The 1904 Dublin St Stephen's Green

by-election A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...

was held on 21 March 1904 following the death of the incumbent

Irish Parliamentary Party The Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP; commonly called the Irish Party or the Home Rule Party) was formed in 1874 by Isaac Butt, the leader of the Nationalist Party, replacing the Home Rule League, as official parliamentary party for Irish national ...

MP, James Cann on 14 February.

Candidates

The Unionist candidate was Charles Louis Matheson, a lawyer. He was selected by the City of Dublin Unionist Registration Association when the prospective candidate, Norris Goddard, withdrew as he was ineligible to stand. A potential opponent, M. J. F. McCarthy, withdrew from the contest for the nomination. Matheson would go on to become a

serjeant-at-law A Serjeant-at-Law (SL), commonly known simply as a Serjeant, was a member of an order of barristers at the English and Irish Bar. The position of Serjeant-at-Law (''servientes ad legem''), or Sergeant-Counter, was centuries old; there are writ ...

in 1911 and

Recorder of Belfast The Recorder of Belfast is one of the two senior County Court judges of Northern Ireland known as Recorders, the other being the Recorder of Derry. The County Court judges in Northern Ireland are senior judicial officers, hearing civil actions, ...

in 1913. The

candidate was

Laurence Ambrose Waldron Laurence Ambrose Waldron PC (14 November 1858 – 27 December 1923) was an Irish businessman and politician. Waldron was the son of Laurence Waldron and Anne White; his father had also been an MP, for County Tipperary. He was educated at ...

, a stockbroker.

Unionist campaign

his His or HIS may refer to: Computing * Hightech Information System, a Hong Kong graphics card company * Honeywell Information Systems * Hybrid intelligent system * Microsoft Host Integration Server Education * Hangzhou International School, in ...

by-election ... revealed how deep the divisions in unionist ranks ran, but it was also a harbinger of the future. Senior figures within the Unionist Party were not inclined to contest the seat, especially as the new nationalist-backed ‘independent’ candidate, Laurence Waldron, was a stockbroker and former unionist who would be a moderating influence in the House of Commons. Several leading business figures, including Sir William Goulding, chairman of the Great Southern and Western Railway, and Lord Iveagh, head of the Guinness dynasty, resigned from the Unionist Representative Association in protest at a grass-roots revolt that led to the association supporting the candidacy of Norris Godard, a Crown solicitor. It was a foolish nomination, as Godard could stand only by relinquishing his lucrative government post, which he declined to do. The former Unionist MP for the constituency, James Campbell KC, was available to stand and had the added advantage of being wealthy enough to finance his own campaign, but the Unionist Representative Association would not have him. There followed an unseemly row about the rival candidacies of another lawyer, C. L. Matheson, and Michael McCarthy, a colourful renegade nationalist from Cork who was popular with militant unionists because of his books denouncing the evils of Catholicism. Matheson secured the nomination but, as expected, was defeated by Waldron.'Pádraig Yeates, 'A City in Wartime – Dublin 1914–1918: The Easter Rising 1916'

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Result

References

1904 elections in the United Kingdom, Dublin St Stephen's Green by-election Dublin St Stephen's Green by-election By-elections to the Parliament of the United Kingdom in Dublin (city) constituencies Dublin St Stephen's Green by-election 1900s in Dublin (city) {{Ireland-UK-Parl-by-election-stub