British General Election 1874

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18741880 →

(in %)

 %

60

50

40

30th

20th

10

0

52.0

44.3

3.7

0.1

Liberals

Tories

HRL

Otherwise.

Gains and losses

compared to 1868

 % p

   6th

   4th

   2

   0

  -2

  -4

  -6

  -8th

-10

-9.2

+5.6

+3.7

-0.1

Liberals

Tories

HRL

Otherwise.

242

60

350

242 60 350 

A total of 652 seats

• Liberals : 242
• HBW : 60
• Tories : 350

Benjamin Disraeli 1873

The loser of the election, William Ewart Gladstone

The British general election of 1874 ended Willam Ewart Gladstone's first reign and brought the Conservatives an electoral victory. New Prime Minister was Benjamin Disraeli . The background to this was the dissolution of Parliament by Gladstone, despite a 66-seat Liberal majority.

The election was the second after the Representation of the Peoples Act of 1867, which resulted in a first-time collaboration between unions and liberals in the election. With the reform of the electoral law, the right to vote for workers and other members of the lower classes was expanded. The Liberals recognized the potential of the proletarian voters and agreed to support the officials of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain, Alexander Macdonald and Thomas Burt . Both won a seat in the House of Commons.

Result

Although the Conservatives won the most seats in the election, the Liberals received the most votes. For the first time, representatives of the Irish independence movement ( Home Rule ) also entered parliament. So the election of 1874 was able to re-establish a three-party system in the lower house. In the first half of the 19th century, only members of the Chartists and the Repeal Association were temporarily represented in parliament.

colour	Political party	be right	Candidates	Seats	+/-	Share of voters in%	+/- in%
	Conservative party	1,091,708	507	350	+ 79	44.3	+ 5.9
	Liberal party	1,281,159	489	242	- 145	52	- 9.5
	Home Rule League	57,576	80	60	+ 60	3.7	+ 3.7

reception

On March 4, 1874, Friedrich Engels published an extensive analysis of the elections in the Volkstaat under the title The English Elections . Engels accused Gladstone of an “electoral coup d'état” because he had the elections held eight to 14 days after the dissolution of parliament, so that there was little time to prepare in the constituencies. Coupled with Gladstone's autocratic governance, "which slapped John Bull's ancestral habits right in the face," would have turned many traditional liberal voters against Gladstone.

Engels criticized the union candidates who ran with the help of the liberals for being closer to the bourgeoisie than to the workers and thus hindering the development of an independent workers' party , as it already existed in most countries on the continent. Engels saw the members of the Home Rule movement as a greater success than the entry of the two workers: “The two driving forces in British political development have now entered Parliament: on the one hand the workers, on the other hand the Irish as a compact national party . "

literature

• Friedrich Engels: The English elections . MEW 18, pp. 494-499

Individual evidence

1. ↑ MEW 18, p. 494 f.
2. ↑ MEW 18, p. 499