1885 United Kingdom general election Facts for Kids

Quick facts for kids
1885 United Kingdom general election

← 1880

24 November – 18 December 1885 (1885-11-24 – 1885-12-18)

1886 →

← List of MPs elected in the United Kingdom general election, 1880

List of MPs elected in the United Kingdom general election, 1885 →

All 670 seats in the House of Commons
336 seats needed for a majority

Turnout

81.2%

	First party	Second party	Third party

Leader	William Gladstone	Marquess of Salisbury	Charles Stewart Parnell
Party	Liberal	Conservative	Irish Parliamentary Party
Leader since	April 1880	April 1881	17 October 1882
Leader's seat	Midlothian	None (Lord)	Cork City
Last election	352 seats, 52.5%	237 seats, 35.4%	63 seats, 9.4%
Seats won	319	247	86
Seat change	33	10	23
Popular vote	2,071,868	1,869,560	299,178
Percentage	47.7%	43.0%	6.9%
Swing	7.0%	0.5%	4.1%

Results by constituency

Results by country

Prime Minister before election

Marquess of Salisbury
Conservative

Prime Minister after election

William Gladstone
Liberal

The 1885 United Kingdom general election was held from 24 November to 18 December 1885. This was the first general election after an extension of the franchise and redistribution of seats. For the first time a majority of adult males could vote and most constituencies by law returned a single member to Parliament, fulfilling one of the ideals of Chartism to provide direct single-member, single-electorate accountability. It saw the Liberals, led by William Gladstone, win the most seats, but not an overall majority. As the Irish Nationalists held the balance of power between them and the Conservatives who sat with an increasing number of allied Unionist MPs (referring to the Union of Great Britain and Ireland), this exacerbated divisions within the Liberals over Irish Home Rule and led to a Liberal split and another general election the following year.

The 1885 election saw the first socialist party participate, with the Social Democratic Federation led by H. M. Hyndman standing three candidates.

Results
Voting summary
Seats summary
See also

Results

UK General Election 1885

Party		Candidates						Votes
Party		Stood	Elected	Gained	Unseated	Net	% of total	%	No.	Net %
	Liberal	575	319			−33	47.61	47.65	2,071,868	−7.3
	Conservative	597	247			+10	36.87	43.00	1,869,560	+0.9
	Irish Parliamentary	91	86			+23	12.84	6.88	299,178	+4.0
	Independent Liberal	35	11			+11	1.64	1.28	55,652	N/A
	Crofters	6	4			+4	0.60	0.38	16,551	N/A
	Ind. Conservative	8	2			+2	0.30	0.29	12,599	N/A
	Lib-Lab	4	1			+1	0.15	0.19	8,232	N/A
	Independent	6	0			0	0	0.15	6,570	N/A
	Independent Nationalist	2	0			0	0	0.07	2,889	N/A
	Scottish Land Restoration	5	0			0	0	0.05	2,359	N/A
	Irish Loyalist	6	0			0	0	0.04	1,869	N/A
	Social Democratic Federation	3	0			0	0	0.02	657	N/A

Total votes cast: 4,347,984.
Electorate: 5,708,030 (5,429,708 in contested seats)
Turnout: 81.2%

Voting summary

Popular vote

Liberal			47.65%
Conservative			43.00%
Irish Parliamentary			6.88%
Independent Liberal			1.28%
Crofters			0.38%
Independent Conservative			0.29%
Lib-Lab			0.19%
Independent			0.15%
Others			0.18%

Seats summary

Parliamentary seats

Liberal			47.61%
Conservative			36.87%
Irish Parliamentary			12.84%
Independent Liberal			1.64%
Crofters			0.60%
Independent Conservative			0.30%
Lib-Lab			0.15%

1885 United Kingdom general election facts for kids

Contents

Results

Voting summary

Seats summary

See also