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A rotten or pocket borough, also known as a nomination borough or proprietorial borough, was a
parliamentary borough A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History In the Middle A ...
or constituency in
England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...
,
Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...
, or the
United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
before the
Reform Act 1832 The Representation of the People Act 1832 (also known as the 1832 Reform Act, Great Reform Act or First Reform Act) was an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom (indexed as 2 & 3 Will. IV c. 45) that introduced major changes to the electo ...
, which had a very small electorate and could be used by a patron to gain unrepresentative influence within the unreformed House of Commons. The same terms were used for similar boroughs represented in the 18th-century
Parliament of Ireland The Parliament of Ireland ( ga, Parlaimint na hÉireann) was the legislature of the Lordship of Ireland, and later the Kingdom of Ireland, from 1297 until 1800. It was modelled on the Parliament of England and from 1537 comprised two cham ...
. The
Reform Act 1832 The Representation of the People Act 1832 (also known as the 1832 Reform Act, Great Reform Act or First Reform Act) was an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom (indexed as 2 & 3 Will. IV c. 45) that introduced major changes to the electo ...
abolished the majority of these rotten and pocket boroughs.


Background

A
parliamentary borough A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History In the Middle A ...
was a town or former town that had been incorporated under a
royal charter A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, but ...
, giving it the right to send two elected burgesses as
Members 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 oft ...
(MPs) to the House of Commons. It was not unusual for the physical boundary of the settlement to change as the town developed or contracted over time, for example due to changes in its trade and industry, so that the boundaries of the parliamentary borough and of the physical settlement were no longer the same. For centuries, constituencies electing members to the House of Commons did not change to reflect population shifts, and in some places the number of electors became so few that they could be bribed or otherwise influenced by a single wealthy patron. In the early 19th century, reformists scornfully called these boroughs "rotten boroughs" or "pocket boroughs", or more formally "nomination boroughs", because their democratic processes were rotten and their MPs were elected by the whim of the patron, thus "in his pocket"; the actual votes of the electors were a mere formality; all or most of them voted as the patron instructed them, with or without bribery. As voting was by show of hands at a single polling station at a single time, none dared to vote contrary to the instructions of the patron. Often only one candidate would be nominated (or two for a two-seat constituency), so that the election was uncontested. Thus an MP might represent only a few constituents, while at the same time many new towns, which had grown due to increased trade and industry, were entirely unrepresented, or inadequately represented. For example, before 1832 the town of
Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...
, which expanded rapidly during the
Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
from a small settlement into a large city, was merely part of the larger county constituency of
Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a Historic counties of England, historic county, Ceremonial County, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significa ...
and did not elect its own MPs. Many of these ancient boroughs elected two MPs. By the time of the
1831 general election {{Short description, None The following elections occurred in the year 1831. North America United States * United States Senate election in New York, 1831 South America * 1831 Chilean presidential election Europe * 1831 French legislative electi ...
, out of 406 elected members, 152 were chosen by fewer than 100 voters each, and 88 by fewer than fifty voters. By the early 19th century moves were made towards reform, with eventual success when the
Reform Act 1832 The Representation of the People Act 1832 (also known as the 1832 Reform Act, Great Reform Act or First Reform Act) was an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom (indexed as 2 & 3 Will. IV c. 45) that introduced major changes to the electo ...
abolished the rotten boroughs and redistributed representation in Parliament to new major population centres. The Ballot Act 1872 introduced the
secret ballot The secret ballot, also known as the Australian ballot, is a voting method in which a voter's identity in an election or a referendum is anonymous. This forestalls attempts to influence the voter by intimidation, blackmailing, and potential v ...
, which greatly hindered patrons from controlling elections by preventing them from knowing how an elector had voted. At the same time, the practice of paying or entertaining voters (" treating") was outlawed, and election expenses fell dramatically.


