The Mid-Nineteenth Century Electoral Structure
It is far too early to talk with any real certainty about the mid-nineteenth century electoral structure. The very materials of which it was built are in dispute, let alone the shape of the edifice. A deference school of historians is challenging traditional notions of the growth of political individualism in the period, while so-called quantitative historians are beginning to question the assumptions and approach of both deference historians and traditionalists. Serious and detailed study of the questions involved has hardly begun. Still, some comment on the present state of the controversy may not be entirely out of place. An enduring interpretation can only be constructed of sound materials; and I am by no means certain of the soundness of some of those now being put forward for our use.W. O. Aydelotte, in a paper read a couple of years ago and soon to be published in a series of essays entitled The History of Parliamentary Behavior, notes the divergence of opinion among historians on the role of the electorate in shaping parliamentary opinion after 1832. As he rightly suggests, Norman Gash in his Politics in the Age of Peel appears to be of two minds on the subject, depending on whether one reads his introduction or his text. In the former Professor Gash stresses the increase of popular influence on Parliament, in the latter the continuance of traditional influences over the mass of the electorate. D. C. Moore comes down heavily on the side of the latter influences, contending that a relatively few leaders of what he has called “deference communities” represented effective electoral opinion, which was simply registered by the mass of the electorate.