Reform Acts

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(Redirected from
Reform Act
)
For the Canadian legislation, see Reform Act (Canada).

The Reform Acts (or Reform Bills, before they were passed) are

enfranchise new groups of voters and to redistribute seats in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom
.

These began with the

Conservatives under the urging of the Liberals
, while that of 1882 was introduced by the Liberals and passed in 1884. These latter two bills provided for a more democratic representation.

Following the

Reform Act 1928, passed by the Conservatives, resulted in universal suffrage with a voting age of 21. In 1969, the United Kingdom became the first major democratic country to lower its age of franchise to 18 in the Reform Act 1969 passed by the Labour
government.

Internationally, the Parliament of the United Kingdom and its

The mother of parliaments
".

Background

UK parliamentary franchise (1832-2010)
Percentage of the population of the United Kingdom registered to vote at general elections, 1832-2010

In the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, before 1832, fewer than one adult male in ten was eligible to vote in parliamentary elections.[1] Moreover, the franchise varied a great deal between England (which included Wales), where it was wider, and Scotland and Ireland, where it was narrower.[2][3] A few boroughs gave the vote to all male householders, but many parliamentary seats were under the control of a small group or sometimes a single rich aristocrat. Reforms had been proposed in the 18th century, both by radicals such as John Wilkes and by more conservative politicians such as William Pitt the Younger. However, there was strong opposition to reform, especially after the outbreak of the French Revolution (1789–99). The cause was continued after 1792 by the London Corresponding Society.

Eventually, the parliamentary franchise was expanded and made more uniform through a series of Reform Acts beginning with the

disenfranchised citizens. Sources refer to up to six "Reform Acts",[5][6][7] although the earlier three in 1832, 1867/8 and 1884 are better known by this name.[note 1] Some other acts related to electoral matters also became known as Reform Acts.[12][13][note 2]

The following Acts of Parliament are known as Reform Acts:

There are many other

The mother of parliaments".[26]

1832 Reform Act

Main article: Reform Act 1832

The 1832 Reform Act for England and Wales was the most controversial of the electoral reform acts passed by the Parliament. Similar Acts were passed the same year for Scotland, and Ireland. They were put through Parliament by the

"rotten" and "pocket" boroughs such as Old Sarum, which with only seven voters, all controlled by the local squire, was still sending two members to Parliament. This act not only re-apportioned representation in Parliament, thus making that body more accurately represent the citizens of the country, but also gave the power of voting to those lower in the social and economic scale, for the act extended the right to vote (in the boroughs) to any long-term holders of tenements of at least £10 annual value, adding 217,000 voters to an electorate of 435,000. Annual value here refers to the income that the land could be expected to earn if let, in a year.[27] As many as one man in five, though by some estimates still only one in seven, now had the right to vote.[1]

The agitation preceding and following the First Reform Act made many people consider fundamental issues of society and politics. The bill allowed the middle classes to share power with the upper classes; for many conservatives, this was revolutionary. Some historians argue that this transfer of power achieved in Britain and Ireland what the French Revolution of 1848 eventually achieved in France.

Charles Dickens observed these events at first hand as a shorthand Parliamentary reporter. The novel Middlemarch, by Mary Ann Evans (George Eliot) is set in the 1830s and mentions the struggle over the Reform Bills, though not as a major topic. Eliot's Felix Holt, the Radical, set in 1832, is a novel explicitly about the Great Reform Act.

1867 Reform Act

Main article: Reform Act 1867

The

Conservatives under the urging of the Liberals. The 1867/8 Acts for England and Wales, Scotland, and Ireland extended the right to vote still further down the class ladder. In England and Wales, the reforms added just short of a million voters, including many workingmen, which doubled the electorate to almost two million.[1]

Like the Great Reform Act before it, the Second Reform Act also created major shock waves in contemporary British culture. In works such as Matthew Arnold's Culture and Anarchy and John Ruskin's The Crown of Wild Olive, contemporary authors debated whether the shift of power would create democracy that would, in turn, destroy high culture.

1884 Reform Act

Main article: Representation of the People Act 1884

A further Reform Bill was introduced in 1882 by the Liberals. It was passed by the Conservatives in 1884 becoming the Third Reform Act. It was the first electoral reform act to apply to the United Kingdom as a whole. Only with this Act did a majority of adult males gain the right to vote in parliamentary elections. Along with the 1885 Redistribution Act, this tripled the electorate again, giving the vote to most agricultural laborers.[1]

1918, 1928 and 1969 Reform Acts

Main articles: Representation of the People Act 1918, Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act 1928, and Representation of the People Act 1969

By the end of the 19th century and in they early 20th century, voting was coming to be regarded as a right rather than the property of the privileged but the

Equal Franchise Act 1928, the Fifth Reform Act, passed by the Conservatives.[1]

The

Sixth Reform Act, making Britain the first major democratic nation to extend voting rights to all adults aged 18 or over.[28][29][30]

Modern usage

Further information: Electoral reform § United Kingdom

The periodic redrawing of constituency boundaries is now dealt with by a permanent

Boundary Commission in each part of the United Kingdom, rather than a Reform Act.[31]

Some people in Britain, mostly associated with the Liberal Democrats political party, have called for a new "Great Reform Act" to introduce electoral changes they favour. These would include lowering the minimum voting age to 16 and introducing proportional representation, which are also supported by the Green Party of England and Wales.[26][32][33][34]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Various sources, books and texts commonly use this description.[8][9][10][11]
  2. ^ For the narrative history see Llewellan Woodward, The Age of Reform, 1815–1870 (2nd ed. 1961) and Asa Briggs, The Age of Improvement 1783-1867 (1959).
  3. ^ See the information box at the bottom of the article.

