Cambridge University (UK Parliament constituency) Totally Explained

Everything about Cambridge University Uk Parliament Constituency totally explained

Cambridge University was a university constituency electing two members to the British House of Commons, from 1603 to 1950.

Boundaries, Electorate and Election Systems

This university constituency was created by a Royal Charter of 1603. It was abolished in 1950 by the Representation of the People Act 1948.
The constituency wasn't a physical area. Its electorate consisted of the graduates of the University. Before 1918 the franchise was restricted to male graduates with a Doctorate or MA degree. Sedgwick records that the electors numbered 377, in 1727. For the 1754-1790 period Namier and Brooke estimated the electorate at about 500.
The constituency returned two Members of Parliament. Before 1918 they were elected using the bloc vote. From 1918, the MPs were elected by the Single Transferable Vote method of Proportional Representation.

History

In the early eighteenth century the University electorate were mostly Tory. However the Whig ministers of King George I were able to persuade the King to use the royal prerogative power to confer doctorates, so from 1727 the University returned Whig representatives. Oxford University, where the King didn't have the same prerogative power, remained safely Tory (indeed often Jacobite) in sympathies.
   The leading mid-eighteenth century Whig politician, the Duke of Newcastle, was for many years (1748-1768) Chancellor of the University. He "recommended" suitable candidates to represent the institution in Parliament. This practise continued under his successor, another Whig Duke and Prime Minister (1768-1770), the Duke of Grafton (Chancellor 1768-1811). However Grafton was less prominent as a politician than Newcastle had been and less attentive to the University. As a result some of Grafton's choices were criticised, notably that of the Duke's friend Richard Croftes.
   Croftes lacked the sort of characteristics a University MP usually had. He was neither the son of a peer (like the Hon. John Townshend, the Marquess of Granby or Grafton's own son the Earl of Euston), a distinguished lawyer-politician (such as William de Grey, James Mansfield or Sir Vicary Gibbs) nor a prominent political figure (like William Pitt or Lord Henry Petty).
   In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century Pittite/Tory candidates began to be elected. At the start of this political development some of the Pittite MPs, like William Pitt himself (MP for the University 1784-1806), called themselves Whigs. As time passed the division between the nineteenth century Tory and Whig parties became clearer.
   The future Prime Minister, the Viscount Palmerston, retained his seat as a Whig after he left the Tory ranks. However by 1831 he was defeated. After the Viscount ceased to represent the University he was elected by a territorial constituency. No further non Tory/Conservative MP was to represent the University until the 1920s.
   Even after the introduction of the single transferable vote in 1918, most Cambridge University MPs continued to be Conservatives.

Members of Parliament

This is a list of people who have been elected to represent this University in the Parliament of the United Kingdom, from 1784 to 1950.

Year	Member	Party	Member	Party
1784	William Pitt the Younger	¹	Earl of Euston	Whig
1806	Lord Henry Petty	Whig
1807	Sir Vicary Gibbs	Tory
1811	Sir Vicary Gibbs	Tory	The 3rd Viscount Palmerston	Tory
1812	John Henry Smyth	Whig
1822	William John Bankes	Tory
1826	Sir John Singleton Copley	Tory		Whig
1827	Sir Nicholas Conyngham Tindal	Tory
1829	William Cavendish	Whig
1831	Henry Goulburn	Tory	William Yates Peel	Tory
1832		Conservative	Charles Manners-Sutton	Conservative
1835			Hon. Charles Evan Law	Conservative
1850			Loftus Tottenham Wigram	Conservative
1856	Spencer Horatio Walpole	Conservative	Loftus Tottenham Wigram	Conservative
1859			Charles Jasper Selwyn	Conservative
1868			Alexander Beresford Hope	Conservative
1882	Henry Cecil Raikes	Conservative	Alexander Beresford Hope	Conservative
1887	Henry Cecil Raikes	Conservative	Sir George Gabriel Stokes	Conservative
1891	Sir Richard Claverhouse Jebb ²	Conservative	Sir George Gabriel Stokes	Conservative
1892	Sir Richard Claverhouse Jebb ²	Conservative	Sir John Eldon Gorst	Conservative
1906	Samuel Henry Butcher	Conservative	John Frederick Peel Rawlinson	Conservative
1911	Sir Joseph Larmor	Conservative		Conservative
1918	Sir Joseph Larmor	Co. Conservative ³		Co. Conservative ³
1922	James Ramsay Montagu Butler	Ind. Liberal ⁴		Conservative
1923	Sir George Geoffrey Gilbert Butler ⁵	Conservative		Conservative
1926	Sir George Geoffrey Gilbert Butler ⁵	Conservative	Sir John James Withers	Conservative
1929	Godfrey Harold Alfred Wilson	Conservative
1935	Sir Kenneth William Murray Pickthorn	Conservative
1940			Dr. Archibald Vivian Hill	Ind. Conservative ⁴
1945			Henry Wilson Harris	Independent

Notes:-

¹ Pitt called himself a Whig, but is usually retrospectively regarded as a Tory since most of his followers (whether their background was in the Whig or Tory tradition) came to call themselves the Tory Party in the decade after Pitt's death.
² Jebb died on 10 December 1905 - seat vacant at dissolution.
³ Co. is an abbreviation for Coalition.
⁴ Ind. is an abbreviation for Independent.
⁵ Butler died on 2 May 1929 - seat vacant at dissolution.

