The 1929 Midlothian and Peebles Northern by-election was a parliamentary

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 ...

held in

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to ...

on 29 January 1929 to elect a new

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

(MP) for the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. T ...

constituency An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger state (a country, administrative region, or other poli ...

of Midlothian and Peebles Northern. It was the first election to the

Parliament of the United Kingdom The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative suprem ...

to be contested by a candidate for a

Scottish nationalist Scottish nationalism promotes the idea that the Scottish people form a cohesive nation and national identity. Scottish nationalism began to shape from 1853 with the National Association for the Vindication of Scottish Rights, progressing into th ...

party.

Vacancy

The vacancy was caused by the death in December 1928 of the constituency's Unionist MP, Sir George Hutchison. He had held the seat from

1922 Events January * January 7 – Dáil Éireann (Irish Republic), Dáil Éireann, the parliament of the Irish Republic, ratifies the Anglo-Irish Treaty by 64–57 votes. * January 10 – Arthur Griffith is elected President of Dáil Éirean ...

to 1923 and from

1924 Events January * January 12 – Gopinath Saha shoots Ernest Day, whom he has mistaken for Sir Charles Tegart, the police commissioner of Calcutta, and is arrested soon after. * January 20– 30 – Kuomintang in China hold ...

until his death.

Previous result

Candidates

Four candidates were nominated. The Labour Party nominated Andrew Clarke, who had held the seat from 1923 to 1924. The Conservatives nominated the industrialist John Colville, who had been the

National Liberal National liberalism is a variant of liberalism, combining liberal policies and issues with elements of nationalism. Historically, national liberalism has also been used in the same meaning as conservative liberalism (right-liberalism). A seri ...

candidate for

Motherwell Motherwell ( sco, Mitherwall, gd, Tobar na Màthar) is a town and former burgh in North Lanarkshire, Scotland, United Kingdom, south east of Glasgow. It has a population of around 32,120. Historically in the parish of Dalziel and part of Lana ...

. The local Liberal association selected 23-year-old

David Edwin Keir David Edwin Keir MBE (12 March 1906 – 9 June 1969), was a Scottish journalist and Liberal Party politician. Background Keir was born the son of Rev. Thomas Keir of Dumfries and Edinburgh and Lily Jane Cross, of Bath. He was educated at Dum ...

as their candidate. He was the son of the Rev. T. Keir of Dumfries. He was educated at Dumfries Academy and the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 1 ...

. The fourth candidate was the journalist and folklorist

Lewis Spence James Lewis Thomas Chalmers Spence (25 November 1874 – 3 March 1955) was a Scottish journalist, poet, author, folklorist and occult scholar. Spence was a Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, and vice- ...

of the National Party of Scotland, who was the first nationalist to contest a parliamentary seat in Scotland.

Result

The result was a victory for the Labour Party candidate, Andrew Clarke, who took the seat with a slightly lower share of the vote than in his defeat in

, when there had been only two candidates. With only 4.5% of the votes, Spence lost his £150 deposit.

Aftermath

Clarke's victory was short-lived. At the general election on 30 May 1929, Colville won the seat, and although Clarke stood again in 1931, the by-election victory was his last electoral success. Colville held the seat for fourteen years, holding a variety of ministerial posts, and left Parliament in 1943 to become

Governor of Bombay Until the 18th century, Bombay consisted of seven islands separated by shallow sea. These seven islands were part of a larger archipelago in the Arabian sea, off the western coast of India. The date of city's founding is unclear—historians tr ...

, triggering another by-election. He was ennobled in 1948 as

Baron Clydesmuir Baron Clydesmuir, of Braidwood in the County of Lanark, Scotland, is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1948 for the Unionist politician John Colville. He served as Secretary of State for Scotland from 1938 to 194 ...

Vacancy

Previous result

Candidates

Result

Aftermath

References

See also