1.
Parliament of the United Kingdom
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It alone possesses legislative supremacy and thereby ultimate power over all other political bodies in the UK and its territories. Its head is the Sovereign of the United Kingdom and its seat is the Palace of Westminster in the City of Westminster, one of the boroughs of the British capital, the parliament is bicameral, consisting of an upper house and a lower house. The Sovereign forms the third component of the legislature, prior to the opening of the Supreme Court in October 2009, the House of Lords also performed a judicial role through the Law Lords. The House of Commons is an elected chamber with elections held at least every five years. The two Houses meet in separate chambers in the Palace of Westminster in London, most cabinet ministers are from the Commons, whilst junior ministers can be from either House. The Parliament of Great Britain was formed in 1707 following the ratification of the Treaty of Union by Acts of Union passed by the Parliament of England and the Parliament of Scotland. The UK parliament and its institutions have set the pattern for many throughout the world. However, John Bright – who coined the epithet – used it with reference to a rather than a parliament. In theory, the UKs supreme legislative power is vested in the Crown-in-Parliament. However, the Crown normally acts on the advice of the Prime Minister, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was created in 1801, by the merger of the Kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland under the Acts of Union. The principle of responsibility to the lower House did not develop until the 19th century—the House of Lords was superior to the House of Commons both in theory and in practice. Members of the House of Commons were elected in an electoral system. Thus, the borough of Old Sarum, with seven voters, many small constituencies, known as pocket or rotten boroughs, were controlled by members of the House of Lords, who could ensure the election of their relatives or supporters. During the reforms of the 19th century, beginning with the Reform Act 1832, No longer dependent on the Lords for their seats, MPs grew more assertive. The supremacy of the British House of Commons was established in the early 20th century, in 1909, the Commons passed the so-called Peoples Budget, which made numerous changes to the taxation system which were detrimental to wealthy landowners. The House of Lords, which consisted mostly of powerful landowners, on the basis of the Budgets popularity and the Lords consequent unpopularity, the Liberal Party narrowly won two general elections in 1910. Using the result as a mandate, the Liberal Prime Minister, Herbert Henry Asquith, introduced the Parliament Bill, in the face of such a threat, the House of Lords narrowly passed the bill. However, regardless of the Parliament Acts of 1911 and 1949, the Government of Ireland Act 1920 created the parliaments of Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland and reduced the representation of both parts at Westminster
2.
William Ewart Gladstone
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William Ewart Gladstone, FRS, FSS was a British Liberal and earlier conservative politician. In a career lasting over sixty years, he served as Prime Minister four separate times, more than any other person, Gladstone was also Britains oldest Prime Minister, he resigned for the final time when he was 84 years old. Gladstone first entered Parliament in 1832, beginning as a High Tory, Gladstone served in the Cabinet of Sir Robert Peel. After the split of the Conservatives Gladstone was a Peelite – in 1859 the Peelites merged with the Whigs, as Chancellor Gladstone became committed to low public spending and to electoral reform, earning him the sobriquet The Peoples William. Gladstones first ministry saw many reforms including the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland, after his electoral defeat in 1874, Gladstone resigned as leader of the Liberal Party, but from 1876 began a comeback based on opposition to Turkeys reaction to the Bulgarian April Uprising. Gladstones Midlothian Campaign of 1879–80 was an example of many modern political campaigning techniques. The government also passed the Third Reform Act, Back in office in early 1886, Gladstone proposed Irish home rule but this was defeated in the House of Commons in July. The resulting split in the Liberal Party helped keep out of office, with one short break. In 1892 Gladstone formed his last government at the age of 82, the Second Home Rule Bill passed the Commons but was defeated in the Lords in 1893. Gladstone resigned in March 1894, in opposition to increased naval expenditure and he left Parliament in 1895 and died three years later aged 88. Gladstone was known affectionately by his supporters as The Peoples William or the G. O. M, Gladstone is consistently ranked as one of Britains greatest Prime Ministers. Born in 1809 in Liverpool, at 62 Rodney Street, William Ewart Gladstone was the son of the slave-owning merchant Sir John Gladstone. Although born and brought up in Liverpool, William Gladstone was of purely Scottish ancestry, in 1814 young Willy visited Scotland for the first time, as he and his brother John travelled with their father to Edinburgh, Biggar and Dingwall to visit their relatives. William and his brother were both made freemen of the burgh of Dingwall, in 1815 Gladstone also travelled to London and Cambridge for the first time with his parents. In London he attended a service of thanksgiving with his family at St Pauls Cathedral following the Battle of Waterloo, William Gladstone was educated from 1816 to 1821 at a preparatory school at the vicarage of St Thomass Church at Seaforth, close to his familys residence, Seaforth House. In December 1831 he achieved the double first-class degree he had long desired, Gladstone served as President of the Oxford Union debating society, where he developed a reputation as an orator, which followed him into the House of Commons. At university Gladstone was a Tory and denounced Whig proposals for parliamentary reform, following the success of his double first, William travelled with his brother John on a Grand Tour of Europe, visiting Belgium, France, Germany and Italy. On his return to England, William was elected to Parliament in 1832 as Tory Member of Parliament for Newark, partly through the influence of the local patron, the Duke of Newcastle
3.