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Johnston, Neil (2013), The History of the Parliamentary Franchise, House of Commons Library, retrieved 16 March 2016
  2. JSTOR 24416034
    .
  3. ^ History, Scottish; read, Archaeology 10 min. "Franchise reform in nineteenth century Scotland". National Museums Scotland. Retrieved 1 January 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  4. ISBN 978-1-136-09732-4
    .
  5. ^ a b Kitching, Paula. "Political Reform: Lesson Plan 6: Overview" (PDF). The History of Parliament. p. 3. Create one of the following charts for each of the six Reform Acts
  6. ^ a b "1969 Representation of the People Act". www.parliament.uk. Retrieved 2 January 2021. 1969-sixth-reform-act
  7. ^ a b "Members of Parliament Chadderton". www.chadderton-historical-society.org.uk. Retrieved 2 January 2021. Act of 1969 (also known as the Sixth Reform Act)
  8. ISBN 978-1-4718-3848-4
    .
  9. ISBN 978-1-905036-26-4
    .
  10. ISBN 978-0-435-32692-0
    .
  11. ISBN 978-0-7190-6081-6
    .
  12. ^
    ISBN 978-1-317-88325-8
    .
  13. ^ a b Reid, Andrew (1887). We must fight it out!-And why?. pp. 16–17.
  14. ISBN 978-1-134-81603-3
    .
  15. ^ Francis Barrymore Smith (1966). The Making of the Second Reform Bill. CUP Archive.
  16. ISBN 978-0-8240-5156-3
    .
  17. S2CID 155070834
    .
  18. ^ Tanner, Duncan (1983). The Parliamentary Electoral System, the Fourth Reform Act and the Rise of Labour in England and Wales.
  19. ^ Albjerg, Victor Lincoln; Albjerg, Esther Marguerite Hall; Albjerg, Marguerite Hall (1951). Europe from 1914 to the Present. McGraw-Hill. p. 257.
  20. ISBN 978-0-429-82018-2
    .
  21. ^ Alder and Syrett. Constitutional and Administrative Law. (Palgrave Law Masters). 11th Edition. 2017. p 294. Birch. The British System of Government. 10th Edition. Routledge. 1998. Taylor & Francis e-Library. 2006. p 17.
  22. ^ See, for example, the definition in section 8(1) of the Representation of the People Act 1884, read with the definition of the Registration Acts in section 8(2)
  23. ^ "How the Westminster parliamentary system was exported around the world". University of Cambridge. 2 December 2013. Retrieved 30 December 2022.
  24. ISBN 978-9004151741
    .
  25. ISBN 978-9047423935
    .
  26. ^
    ISSN 0261-3077
    . Retrieved 2 January 2021.
  27. ^ "The Reform Act of 1832". www.historyhome.co.uk. Retrieved 19 January 2024.
  28. S2CID 233956982
    . Our starting point is placement of the 1969 Act within the context of previous reforms of the age of enfranchisement since the Great Reform Act of 1832.
  29. ^ Loughran, Thomas; Mycock, Andrew; Tonge, Jonathan (3 November 2021). "Lowering the voting age: three lessons from the 1969 Representation of the People's Act". British Politics and Policy at LSE. Retrieved 31 December 2022. 'Votes at 18' was the last major extension of the UK franchise and is therefore an important element of the history of UK democracy from the 1832 Great Reform Act onwards.
  30. ^ Bingham, Adrian (25 June 2019). "'The last milestone' on the journey to full adult suffrage? 50 years of debates about the voting age". History & Policy. Retrieved 31 December 2022.
  31. ^ Johnston, Neil (1 February 2021). "Constituency boundary reviews and the number of MPs". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  32. ISSN 0261-3077
    . Retrieved 2 January 2021.
  33. ^ "A new Great Reform Act is needed to limit the absurdities of our constitution". The Independent. 6 May 2015. Retrieved 2 January 2021.
  34. ^ "Electoral Reform: Is Proportional Representation The Solution?". Green Party of England and Wales. 3 February 2023. Retrieved 29 April 2023.

Further reading

  • Conacher. The Emergence of British Parliamentary Democracy in the Nineteenth Century: The Passing of the Reform Acts of 1832, 1867, and 1884-1885. (Major Issues in History). John Wiley and Sons. 1971. Google Books.
  • Brown, Richard. "The Reform Acts". Church and State in Modern Britain 1700-1850. Routledge. 1991. Pages 220 to 227.
  • Briggs, Asa The Age of Improvement 1783-1867 (1959)
  • Woodward, Llewellan. The Age of Reform, 1815–1870 (2nd ed. 1961)

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Reform_Acts&oldid=1203310474"