sharing the representation: Northumberland’s electoral politics in the nineteenth century
This post first appeared on the History of Parliament blog as part of a local history series on Northumberland’s politics. You can read the other posts in the series here and here. In 1826 Northumberland experienced its first contested election … Continue reading
‘The power of returning our members will henceforth be in our own hands’: parliamentary reform and its impact on Exeter, 1820-1868
This week Dr Martin Spychal, research fellow for the Commons 1832-68, uses polling and voter registration data to explore the 1832 Reform Act’s impact on elections in Exeter. This blog was originally published on the History of Parliament blog as … Continue reading
Posted in Constituencies, Elections, party labels, Voting and Divisions
Tagged 1832 Reform Act, 1867 Reform Act, boundaries, Devon, devon history, exeter, Exeter elections, Exeter Guildhall, Featured, General election, local and community history, local history, parliamentary reform, Polling
1 Comment
From parliamentary reporter to Member of Parliament: Robert Spankie (1774-1842)
January’s MP of the Month takes a look at the unusual pre-parliamentary career of Robert Spankie, who was returned for Finsbury in 1832. A ground-breaking parliamentary reporter during the 1790s, Spankie ascended to the editorship of the Morning Chronicle before re-training as a barrister and serving as a controversial advocate-general of Bengal. Continue reading
Happy New Year from the Victorian Commons!
For eight years now we have been marking the new year with some highlights from the previous 12 months. The events of 2019 certainly focused attention on parliamentary history and the UK’s constitutional practices as never before. Taking our cue … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, Uncategorized
Tagged election corruption, Electioneering, Jack Whitehall, MP of the Month, newport, peterloo, Prorogation, Registration, speaker
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Elections and electioneering, 1832-1868
As voters across the country head to the polls this month, we thought it was an ideal opportunity to look back at some of the research on 19th century elections we have featured in our blogs over the past few … Continue reading
Posted in Elections
Tagged election corruption, Electioneering, Elections, Hustings, non-electors, public voting, secret ballot
1 Comment
MP of the Month: Thomas Neville Abdy (1810-1877) and electoral misconduct
Thomas Abdy’s political career provides a useful reminder of the chicanery, lies and corruption sometimes associated with 19th century English electioneering – venal traditions that became increasingly unacceptable during the Victorian era. Born into a naval family – his father … Continue reading
MP of the Month: William Tooke and the royal charters of the University of London
Following our blogs on the creation of the University of London constituency in 1868 and its first MP, Robert Lowe, August’s MP of the Month is William Tooke. As MP for Truro from 1832, Tooke worked tirelessly to secure a royal charter for the London University (later University College London) in order that it could grant degrees to its students. Continue reading
‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ Thomas Jones Phillips (1790-1843): pioneering Tory election agent
If you think some of the recent electioneering tactics that have hit the headlines seem extraordinary, spare a thought for the voters of Monmouth in the 1830s. As a new episode of the BBC’s ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ … Continue reading
The representation of Devon and Cornwall after reform, 1832-68
Last week the History of Parliament and the Devon and Cornwall Record Society hosted a conference at Exeter on ‘The South West and Parliament’. Dr Martin Spychal of the Victorian Commons spoke at the event, and today provides an overview of … Continue reading
The Disruption, Parliament and Conservative division: Alexander Campbell (1811-1869)
In May 1843 a schism in the Church of Scotland, better known as the Disruption, led to the creation of the evangelical Free Church of Scotland. It was the culmination of a decade-long conflict over the ability of parishioners to appoint their minister, and wider concerns over state interference with the Scottish Church. April’s MP of the Month is the Conservative MP for Argyllshire, Alexander Campbell, who was one of the founding elders of the Free Church. His ruthless electioneering in Argyllshire from 1836, eventual election in 1841, and failed legislative attempts to prevent the breakup of the Church placed the looming controversy at the centre of parliamentary politics. It also revealed irreconcilable differences between the Conservative Prime Minister Robert Peel and one of his few Scottish backbenchers. Continue reading
The Anglican clergy and English elections, 1832-37
This week we hear from Nicholas Dixon, of Pembroke College, Cambridge, on clerical influence in the reformed electoral system. It is one of the themes addressed in his PhD, which examines the Church of England’s influence on English politics and society … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, Guest blog
Tagged Church of England, clergy, clerical influence, religion
1 Comment
Corruption at elections in Britain in the 19th century
Following on from Martin Spychal’s blog about the paper he gave at last month’s ‘From “Old Corruption” to the New Corruption?’ conference, organised jointly by Oxford Brookes and Newman Universities, we hear from our assistant editor Kathryn Rix. She gave … Continue reading
Victorian Election Violence Project
We’re delighted to host a guest blog from Dr. Gary Hutchison, Research Associate on the Victorian Election Violence Project at Durham University. Here he outlines the project’s methods and shares some of its preliminary findings. Electoral violence plagues many current … Continue reading
Electoral malpractice and uncivil political speech: the case of Alfred Seymour MP