Royal assent
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Royal assent is the method by which a countrys constitutional monarch formally approves an act of that nations parliament, thus making it a law or letting it be promulgated as law. Royal assent is sometimes associated with elaborate ceremonies, however, royal assent is usually granted less ceremonially by letters patent. In other nations, such as Australia, the Governor-General merely signs the bill, in Canada, the Governor-General may give assent either in person at a ceremony held in the Senate or by a written declaration notifying parliament of his or her agreement to the bill. Before the Royal Assent by Commission Act of 1541 became law, the last time royal assent was given by the sovereign in person was during the rule of Queen Victoria at a prorogation on the 12th of August 1854. The Act was repealed and replaced by the Royal Assent Act of 1967, Royal assent is the final step required for a parliamentary bill to become law. -the sovereign may delay the bills assent through the use of his or her powers in near-revolutionary situations. -the sovereign may refuse royal assent on the advice of his or her ministers, under modern constitutional conventions, the sovereign acts on the advice of his or her ministers. Since these ministers most often maintain the support of parliament and are the ones who obtain the passage of bills, it is highly improbable that they would advise the sovereign to withhold assent. Hence, in practice, royal assent is always granted. The Monarch does not have the power to withhold a Bill from assenting, the last bill that was refused assent by the sovereign was the Scottish Militia Bill during Queen Annes reign in 1708. The so-called Model Parliament included bishops, abbots, earls, barons, in 1265, the Earl of Leicester irregularly called a full parliament without royal authorization. The body eventually came to be divided into two branches, bishops, abbots, earls, and barons formed the House of Lords, while the shire, the King would seek the advice and consent of both houses before making any law. The Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949 provide a second potential preamble if the House of Lords were to be excluded from the process, the power of parliament to pass bills was often thwarted by monarchs. Charles I dissolved parliament in 1629, after it passed motions critical of, during the eleven years of personal rule that followed, Charles performed legally dubious actions, such as raising taxes without parliaments approval. After the English Civil War, it was accepted that parliament should be summoned to meet regularly, the last Stuart monarch, Anne, similarly withheld on 11 March 1707, on the advice of her ministers, her assent from a bill for the settling of Militia in Scotland. No monarch has since withheld royal assent on a passed by the British parliament. During the rule of the succeeding Hanoverian dynasty, power was gradually exercised more by parliament, the first Hanoverian monarch, George I, relied on his ministers to a greater extent than did previous monarchs. However, George IV reluctantly granted his assent upon the advice of his ministers, thus, as the concept of ministerial responsibility has evolved, the power to withhold royal assent has fallen into disuse, both in the United Kingdom and in the other Commonwealth realms
4.