Elections before 1715

Election by Block Vote 1715-1918

1710s – 1720s – 1730s – 1740s – 1750s – 1760s – 1770s – 1780s – 1790s – 1800s – 1810s – 1820s – 1830s – 1840s – 1850s – 1860s – 1870s – 1880s – 1890s – 1900s – 1910s

Elections in the 1710s

Elections in the 1720s

Death of Paske Note (1722): Stooks Smith gives Willoughby 319 votes.
Note (1727): Unusually, for a pre-1832 election, Stooks Smith records the total number of electors for the constituency as well as the number who voted; so a turnout figure can be calculated.

Elections in the 1730s

Note (1734): Goodrick was an Opposition Whig

Elections in the 1740s

Seat vacated when Finch was appointed a Groom of the Bedchamber

Elections in the 1750s

Seat vacated when Finch was appointed to an office

Elections in the 1760s

Seat vacated when Finch was appointed to an office

Elections in the 1770s

Seat vacated on the appointment of Yorke as Lord Chancellor

Seat vacated on the appointment of de Grey as Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas

Succession of Granby as the 4th Duke of Rutland Elections in the 1780s Note (1780): Stooks Smith records Townshend as getting 237 votes.

Seat vacated on Townshend being appointed to an office

Seat vacated on Mansfield being appointed as Solicitor General for England and Wales
Note The 1784 election was broadly fought as a contest between the new government of Pitt and the ousted Fox-North Coalition, in which boh Townshend and Mansfield had held office.

Elections in the 1790s

Note (1790): Pary labels in the 1790-1832 period follow Stooks Smith, who classifies Pitt and his Pittite supporters as Tories without regard to what they'd have actually called themselves.

Seat vacated on Pitt being appointed Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports

Seat vacated on Euston being appointed to an office

Elections in the 1800s

Seat vacated on Pitt being appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer

Death of Pitt Palmerston was a Peer of Ireland

Elections in the 1810s

Succession of Euston as the 4th Duke of Grafton Seat vacated on Gibbs being appointed a Judge of the Court of Common Pleas

Elections in the 1820s

Death of Smyth

Seat vacated on the appointment of Copley as Lord Chancellor and creation as 1st Baron Lyndhurst Note (1827): Unusually for a pre-1832 election Stooks Smith provides a total electorate figure, so a turnout percentage can be calculated. See the 1727 result above for another instance.

Seat vacated on the appointment of Tindal as Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas

Elections in the 1830s

Seat vacated on the appointment of Palmerston as Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs

Note (1832): Manners-Sutton was the Speaker of the House of Commons.

Manners-Sutton created 'The 1st Viscount Canterbury'.

Note (1837): McCalmont's Parliamentary Poll Book classifies Law as a Peelite between this election and that of 1847.

Elections in the 1840s

Note (1841): McCalmont's Parliamentary Poll Book classifies Goulburn as a Liberal Conservative and Law as a Peelite for this election.

Goulburn appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Note 1 (1847): 3,800 registered electors; 4,682 votes cast; minimum possible turnout estimated by dividing votes by 2. To the extent that electors didn't use both their votes, the figure will be an underestimate.

Note 2 (1847): McCalmont's Parliamentary Poll Book classifies Goulburn as a Liberal Conservative and Law as a Peelite for this election.

Elections in the 1850s

Death of Law.

Note (1852): McCalmont's Parliamentary Poll Book classifies Goulburn as a Liberal Conservative for this election.

Death of Goulburn.

Appointment of Walpole as Secretary of State for the Home Department.

Elections in the 1860s

Appointment of Walpole as Secretary of State for the Home Department.

Appointment of Selwyn as Solicitor-General.

Appointment of Selwyn as Judge of the Court of Appeal in Chancery.

Elections in the 1870s

Elections in the 1880s

Resignation of Walpole.

Appointment of Raikes as Postmaster General

Death of Beresford Hope.

Elections in the 1890s

Death of Raikes.

Elections in the 1900s

Death of Jebb - seat vacant at dissolution.

Note (1906): Turnout is as in Craig.

Elections in the 1910s

Death of Butcher. Election by Single Transferable Vote 1918-1950 General Elections, from 1918 when most constituencies polled on the same day, were on different polling days than for territorial constituencies. The polls for university constituencies were open for five days.

1910s – 1920s – 1930s – 1940s

Elections in the 1910s

Elections in the 1920s

Death of Rawlinson.

Death of Butler - seat vacant at dissolution. Elections in the 1930s

Resignation of Wilson.
Death of Withers.

Elections in the 1940s

Constituency abolished (1950)Further Information

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