Our ‘MP of the Month’ blog highlights some themes still fresh in our minds after attending a conference on corruption at Oxford Brookes University. Alfred Seymour (1824-1888) was the younger brother of the better known archaeologist and explorer Henry Danby … Continue reading
Innovation, corruption and bankruptcy: Charles John Mare (1814-1898)
Charles John Mare (1814-1898) was an innovative East End shipbuilder. Thought to be a millionaire when he was returned for Plymouth in 1852, his election proved the apex of his career. He was unseated for bribery in 1853, and declared bankrupt, for the first of four times, in 1855. Continue reading
Posted in Biographies, Corruption, Elections, Images of MPs, Uncategorized
Tagged bankruptcy, East End, London, Plymouth, shipbuilding, West Ham
3 Comments
‘So much for the behaviour of the first assemblage of gentlemen’: views from parliament by a Devonshire Tory
Our Victorian MP of the Month is the Conservative MP for Devonshire South, Montagu Parker. His correspondence with his mother between 1835 and 1841 provides a fascinating perspective on life at Westminster. Montagu Edmund Newcombe Parker (1807-1858) is best known … Continue reading
MP of the Month: John Barton Willis Fleming (1781-1844)
With modern electioneering tactics currently attracting so much scrutiny at home and abroad, our Victorian MP of the Month focuses on a notorious election fixer or ‘boroughmonger’, whose activities increasingly pushed the boundaries of acceptable behaviour. His refusal to answer … Continue reading
MP of the Month: Andrew Carew O’Dwyer (1801-1877)
Many of our recent posts have focused on the way barriers to the franchise were gradually removed in the 19th century, but it is worth noting that there were also many barriers to becoming a Victorian MP. One of these … Continue reading
Posted in Biographies, Elections, Ireland, MP of the Month
Tagged Daniel O'Connell, Drogheda, Ireland, MP of the Month, property qualification
1 Comment
MP of the Month: John Moyer Heathcote (1800-1892), the MP who never was
One of our first tasks when we began our 1832-1868 project was to compile a full list of the MPs elected during this period whose biographies we would research. With invaluable assistance from Stephen Lees, who co-edited the later Who’s … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, MP of the Month
Tagged double return, Election petitions, Huntingdonshire, Lord John Russell, MP of the Month
1 Comment
MP of the Month: George Donisthorpe Thompson (1804-1878)
December’s MP of the Month blog charts the path into Parliament of George Thompson, a self-educated book-seller’s son. As one of Britain’s foremost platform orators he was a major figure in the abolition of slavery in the West Indies and … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, MP of the Month, women, Working-class politics
Tagged Abolition of slavery, Abolitionists, American Civil war, Anti-Corn Law League, British India Society, Dwarkanauth Tagore, Female participation, Frederick Douglass, George Thompson, indian independence, Lord Brougham, March of Intellect, slavery, Southampton, Tower Hamlets
2 Comments
‘A woman actually voted!’: Lily Maxwell and the Manchester by-election of November 1867
Today marks the 150th anniversary of the casting of a parliamentary vote by Lily Maxwell, a Manchester shopkeeper, more than half a century before the partial enfranchisement of women in 1918. On 26 November 1867, at a by-election in Manchester, … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, women
Tagged 1867 Reform Act, Female participation, John Stuart Mill, Lily Maxwell, Lydia Becker, Manchester, Registration, women, Women voters, women's suffrage
4 Comments
Parliaments and Popular Sovereignty Conference: Manchester
Last week two members of the Victorian Commons project gave papers in Manchester, at a conference held at the People’s History Museum, home to what must surely be one of the UK’s finest collections of political memorabilia associated with mass … Continue reading
Some parallels: the 1832 and 2018 boundary reviews
To celebrate the recent open-access publication of his article ‘‘One of the best men of business we had ever met’: Thomas Drummond, the boundary commission and the 1832 Reform Act’, our Research Fellow on the 1832-1868 project, Dr Martin Spychal, … Continue reading
Party Affiliation in the Reformed Commons, 1832-68
As the election results were declared in each constituency at this month’s general election, they were swiftly collated by the media to give an assessment of the overall balance of power within the new House of Commons. With each candidate’s … Continue reading
Posted in Elections
Tagged Conservative party, general elections, Liberal party, party labels
2 Comments
Minority governments and major change: a Victorian view
For most modern commentators the prospects for minority governments, based on the experience of the last half century or so, don’t look particularly good. Nearly all the recent examples currently being revisited by analysts, such as those of the 1970s, … Continue reading
Local polls and general elections: a Victorian perspective
As barometers of political opinion, local elections have long had a special place in British politics, offering useful (though not necessarily accurate) guides to national trends. The link between local and national polls, however, has always been complicated. As the … Continue reading
Five elections in seven years: Peterborough, Whalley and the Fitzwilliam interest
With suggestions of election fatigue setting in across Britain, this week’s blog – featuring our MP of the Month, George Hammond Whalley – looks at a constituency which saw five elections held in seven years between 1852 and 1859: the … Continue reading
‘Fighting, swearing, drinking, and squabbling’: Charles Dickens, Eatanswill and the 1835 Northamptonshire North by-election
Today’s blog marks the anniversary of Charles Dickens’s birth by exploring the inspiration behind one of the most notable political events in his first novel. Dickens’s riotous description of the Eatanswill borough election in the Pickwick Papers, first published in July … Continue reading
