Downton (UK Parliament constituency)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Downton Borough constituency |
|
|---|---|
| Created: | 1295 |
| Abolished: | 1832 |
| Type: | House of Commons |
| Members: | two |
Downton was a parliamentary borough in Wiltshire, which elected two Members of Parliament (MPs) to the House of Commons from 1295 until 1832, when it was abolished by the Great Reform Act.
Contents |
[edit] History
The borough consisted of part of the parish of Downton, a small town six miles south of Salisbury. By the 19th century, only about half of the town was within the boundaries of the borough, and the more prosperous section was excluded: at the 1831 census the borough had 166 houses and a tax assessment of £70, whereas the whole town consisted of 314 houses, and was assessed at £273.
Downton was a burgage borough, meaning that the right to vote rested solely with the freeholders of 100 specified properties or "burgage tenements"; it was not necessary to be resident on the tenement, or even in the borough, to exercise this right. Indeed, some of the tenements could not realistically be occupied, and one was in the middle of a watercourse. At the time of the Great Reform Act, The Earl of Radnor (who supported the Reform) told the House of Lords that he owned 99 of the 100 tenements — which, of course, gave him absolute power in choosing both the borough's MPs. Earlier, in the 18th century, the Duncombe family had been the owners.
Corruption was rife at 18th century elections in Downton, and the House of Commons at one point proposed to "throw it into the hundred", that is to extend the boundaries to include the whole of the Hundred of Downton and to abolish the restrictive franchise — one of the earliest examples of such a proposal being debated; however, the proposal was not adopted.
Although there was supposedly a property qualification to become an MP (borough MPs were required to have an annual income of at least £300 derived from the ownership of land), this was routinely ignored or evaded, and Downton offers perhaps the only example of an election being re-run because the victor lacked the qualification. On 11 June 1826 the poet Southey was elected MP for Downton, but he did not take his seat when Parliament assembled in July, and in November wrote to the Speaker: "Having while I was on the continent been, without my knowledge, elected a burgess to serve in the present Parliament for the borough of Downton, it has become my duty to take the earliest opportunity of requesting you to inform the honourable House that I am not qualified to take a seat therein, inasmuch as I am not possessed of such an estate as is required by the Act passed in the ninth year of Queen Anne." A by-election had to be held to replace him.
By 1831 the parish of Downton had a population of around 450, too small to retain representation after the Reform Act, and yet in the original Reform Bill it was proposed that Downton should lose only one of its two members, its boundaries being extended to include Fordingbridge, over the county border in Hampshire. However, the Earl of Radnor pushed for its complete disfranchisement as it would be too difficult to make even an extended borough free of the influence of himself and his family. (He also made it a condition of becoming MP for Downton that its members should vote for its abolition.) As this abolition of a Whig-owned borough was useful to the Whig government in demonstrating their even-handedness, they backed an amendment to move Downton into Schedule A, the list of boroughs that were to lose both seats; but the government majority in the Commons fell to 30 in the vote on the amendment, the narrowest of all the votes on the details of the eventual Act.
The Reform Act being passed, Downton ceased to be represented from the general election of 1832, those of its residents who were qualified voting instead in the county constituency of Southern Wiltshire.
[edit] Members of Parliament
[edit] Before 1660
- 1640–44: Sir Edward Griffin
- 1640–60: Anthony Ashley Cooper (Elected in 1640, his election was disputed, and resolution of the dispute was delayed by the English Civil War. Not admited to sit until January 1660.)
- 1645(?)–48: Alexander Thistlethwaite
- 1658–59: Colonel Fitz-James
[edit] 1660–1832
| Year | First member | First party | Second member | Second party | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| April 1660 | Thomas Fitzjames | William Coles | ||||
| May 1660 | Giles Eyre | John Elliott | ||||
| 1661 | Gilbert Raleigh | Walter Bockland | ||||
| 1670 | Sir Joseph Ashe | |||||
| 1675 | Henry Eyre | |||||
| 1678 | Maurice Bocland | |||||
| 1685 | Sir Charles Raleigh | |||||
| 1695 | Charles Duncombe | Tory | ||||
| February 1698 | Maurice Bocland | |||||
| May 1698 | John Eyre | |||||
| July 1698 | Carew Raleigh | |||||
| 1701 | Sir James Ashe | |||||
| 1702 | Sir Charles Duncombe | Tory | ||||
| 1705 | John Eyre | |||||
| 1711 | Thomas Duncombe | |||||
| 1713 | John Sawyer | |||||
| January 1715 | Charles Longueville | |||||
| December 1715 | Giles Eyre | |||||
| 1722 | John Verney | |||||
| 1734 | Anthony Duncombe | Joseph Windham-Ashe | ||||
| 1741 | John Verney | |||||
| 1742 | Joseph Windham-Ashe | |||||
| 1746 | George Proctor | |||||
| June 1747 | George Lyttelton | |||||
| December 1747 | Richard Temple | |||||
| 1749 | Henry Vane | |||||
| 1751 | Thomas Duncombe | |||||
| 1753 | James Hayes | |||||
| 1754 | James Cope | |||||
| 1756 | Edward Poore | |||||
| 1757 | Charles Pratt | |||||
| 1761 | James Hayes | |||||
| 1762 | Thomas Pym Hales | |||||
| 1768 | Thomas Duncombe | Richard Croftes | ||||
| 1771 | James Hayes | |||||
| 1774 | Thomas Dummer | |||||
| 1775 | John Cooper | Sir Philip Hales | ||||
| September 1779 | Thomas Duncombe | |||||
| December 1779 | Bartholomew Bouverie | |||||
| February 1780 | Robert Shafto | |||||
| September 1780 | Henry Seymour-Conway | |||||
| 1784 | William Seymour-Conway | |||||
| 1790 | Bartholomew Bouverie | Sir William Scott | ||||
| 1796 | Edward Bouverie | |||||
| 1801 | Viscount Folkestone | |||||
| 1802 | John William Ward | |||||
| June 1803 | The Lord de Blaquiere | |||||
| August 1803 | Viscount Marsham | |||||
| 1806 | Bartholomew Bouverie | Duncombe Pleydell-Bouverie | ||||
| 1807 | Sir Thomas Plumer | |||||
| 1812 | Charles Henry Bouverie | |||||
| 1813 | Sir Thomas Brooke-Pechell | Edward Golding | ||||
| 1818 | Viscount Folkestone | Sir William Scott | ||||
| 1819 | Bartholomew Bouverie | Sir Thomas Brooke-Pechell | ||||
| June 1826 | Thomas Grimston Bucknall Estcourt | Robert Southey[1] | ||||
| December 1826 | Bartholomew Bouverie | Alexander Powell | ||||
| 1830 | James Brougham | Charles Shaw-Lefevre | ||||
| May 1831 | Thomas Creevey | Whig | ||||
| July 1831 | Philip Pleydell-Bouverie | |||||
| 1832 | Constituency abolished | |||||
Notes
- ^ Southey was proposed and elected without his knowledge, and declined to sit on the grounds that he did not meet the property qualification to be a borough MP
[edit] References
- Michael Brock, The Great Reform Act (London: Hutchinson, 1973)
- D Brunton & D H Pennington, Members of the Long Parliament (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1954)
- Lewis Namier, The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III (2nd edition, London: St Martin's Press, 1961)
- J Holladay Philbin, Parliamentary Representation 1832 — England and Wales (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965)
- Edward Porritt and Annie G Porritt, The Unreformed House of Commons (Cambridge University Press, 1903)
- List of speakers in the Parliaments of 1656 and 1658–9, British History Online.
- This page incorporates information from Leigh Rayment's Peerage Page.