Representation of the People Act 1918
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The Representation of the People Act 1918 was an Act of Parliament passed to reform the electoral system in the United Kingdom. It is sometimes known as the Fourth Reform Act and this act was the first to include practically all men in the political system and began the inclusion of women, extending the franchise by 5.6 million men and 8.4 million women. Even after the passing of the Third Reform Act in 1884, following the horrors of World War I, millions of returning soldiers would still not have been entitled to vote in the long overdue general election. The issue of a right to vote first gathered momentum during the later half of the nineteenth century based on the work of liberal thinkers such as John Stuart Mill. The issue was raised by Suffragist Millicent Fawcett at the Speakers Conference in 1916 and she called for the age for voting to be lowered to 18 overthrowing the male majority. She also suggested that, if this would not be possible, during the debates in Parliament, there was virtual cross party unanimity. The Home Secretary, George Cave introduced the Act, War by all classes of our countrymen has brought us together, has opened men’s eyes. I think I need say no more to justify this extension of the franchise, the Representation of the People Act 1918 widened suffrage by abolishing practically all property qualifications for men and by enfranchising women over 30 who met minimum property qualifications. The enfranchisement of this group was accepted as recognition of the contribution made by women defence workers. However, women were not politically equal to men, full electoral equality did not occur until the Representation of the People Act 1928. The terms of the Act were, All men over 21 gained the vote in the constituency where they were resident, the Representation of the People Act 1920 clarified this in the affirmative, albeit after the 1918 general election. Women over 30 years old received the vote if they were either a member or married to a member of the Local Government Register, some seats redistributed to industrial towns. Elections to be held on a day each year The costs incurred by returning officers were for the first time to be paid by the Treasury. Prior to the 1918 general election, the costs were passed on the candidates to pay. The size of the electorate tripled from the 7.7 million who had been entitled to vote in 1912 to 21.4 million by the end of 1918, Women now accounted for about 43% of the electorate. Had women been enfranchised based upon the requirements as men. This may explain why the age of 30 was settled on, the bill for the Representation of the People Act was passed by a majority of 385 to 55 in the House of Commons on 19 June 1917. Many other opponents of the Bill in the Lords lost heart when he refused to act as their spokesman, the bill passed by 134 to 71 votes
5.
United Kingdom
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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom or Britain, is a sovereign country in western Europe. Lying off the north-western coast of the European mainland, the United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea lies between Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world and the 11th-largest in Europe. It is also the 21st-most populous country, with an estimated 65.1 million inhabitants, together, this makes it the fourth-most densely populated country in the European Union. The United Kingdom is a monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. The monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, other major urban areas in the United Kingdom include the regions of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. The United Kingdom consists of four countries—England, Scotland, Wales, the last three have devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in their capitals, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, respectively. The relationships among the countries of the UK have changed over time, Wales was annexed by the Kingdom of England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. A treaty between England and Scotland resulted in 1707 in a unified Kingdom of Great Britain, which merged in 1801 with the Kingdom of Ireland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, there are fourteen British Overseas Territories. These are the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. The United Kingdom is a country and has the worlds fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP. The UK is considered to have an economy and is categorised as very high in the Human Development Index. It was the worlds first industrialised country and the worlds foremost power during the 19th, the UK remains a great power with considerable economic, cultural, military, scientific and political influence internationally. It is a nuclear weapons state and its military expenditure ranks fourth or fifth in the world. The UK has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946 and it has been a leading member state of the EU and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. However, on 23 June 2016, a referendum on the UKs membership of the EU resulted in a decision to leave. The Acts of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved self-government
6.
