A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering in the Old Days. Joseph Grego

      WALPOLE CHAIRED. 1701. (From “Robin’s Progress.”)

       (Dr. Newton’s Collection.)

      It will be observed in this “bill” that bribery is not put down as one of the prominent features of an election at this period; violence was, as yet, found to be more effective than corruption.

      In March, 1721, when the first of the succession of triennial parliaments dissolved, the country was already in a state of fermentation at the prospect of the coming contest. Violence was now utilized in new methods, such as beating off voters of opposition candidates; while hostile electors were surrounded by mobs hired for the purpose, and cut off from the polling-booths; and in some cases voters were carried off forcibly, and locked up until the election was over.

      In country boroughs much agitation was manifested, and in several places, such as Coventry, formidable riots took place.

      The metropolis shared the general excitement. It was on this occasion that the Westminster contest began to be regarded as of the first consequence, it being a point of ambition with the rival parties to return their candidates for this constituency, the results of which conflict were expected to exercise an influence upon other places. The election for this city set in uproariously in 1721, and, as the progress of these electioneering memorials will demonstrate, it continued the same throughout its history, even when in other places the elections were tranquil and uneventful.

      The Tories did not allow Walpole to triumph without a struggle for the ascendency, although, by his foresight, and a lavish employment of his universal salve—gold, he managed to diminish the influence both of his opponents and of the mobocracy; and in the new House the Government secured a powerful majority, leaving the Tory organs, towards the close of the elections, when the results were no longer doubtful, to vent their spleen in political squibs and caricatures. Thus, on the 31st of March, the Post Boy announces two satirical prints—one, “Britannia stript by a Villain, to which is added, the True Phiz of a Late Member,” which seems to have disappeared completely; and the other, “The Prevailing Candidate; or the Election carried by Bribery and the D——l;” which, according to all accounts, is the earliest existing contemporary caricature upon the subject of electioneering; and is, moreover, one of the best examples of these productions as published in the reign of George I.