The borough franchise after 1867

Historical Research

Volumn 69, Issue 170, 1996, Pages 306-327

  Davis, John ^a   Tanner, Duncan ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 2542519118     PISSN: 09503471     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-2281.1996.tb01860.x     Document Type: Review

References (90)

1. N. Blewett, 'The franchise in the United Kingdom, 1885-1918', Past and Present, xxxii (1965), 27-56;
2. H. C. G. Matthew, R. I. McKibbin and J. A. Kay, 'The franchise factor in the rise of the Labour party', Eng. Hist. Rev., xci (1976), 723-52;
3. P. F. Clarke, 'Liberals, Labour and the franchise', ibid., xcii (1977), 582-90;
4. D. M. Tanner, 'The parliamentary electoral system, the "4th" Reform Act and the rise of Labour in England and Wales', ante, lvi (1983), 205-19;
5. idem, Political Change and the Labour Party, 1900-18 (Cambridge, 1990), ch. iv.
6. F. O'Gorman, Voters, Patrons and Parties (Oxford, 1989);
7. idem, 'The unreformed electorate of Hanoverian England', Social Hist., xi (1986), 33-52;
8. broader debate, discussed in D. Beales, 'The electorate before and after 1832', Parliamentary Hist., xi (1992), 139-50.
9. Despite some pioneering studies, esp. H. J. Hanham, Elections and Party Management (2nd edn., Hassocks, 1978);
10. J. R. Vincent, The Formation of the Liberal Party, 1857-68 (1966);
11. I. G. Jones, Explorations and Explanations: Essays in the Social History of Victorian Wales (Llandysul, 1981), chs. iii-v, viii.
12. See also K. T. Hoppen, 'The franchise and electoral politics in England and Ireland, 1832-85', History, lxx (1985);
13. idem. Elections, Politics and Society in Ireland, 1832-85 (Oxford, 1984).
14. J. Davis, 'Slums and the vote', ante, lxiv (1991), 375-88.
15. D. G. Wright, Democracy and Reform, 1815-85 (1970), p. 93;
16. P. Thompson, Socialists, Liberals and Labour: the struggle for London, 1885-1914 (1967), pp. 65-9;
17. P. F. Clarke, Lancashire and the New Liberalism (Cambridge, 1971), p. 103; Blewett.
18. C. Seymour, Electoral Reform inEngland and Wales (1915, repr. Newton Abbot, 1970), p. 292.
19. Davis, 'Slums and the vote', for details of the legal cases, and further discussion of the implications below, p. 314-17.
20. Report from Select Committee on Registration of Voters, P.P., 294, 294-I (1868-9), vii. 301-524; 360 (1870), vi. 191-370.
21. T. Lloyd, The General Election of 1880 (Oxford, 1968), ch. iii;
22. Clarke, Lancashire, pp. 201-3.
23. For Liberal organization in the late 1880s and early 1890s, J. Davis, 'Radical clubs and London politics, 1870-1900', in Metropolis: Histories and Representations of London since 1800, ed. G. Stedman Jones and D. Feldman (1989). G. A. Jones, 'Further thoughts on the franchise, 1885-1918', Past and Present, xxxiv (1966), 134-8;
24. Tanner, Political Change, pp. 165, 231, 287-9, 306-7;
25. Newcastle Daily Leader, 12, 27 Sept. 1888 ('Northern constituencies: How to keep them and how to win them') and leader on Liberal organization in County Durham, 18 Sept. 1890.
26. See also Surrey County Record Office, Reigate Conservative Association Minutes, 21 Dec. 1892.
27. For uncontested seats, T. Lloyd, 'Uncontested seats in British general elections, 1852-1910', Historical Jour., viii (1965), 260-5.
28. The Ferret or South Wales Reporter, 11 Oct. 1873).
29. Tenement occupiers were granted the vote in Gateshead, Sunderland, South Shields and Newcastle, but denied it in Berwick, Tynemouth and Morpeth even when they paid rates (Newcastle Daily Chronicle, 2 Oct. 1868, Seymour, pp. 352, 356).
30. For protests at Berwick and Tynemouth, ibid., 26, 30 Sept. 1868.
31. Manchester Examiner and Times, 24 Sept. 1869;
32. Davis, 'Slums and the vote, p. 383.
33. Newcastle Telegraph, 30 Sept. 1871 for the revising barrister's view; Tyne and Wear Archives, Newcastle upon Tyne Electoral Register 1872, All Saints Parish, for the details.
34. Board of Trade inquiry into working-class Rents, Housing and Retail Prices, P. P. (1908), cvii. 370-1,
35. cited in M. J. Daunton, House and Home in the Victorian City (1983), p. 29.
36. Kensington vestry clerk, quoted West London Observer, 24 Sept. 1880.
37. H. M. Bompas, 'The vestry clerks and the franchise', The Echo, 31 July 1879.
38. E.g. Bathurst at Hackney, [Borough of] Hackney Express and Shoreditch Observer, 2 Oct. 1880.
39. Layton, Islington vestry clerk, quoted Islington Gazette, 27 Sept. 1881.
40. E.g. at Marylebone, Borough of Marylebone Mercury, 16 July 1881;
41. at Paddington, ibid., 23 July 1881;
42. at Islington, Islington Gazette, 18 July 1881.
43. St. George the Martyr, The Times, 22 Sept. 1883.
44. Overseers' dinner, Eastern Argus [and Borough of Hackney Times], 9 Sept. 1882.
45. E.g. in Shoreditch and Bethnal Green, Hackney Express and Shoreditch Observer, 11 March 1882, 4 Oct. 1884.
46. Dewey, Islington vestry clerk, Islington Gazette, 1 Oct. 1886.