Redistribution of Seats Act 1885
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The Redistribution of Seats Act 1885 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It was associated with, but not part of, the Reform Act 1884, the first major reform of parliamentary seats took place under the Reform Act 1832. The next redistribution of seats occurred in three parliamentary acts in 1867–68. The Reform Act 1867 applied to English and Welsh constituencies and this was followed by the Representation of the People Act 1868 which redistributed Scottish seats and gave Scotland extra seats at the expense of England. The third act was the Representation of the People Act 1868, the 1868 redistribution had proved unsatisfactory and there had been only superficial attempts to match the numbers of representatives to the population of a constituency. A few of the largest towns were given three MPs, but electors could vote for two candidates. As a result, the importance of these boroughs was reduced, for example. In a Commons vote on party lines, the Conservative neutralised one of the Liberals, smaller boroughs with two members of the same party had twice the voting power in the house as the larger boroughs. By the 1880s, continued growth and resulting population movements had resulted in an increased imbalance between the constituencies in terms of the numbers of MPs and the population. The Liberals had a majority in the House of Commons. The House of Lords, on the hand, was dominated by the Conservative Party. The Conservative leader, Lord Salisbury, was opposed to the bill, the majority of the Conservative partys MPs were elected by the counties, with the Liberals being electorally strong in the boroughs. This, he claimed, would lead to the absolute effacement of the Conservative Party, Salisbury hoped to use the Conservative majority in the Lords to block the bill and force Gladstone to seek a dissolution of Parliament before the reforms could be enacted. The Lords duly rejected the bill and returned it to the Commons, a campaign organised around the slogan The Peers Against the People called for reform or abolition of the Lords if they rejected the bill a second time. In October 1884 Queen Victoria intervened in what was becoming a constitutional crisis, urging the party leaders to meet. Negotiations duly started at Salisburys London home in Arlington Street, Westminster, Salisbury agreed to allow the reform bill to pass on condition that a bill to redistribute parliamentary seats was also enacted. The two parties reached an agreement, known as the Arlington Street Compact, whereby the majority of MPs would be elected in single-member constituencies. The division of boroughs would allow the suburban areas of towns to be represented separately from the inner cities, allowing the growth of Villa Toryism
7.
Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby
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He was known before 1834 as Edward Stanley, and from 1834 to 1851 as Lord Stanley. He is one of only four British Prime Ministers to have three or more separate periods in office, however his ministries all lasted less than two years, and totalled 3 years 280 days. Historian Frances Walsh says it was, Derby who educated the party and acted as its strategist to pass the last great Whig measure, the 1867 Reform Act. It was his greatest achievement to create the modern Conservative Party in the framework of the Whig constitution, Stanley was born to Lord Stanley and his wife, Charlotte Margaret née Hornby, the daughter of the Reverend Geoffrey Hornby. The Stanleys were a long-established and very wealthy landowning family whose residence was Knowsley Hall in Lancashire. Stanley was educated at Eton College and at Christ Church, Oxford, in 1822 Edward Stanley, as he was then, was elected to Parliament in the rotten borough of Stockbridge as a Whig, the traditional party of his family. In 1824, however, he alienated his Whig colleagues by voting against Joseph Humes motion for an investigation into the Established Protestant Church of Ireland. When the Whigs returned to power in 1830, Stanley became Chief Secretary for Ireland in Lord Greys Government, as Chief Secretary Stanley pursued a series of coercive measures which frequently brought him into conflict with the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Lord Anglesey. In 1833, Stanley moved up to the important position of Secretary of State for War. Stanley, a conservative Whig, broke with the ministry over the reform of the Church of Ireland in 1834, the term Derby Dilly was coined by Irish Nationalist leader Daniel OConnell. Joining the Conservatives, Stanley again served as Colonial Secretary in Sir Robert Peels second government in 1841, in 1844 he was summoned to the House of Lords as Lord Stanley of Bickerstaffe in his fathers Barony of Stanley by Writ of Acceleration. He broke with the Prime Minister again in 1845, this time over the repeal of the Corn Laws and he thereafter led the protectionist faction of the Conservative Party. In 1851 he succeeded his father as Earl of Derby, the party system was in a state of flux when the Conservatives left office in 1846, the outstanding issues being the question of Ireland and the unresolved franchise. The protectionists had a core of leaders, of whom Disraeli was a leading light, but in opposition the party was still in-fighting, although Disraeli was determined to heal rifts. Derby formed a minority Government in February 1852 following the collapse of Lord John Russells Whig Government, in this new ministry, Benjamin Disraeli would be appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer. With many senior Conservative ministers having followed Peel, Derby was forced to appoint many new men to office – of the Cabinet only three were pre-existing Privy Counsellors. When the aged Duke of Wellington, by then very deaf, heard the list of inexperienced Cabinet Ministers being read aloud in the House of Lords, from then this government would be known as the Who. Traditionally Derbys ministries were thought in hindsight to have been dominated by Disraeli, however recent research suggests that this was not always the case, especially in the governments conduct of foreign policy
