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The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria cover

The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria

Chapter 973: GENERAL ELECTION.
By Edward Farr
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About This Book

The volume traces British political, parliamentary, and military developments from the accession of George III through the early nineteenth century, chronicling changes of ministry and cabinet, debates over colonial taxation and the American conflict, parliamentary controversies involving figures such as Wilkes and Warren Hastings, questions of Catholic relief and slave-trade abolition, and responses to the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars, including major naval and continental campaigns, the union with Ireland, and domestic legislation on finance, civil liberties, and parliamentary reform.

GENERAL ELECTION.

The election of the new parliament took place in the midst of general excitement. This was very auspicious for the ministry. The declared intention of the dissolution had been to obtain from the people a house of commons pledged to support the reform bill. The only test by which candidates were tried, was their determination to support that measure. Nor was it sufficient to save a candidate from the storm which raged all over the country, that he should be willing to reform the representation. It was demanded of him that he should support the particular measure which the ministry had proposed. It was to be “the bill, the whole bill, and nothing but the bill.” Candidates who had long represented places were told by the electors that they could no longer vote for them, not because they were against the bill, but that they were against the king; they did not know much about it, but it was the king’s, and it must pass. The official influence of the ministry was put forth unsparingly and unblushingly. In some instances, indeed, it defeated its own object. Thus, in Ireland, two pledged supporters of the bill were elected for the city of Dublin. The losing candidates petitioned against the return, and it came out in the proceedings before the committee, that the vice-regal government had interfered directly to ensure the success of the sitting members. The consequence of this was that the committee found the sitting members were not duly elected; and, on a new election, two members were returned who were hostile to reform. The tumult and license which usually characterise a general election were more than ordinarily rampant and intolerant. Anti-bill candidates and their supporters were exposed to the most lawless violence wherever they dared to show themselves on the hustings, and were denounced on the one hand as oppressors of the people, and on the other as disloyal opponents of the people. In some instances the life, as well as the property of unpopular men was sacrificed; and in Scotland especially, the elections were controlled by the violence of riotous mobs. At the election for the county of Lanark, the late member was attacked with stones and missiles, from the gallery of the church in which the election took place; and when he was re-elected, those who voted for him were detained prisoners for some hours, until the military arrived to shield them from lawless violence. At Dumbarton, also, the successful candidate for the county was obliged to conceal himself in a garret, till the mob, believing he had escaped, dispersed. From the excitement and violence which everywhere prevailed, it was not surprising that the great majority of the elections terminated in favour of the reforming candidates. Out of the eighty-two county members for England, with the exception of about twelve, all were pledged to support the bill. Ministers, indeed, completely succeeded in obtaining a house of commons fashioned after their own mind: the great majority of the members were pledged to implicit obedience to the will of the people.