MP of the month: William Pinney and another kind of ‘slavery election’
William Pinney’s career as an MP serves as an important reminder of the legacy of slave ownership in British public life and the very different attitudes to electoral corruption that existed in the nineteenth century, even among radically-inclined Liberals. In Pinney’s … Continue reading
Posted in Biographies, Constituencies, Corruption, Elections, MP of the Month
Tagged Female participation, Lyme Regis, Mary Anning, slavery
3 Comments
180th Anniversary of Town Council Elections
This month marks the anniversary of a completely new system of local elections being implemented throughout England and Wales. One hundred and eighty years ago, almost 180 boroughs in England and Wales began to publish the lists of all those … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, Local government
Tagged council elections, Local government, municipal reform, town councils
2 Comments
A Victorian Essex Election
As electors go to the polls in the Clacton by-election, we consider how Essex voters behaved in the mid-nineteenth century, when the expanding seaside resort was still part of the Essex North constituency. In the fifty years following the 1832 … Continue reading
Posted in Constituencies, Elections
1 Comment
The mathematics of Victorian representation: part 2
In an earlier blog on Victorian double-member elections, we looked at the differences between the total vote received by candidates and the levels of support for each party. Put simply, owing to splitting (cross-party voting) and other ‘non-party’ forms of … Continue reading
Posted in Constituencies, Elections
Tagged double-member, multi-member, plumping, pollbooks, splitting
3 Comments
The mathematics of Victorian representation: part 1
In this new series of posts, we look at the Victorian multi-member constituencies that predated the UK’s current electoral system and highlight the mathematical challenges they pose for historians. The first-past-the-post system of electing MPs has long been viewed as … Continue reading
MP of the Month: Sir Robert Juckes Clifton
Next to the Wilford toll bridge, on the Trent embankment near Nottingham, stands a statue of Sir Robert Juckes Clifton (1826-1869). The life-size sandstone statue, which was once described by the Strand magazine as having ‘the worst sculptured trousers in the kingdom’, … Continue reading
Project progress: 1,000th article
The 1832-68 project recently passed a major milestone with the completion of its 1000th article. 897 biographies and 106 constituency accounts (comprising over 2 million words) have now been written and are being uploaded to our preview website, which, when … Continue reading
Parliament Week 2013: Women in Democracy
To mark Parliament Week 2013, the theme of which is ‘Women in Democracy’, we would like to share some of our recent research highlighting the varied nature of female participation in British political life during the nineteenth century, despite the … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, women
Tagged Election petitions, Electioneering, Female participation, Parliament Week, women
3 Comments
A Victorian paradox explained: popular candidates with no votes
To campaign for a seat in the House of Commons, only to find that no one has voted for you, is something that must haunt the imagination of any aspiring MP. In the 1850s this fate befell two controversial politicians … Continue reading
Book review: By-elections in British politics, 1832-1914
A review of By-elections in British politics, 1832-1914 (edited by T. Otte and P. Readman), to which Philip Salmon and Kathryn Rix have both contributed chapters, has just been published by Reviews in History. Our earlier blog giving details of … Continue reading
Elections after the secret ballot
Following on from Philip Salmon’s recent post about elections before the secret ballot, you can now see Kathryn Rix’s post on the main History of Parliament blog about the first poll under the 1872 Ballot Act, held at Pontefract 141 years … Continue reading
Elections before the secret ballot
This month marks the 141st anniversary of the first use of the secret ballot to elect an MP, at a by-election in the Yorkshire borough of Pontefract. Before the 1872 Ballot Act, and throughout the period covered by our Victorian … Continue reading
Posted in Constituencies, Elections, Uncategorized
Tagged poll clerks, public voting, secret ballot
3 Comments
MP of the month: George Faithfull
Continuing our recent focus on Victorian female voters and women’s suffrage, this MP of the month feature highlights the career of George Faithfull (1790-1863), a Brighton radical who clashed spectacularly with his former supporters over the rights of women voters … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, MP of the Month
Tagged Female participation, Local government, MP of the Month, women, Women voters
1 Comment
Democracy in Devon: exhibition at the Devon Heritage Centre
Welcome to the second of our guest blogs, which coincides with an exhibition running at the Devon Heritage Centre. Organised by Dr. David Thackeray, of the University of Exeter, the exhibition demonstrates the vitality of popular participation in nineteenth century … Continue reading
The Victorian female franchise
Welcome to the first of our guest blogs. On BBC Radio 4 tonight Dr Sarah Richardson presents a programme about the discovery of an early Victorian poll book listing women voters (click here to listen). Female participation in non-parliamentary elections … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, Guest blog, Local government, women
Tagged Elections, Female participation, Local government, women, Women voters
5 Comments
Happy New Year from the Victorian Commons!
As 2013 begins, the Victorian Commons blog would like to wish all its readers a very Happy New Year! We’re looking forward to a new year of blogging, but in the meantime, here are some of our highlights of 2012. Our … Continue reading