Rotten boroughs

The term ''rotten borough'' came into use in the 18th century; it meant a parliamentary borough with a tiny electorate, so small that voters were susceptible to control in a variety of ways, as it had declined in population and importance since its early days. The word ''rotten'' had the connotation of corruption as well as long-term decline. In such boroughs most or all of the few electors could not vote as they pleased, due to the lack of a secret ballot and their dependency on the "owner" of the borough. Only rarely were the views or personal character of a candidate taken into consideration, except by the minority of voters who were not beholden to a particular interest. Typically, rotten boroughs had gained their representation in Parliament when they were more flourishing centres, but the borough's boundaries had never been updated, or else they had become depopulated or even deserted over the centuries. Some had once been important places or had played a major role in England's history, but had fallen into insignificance as for example when industry moved away. For example, in the 12th century
Old Sarum Old Sarum, in Wiltshire, South West England, is the now ruined and deserted site of the earliest settlement of Salisbury. Situated on a hill about north of modern Salisbury near the A345 road, the settlement appears in some of the earliest ...
had been a busy cathedral city, reliant on the wealth expended by its own Sarum Cathedral within its city precincts, but it was abandoned when the cathedral was moved to create the present
Salisbury Cathedral Salisbury Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary, is an Anglican cathedral in Salisbury, England. The cathedral is the mother church of the Diocese of Salisbury and is the seat of the Bishop of Salisbury. The buil ...
, built on a new site nearby ("New Sarum"). The new site immediately attracted merchants and workers who built up a new town around it. Despite this dramatic loss of population, the constituency of Old Sarum retained its right to elect two MPs, effectively putting it in control of a single landowning family. Many such rotten boroughs were controlled by landowners and peers who might give the seats in Parliament to their like-minded friends or relations, or who went to Parliament themselves, if they were not already members of the House of Lords. They also commonly sold them for money or other favours; the peers who controlled such boroughs had a double influence in Parliament as they themselves held seats in the
House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster ...
. This patronage was based on property rights which could be inherited and passed on to heirs, or else sold, like any other form of property. Before being awarded a peerage, Arthur Wellesley, later
Duke of Wellington Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, (1 May 1769 – 14 September 1852) was an Anglo-Irish soldier and Tory statesman who was one of the leading military and political figures of 19th-century Britain, serving twice as prime minister o ...
, served in the
Irish House of Commons The Irish House of Commons was the lower house of the Parliament of Ireland that existed from 1297 until 1800. The upper house was the House of Lords. The membership of the House of Commons was directly elected, but on a highly restrictive fr ...
as a Member for the rotten borough of Trim. Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh served as a Member for the rotten borough of Plympton Erle.


Pocket boroughs

Pocket boroughs were boroughs which could effectively be controlled by a single person who owned at least half of the " burgage tenements", the occupants of which had the right to vote in the borough's parliamentary elections. A wealthy patron therefore had merely to buy up these specially qualified houses and install in them his own tenants, selected for their willingness to do their landlord's bidding, or given such precarious forms of tenure that they dared not displease him. As there was no
secret ballot The secret ballot, also known as the Australian ballot, is a voting method in which a voter's identity in an election or a referendum is anonymous. This forestalls attempts to influence the voter by intimidation, blackmailing, and potential v ...
until 1872, the landowner could evict electors who did not vote for the two men he wanted. A common expression referring to such a situation was that "Mr A had been elected on Lord B's interest". There were also boroughs which were controlled not by a particular patron but rather by the Crown, specifically by the departments of state of the
Treasury A treasury is either *A government department related to finance and taxation, a finance ministry. *A place or location where treasure, such as currency or precious items are kept. These can be state or royal property, church treasure or ...
or Admiralty, and which thus returned the candidates nominated by the ministers in charge of those departments. Some rich individuals controlled several boroughs; for example, the Duke of Newcastle is said to have had seven boroughs "in his pocket". One of the representatives of a pocket borough was often the man who controlled it, and for this reason they were also referred to as proprietarial boroughs. Pocket boroughs were seen by their 19th-century owners as a valuable method of ensuring the representation of the landed interest in the House of Commons. Significantly diminished by the Reform Act 1832, pocket boroughs were for all practical purposes abolished by the
Reform Act of 1867 The Representation of the People Act 1867, 30 & 31 Vict. c. 102 (known as the Reform Act 1867 or the Second Reform Act) was a piece of British legislation that enfranchised part of the urban male working class in England and Wales for the first ...
. This considerably extended the borough franchise and established the principle that each parliamentary constituency should hold roughly the same number of electors. Boundary commissions were set up by subsequent Acts of Parliament to maintain this principle as population movements continued.


