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Electoral Systems and Political Manipulation: a Case Study of Northern Ireland in the 1920S

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Electoral Systems and Political Manipulation: a Case Study of Northern Ireland in the 1920S The Economic and Social Review, Vol 11, No. 3, April, 1980, pp. 187-205. Electoral Systems and Political Manipulation: A Case Study of Northern Ireland in the 1920s D. G. PRINGLE St. Patrick's College, Maynooth Precis: Three general elections were held for the Northern Ireland Parliament during the 1920s. The 1921 and 1925 elections were contested using proportional representation, whereas the 1929 elec­ tions used the "first-past-the-post system". This paper analyses how the change in the electoral system reversed the trend towards political plurality reflected in the 1925 election results, and facilitated the hegemony of the Unionist Party which continued for 40 years. The paper also discusses how the new electoral system facilitated changes within the Unionist Party itself. I INTRODUCTION reland was divided into two parts, Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland, Iby the Government of Ireland Act (1920), and elections were subse­ quently held in May, 1921, to elect a House of Commons and a Senate for each part. Sinn Fein returned 124 candidates unopposed (out of a total of 128 seats) in the Southern Parliament, and, as they adopted an abstentionist policy, Southern Ireland was stillborn (Beckett, 1966, p. 451). A Unionist victory in the North, however, resulted in the creation of the Northern Ireland Parliament, which was opened by King George V on 22 June, 1921, and which continued until the abolition of Stormont in 1972. Three general elections were held for the Northern Ireland Parliament in the 1920s. The Government of Ireland Act specified that the single trans­ ferable vote method of proportional representation (PR) was to be used to elect the first Parliament, but, under Section 14 of the Act, the Parliament was empowered to change the electoral law after a period of three years, providing that the total number of seats was not altered (Harbinson, 1973, p. 107). PR was abolished in time for the local authority elections held in 1923 and 1924, but it was retained for the second general elections held in 1925. However, it was replaced by the "first-past-the-post" system (i.e., the system used in Britain) by the House of Commons (Method of Voting and Redistribution of Seats) Act shortly before the third general elections in 1929. It is argued that these changes had major implications for the later development of the Northern Ireland state. This paper describes the results of the three Northern Ireland general elec­ tions in the 1920s in some detail, largely based upon the source material usefully presented by Knight and Baxter-Moore (1972). While it is hoped that the paper will be found to be of historical interest, the main objective is to highlight how the electoral law was manipulated to serve partisan party political and class objectives. This is useful, not only to an understanding of the historical development of Unionist hegemony in Northern Ireland, but also to serve as a warning against attempts to abolish PR in the Republic, as attempted, for example, by Fianna Fail in 1959 and 1968 (O'Leary, 1979). The abolition of PR in Northern Ireland in 1929 has recently become a miniature research growth area with at least three other works on the same subject appearing within the last year. There is obviously some degree of duplication in content between the present paper and these works, but the present paper differs both in emphasis and in interpretation. Osborne (1979) , for example, provides a much more detailed discussion of the ex­ tent of gerrymandering and malapportionment associated with the new constituency boundaries, whereas the present paper places more emphasis upon the effects arising from the changes in the method of voting. The two papers are, therefore, complementary rather than contradictory. The differences between the present paper and Buckland (1979) and Clif­ ford (1980), however, are interpretative. Buckland's book deals with a much broader topic — the Northern Ireland State between 1921 and 1939 — but the chapter on discrimination in representation overlaps with the present paper. Buckland is primarily concerned with the effects that changes in the electoral system had in terms of discrimination against Catholics, but he makes little distinction between local government and Northern Ireland Parliamentary elections. This is unfortunate because although changes in local government were aimed at securing more councils for the Unionists at the expense of the Nationalists and Republicans by gerrymanders, the abolition of PR at parliamentary level served a totally different purpose. The Unionists had little to fear from the Nationalists and Republicans at parlia­ mentary level; rather the major threat was a further