47. As Hockin of the Plymouth Conservatives noted, people 'could not fail in looking through the judgement to see that Justice Brett was in a state of annoyance ... at having been called upon to construe and reconcile statutes which were apparently irreconcilable' (quoted Western Independent, 20 Sept. 1882). The decision was noted in other areas where its application could have proved significant (e.g. Leeds Mercury, 19 Sept. 1882;
48. Cited in R. M. Pritchard, Housing and the Spatial Structure of the City (Cambridge, 1976), p. 63.
49. See R. Dennis, English Industrial Cities of the 19th Century (Cambridge, pbk. edn. 1986), p. 261.
50. 'In Birmingham where they got four men on the electoral roll, three of them would be found sound Liberals. They therefore got them on wholesale, and as fast as they could' (speech at Hackney Liberals' Registration Conference, Borough of Hackney Times, 28 July 1883). The West Midlands generally presented an impressive picture and the Wolverhampton lists for 1882 were said to be a 'model of correctness' (Birmingham Daily Gazette, 29 Sept. 1882).
51. Birmingham Daily Post, 22 Sept. 1890.
52. Newcastle Daily Leader, 27 Sept. 1893.
53. W. F. Dewey, vestry clerk, quoted Islington Gazette, 24 Sept. 1888.
54. Comments on South-East Durham and Gateshead, Newcastle Daily Leader, 23 Sept. 1886, 19 Sept. 1890.
55. Bathurst, revising barrister for Bethnal Green, quoted in Eastern Argus, 3 Oct. 1891.
56. Islington Gazette, 21, 22, 26 Sept. 1887, 15 Sept. 1891).
57. In the area cleared for the Greyhound Street scheme in Nottingham 83 of the 136 adult men recorded in the census in 1871 do not appear in the electoral register. 19 of these were described as 'lodgers', 'boarders' or 'visitors' in the census. 12 of the remaining 64. were men living with one or both parents. Only one man living in such circumstances was registered (P.R.O., RG 10/3506; Nottinghamshire County Archives, Nottingham Electoral Register 1871).
58. 'I shall give up business until you are quiet. The House of Lords and House of Commons thought you respectable, or they would never have given you the franchise (derisive laughter)' (Goren, revising barrister, Marylebone Mercury, 24 Sept. 1881).
59. Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 20 Sept. 1881;
60. South Wales Daily News, 16 Sept. 1890.
61. For a description of the problems, Municipal Journal, 24 Aug. 1906 and for a registration diary, P.R.O., HO 45/10075/B7422.
62. For details of these dwellings, J. N. Tarn, Five Per Cent Philanthropy: an Account of Housing in Urban Areas between 1840 and 1914 (Cambridge, 1973), pp. 100-1.
63. Newcastle Daily Leader, 27 Sept. 1893.
64. Eastern Argus, 27 Aug. 1887.
65. Salford Chronicle, 26 Sept. 1891;
66. Newcastle Daily Chronicle, 17 Sept. 1886, 19 and 20 Sept. 1888, 19 Sept. 1890.
67. Newcastle Daily Chronicle, 26 Sept. 1888.
68. See also Tory statement that Liberals were claiming for every house in the borough, and Liberal counter-claims that the Tories had done the same thing the previous year (Sheffield Independent, 21 Sept. 1881).
69. Letter from chairman of the Bethnal Green Conservative Association and comment, Eastern Argus, 30 Aug. 1890.
70. The Star, 22 Aug. 1890.
71. For a similar purge in Poplar, East London Observer, 21 Sept. 1895.
72. For other Liberal attacks on the registration system see, e.g., Sheffield Independent, 23 Sept. 1890;
73. Few objections were usually made at the Newcastle or Swansea courts. At Lambeth it was reported that 'neither side has made any effort to serve objections, and, consequently, there will be only some half a dozen cases before the court' (The Times, 5 Sept. 1883).
74. See Liberal Publication Department, Borough Registration: Notes and Hints for the Guidance of Liberals (1896).
75. For critical evaluations of barristers, and of the appointments procedures, Rogers on Elections (17th edn., 1909), p. 149;
76. Liberal Agent, Oct. 1896, Oct. 1899; Bristol University Archives, Society of Liberal Agents' Minutes, 23 March 1899.
77. Birmingham Daily Gazette, 19 Sept. 1891 (Burton);
78. Islington Gazette, 29 Sept. 1886.
79. Salford Chronicle, 26 Sept. 1891.
80. Islington Gazette, 29 Sept. and 1 Oct. 1886.
81. Eastern Argus, 6 Oct. 1888;
82. West London Observer, 23 Oct. 1882. See also above, n. 48.
83. Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 20 Sept. 1881;
84. Liverpool Daily Post, 16 Sept. 1882.
85. See comments by Manchester's Liberal secretary, 'little, if any, notice is taken of the names sent in by our agents to the overseers of persons entitled to be placed on the list on the first of August either as new occupiers or occupiers who have removed' (Manchester Ref. Libr., Manchester Central Registration Committee Minutes, 9 June 1890).
86. Hull and East Yorkshire Times, 30 Sept., 7 Oct. 1893;
87. Letter from secretary of Limehouse Constitutional Association, East London Observer, 30 Sept. 1893.
88. Birmingham Daily Post, 22 Sept. 1890.
89. J. R. Seager, The Star, 19 Oct. 1888.
90. Eastern Argus (editorial), 12 Aug. 1882.