continuation of the split in the Protestant vote along class lines which had become apparent in 1925. It is argued that the Unionists abolished PR to establish greater control of the Protestant vote, rather than to discriminate against Catholics. Clifford (1980) , on the other hand, argues that the abolition of PR in 1929 had no major effects on representation. This may be true in terms of the balance of "Protestant" and "Catholic" seats won, but it totally ignores the nascent class component in Northern Ireland politics. The present paper also differs from the other three by examining some of the implications that the abolition of PR had on the class backgrounds of the Unionist candidates after 1929. The paper is written in six sections. Sections II, III, and IV discuss the results of the 1921, 1925, and 1929 elections, respectively; the fifth considers to what extent gerrymandering was important in determining the results of the elections; the sixth reviews some of the longer-term implica­ tions of these changes; and the seventh pulls some of the threads together as a conclusion. II THE 1921 ELECTIONS The 1921 Northern Ireland Parliament was the first in Europe to be elected using the single transferable vote method of PR. For the purposes of these elections Northern Ireland was divided into ten multiple-seat constitu­ encies based upon county boundaries (Figure 1). Four counties (Antrim, Armagh, Down, and Londonderry) were each regarded as one constituency, while the other two (Fermanagh and Tyrone) were aggregated to form a single CONST ITUENCY BOUNDARIES j NORTH (921. 1925 ^^^^ '7* }\ BELFAST } A-. ,_.;•--.,/ EAST ~! E I F A S T / ', WEST \ LONDON D E R R Y \ \ B E L F A ST;* "\ / SOUTH \ A N TRIM ji: \ y BEL FA S T/ \i: / _ 1 TYRONE y tougn. y'' AND jr. 'Neogh'^ FERMANAGH DOWN r--/ } V -'* S '.ARMAGH/ \ \ \ » Figure 1: Constituencies in 1921 and 1925 constituency. The Belfast County Borough was divided into four constitu­ encies, plus Queen's University which was treated as a constituency in its own right. The ten constituencies were also used for Westminster elections, using the first past-the-post electoral system. Table 1: Constituency sizes, 1921 Constituency Electorate Seats Voters/seat North Belfast 43,194 4 10,799 East Belfast 40,198 4 10,050 South Belfast 40,566 4 10,142 West Belfast 57,914 4 14,479 Antrim 93,566 7 13,367 Down 93,138 8 11,642 Londonderry 62,111 5 12,422 Armagh 53,977 4 13,494 Fermanagh Tyrone 95,272 8 11,909 Queen's University 2,528 4 632 The number of seats per constituency ranged between four and eight, roughly reflecting (with the exception of Queen's University) the size of the electorate (Table. 1). The relationship, however, was far from perfect and contained a number of anomalies. Antrim, for example, had one seat less than Down, despite having a slightly larger population, but it is uncertain who these malapportionments favoured. For example, if the three Belfast constituencies with the lowest votes per seat ratio had been either aggre­ gated to form larger constituencies or reduced to three-seaters, the Unionists would have lost seats. On the other hand, if any of the three constituencies with the largest votes per seat ratio had been increased by one seat to bring it into line with the others, the new quotas would have resulted in the extra seats being won by the Unionists. It would, therefore, appear that the constituency boundaries were not purposely designed to favour one side or the other, or else that they were done so in a strangely incompetent manner. The major issue in the 1921 elections was the constitutional position of Northern Ireland (i.e., whether or not the Union was desirable). Voting, not surprisingly, was very strongly polarised between the Unionists (including Labour Unionists) on the one hand and the Nationalists and Sinn Fein on the other. The Belfast Labour Party (which later developed into the Northern Ireland Labour Party) did not contest the elections due to the divisive effects it would have had upon the Labour movement, but five members of the Independent Labour Party contested the elections as In­ dependents (Clifford, 1979). These were the only candidates who did not belong to one of the three main parties, but they made very little impres­ sion on the overall results. All five lost their deposits, polling a total of less than one per cent of the total votes. The 1921 elections, therefore, provide a fairly clear-cut indication of the wishes of the Northern Ireland population on the border issue. The elections resulted in a very strong mandate for the Unionists, who won 40 of the 52 seats with 66.9 per cent of the total votes. Sinn Fein, whose successful candidates included Eamon de Valera (Down), Michael Collins (Armagh), Arthur Griffith (Fermanagh Tyrone), and Eoin McNeill (Londonderry), won six seats with 20.5 per cent of the votes, whereas the Nationalists also won six seats, but with only 11.8 per cent of the votes.
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