Reform

In the late 18th century, many political societies, such as the
London Corresponding Society The London Corresponding Society (LCS) was a federation of local reading and debating clubs that in the decade following the French Revolution agitated for the democratic reform of the British Parliament. In contrast to other reform associati ...
and the
Society of the Friends of the People The Society of the Friends of the People was an organisation in Great Britain that was focused on advocating for Parliamentary Reform. It was founded by the Whig Party in 1792. The Society in England was aristocratic and exclusive, in contrast ...
, called for parliamentary reform. Specifically, they thought that the rotten borough system was unfair and they called for a more equal distribution of representatives that reflected the population of Britain. However, legislation enacted by
William Pitt the Younger William Pitt the Younger (28 May 175923 January 1806) was a British statesman, the youngest and last prime minister of Great Britain (before the Acts of Union 1800) and then first Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, prime minister of the Un ...
caused these societies to disband by making it illegal for them to meet or publish information. In the 19th century, there were moves toward reform, which broadly meant ending the over-representation of boroughs with few electors. The culmination of the process of
Catholic Emancipation Catholic emancipation or Catholic relief was a process in the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, and later the combined United Kingdom in the late 18th century and early 19th century, that involved reducing and removing many of the restrict ...
in 1829 finally brought the reform issue to a head. The reform movement had a major success in the
Reform Act 1832 The Representation of the People Act 1832 (also known as the 1832 Reform Act, Great Reform Act or First Reform Act) was an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom (indexed as 2 & 3 Will. IV c. 45) that introduced major changes to the electo ...
, which disfranchised the 56 boroughs listed below, most of them in the south and west of England. This redistributed representation in Parliament to new major population centres and places with significant industries, which tended to be farther north. ;Buckinghamshire * Wendover * Amersham ;Cornwall *
Bossiney Bossiney ( kw, Boskyny, meaning ''Cyni's dwelling'') is a village in north Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is north-east of the larger village of Tintagel which it adjoins: further north-east are the Rocky Valley and Trethevy. Until 1832 t ...
* Callington * Camelford * East Looe * Fowey * Lostwithiel * Mitchell or St Michael's *
Newport Newport most commonly refers to: *Newport, Wales *Newport, Rhode Island, US Newport or New Port may also refer to: Places Asia *Newport City, Metro Manila, a Philippine district in Pasay Europe Ireland *Newport, County Mayo, a town on the ...
* Saltash * St Germans * St Mawes * Tregony *
West Looe West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some ...
;Devon * Beeralston *
Okehampton Okehampton ( ) is a town and civil parish in West Devon in the English county of Devon. It is situated at the northern edge of Dartmoor, and had a population of 5,922 at the 2011 census. Two electoral wards are based in the town (east and west). ...
* Plympton Erle ;Hampshire * Newtown, Isle of Wight * Stockbridge * Whitchurch * Yarmouth, Isle of Wight ;Kent * New Romney * Queenborough ;Northamptonshire * Brackley * Higham Ferrers ;Suffolk *
Aldeburgh Aldeburgh ( ) is a coastal town in the county of Suffolk, England. Located to the north of the River Alde. Its estimated population was 2,276 in 2019. It was home to the composer Benjamin Britten and remains the centre of the international Aldeb ...
* Dunwich * Orford ;Somerset *
Ilchester Ilchester is a village and civil parishes in England, civil parish, situated on the River Yeo (South Somerset), River Yeo or Ivel, five miles north of Yeovil, in the England, English county of Somerset. Originally a Roman Britain, Roman town, and ...
* Milborne Port *
Minehead Minehead is a coastal town and civil parish in Somerset, England. It lies on the south bank of the Bristol Channel, north-west of the county town of Taunton, from the boundary with the county of Devon and in proximity of the Exmoor National P ...
;Surrey * Bletchingley * Gatton * Haslemere ;Sussex *
Bramber Bramber is a former manor, village and civil parish in the Horsham District of West Sussex, England. It has a ruined mediaeval castle which was the ''caput'' of a large feudal barony. Bramber is located on the northern edge of the South Downs ...
*
East Grinstead East Grinstead is a town in West Sussex, England, near the East Sussex, Surrey, and Kent borders, south of London, northeast of Brighton, and northeast of the county town of Chichester. Situated in the extreme northeast of the county, the civ ...
* Seaford * Steyning * Winchelsea ;Wiltshire * Downton * Great Bedwyn * Heytesbury * Hindon * Ludgershall *
Old Sarum Old Sarum, in Wiltshire, South West England, is the now ruined and deserted site of the earliest settlement of Salisbury. Situated on a hill about north of modern Salisbury near the A345 road, the settlement appears in some of the earliest ...
* Wootton Bassett ;Yorkshire * Aldborough, West Riding * Boroughbridge, North Riding * Hedon, East Riding ;Other counties * Appleby, Westmorland *
Bishop's Castle Bishop's Castle is a market town in the south west of Shropshire, England. According to the 2011 Census it had a population of 1,893. Bishop's Castle is east of the Wales-England border, about north-west of Ludlow and about south-west o ...
, Shropshire *
Castle Rising Castle Rising is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. The village is situated some north-east of the town of King's Lynn and west of the city of Norwich. The River Babingley skirts the north of the village separating C ...
, Norfolk * Corfe Castle, Dorset * Newton, Lancashire * Weobley, Herefordshire


Contemporary defences

A substantial number of
Tory A Tory () is a person who holds a political philosophy known as Toryism, based on a British version of traditionalism and conservatism, which upholds the supremacy of social order as it has evolved in the English culture throughout history. The ...
constituencies were rotten and pocket boroughs, and their right to representation was defended by the successive Tory governments in office between 1807 and 1830. During this period they came under criticism from figures such as
Thomas Paine Thomas Paine (born Thomas Pain; – In the contemporary record as noted by Conway, Paine's birth date is given as January 29, 1736–37. Common practice was to use a dash or a slash to separate the old-style year from the new-style year. In th ...
and
William Cobbett William Cobbett (9 March 1763 – 18 June 1835) was an English pamphleteer, journalist, politician, and farmer born in Farnham, Surrey. He was one of an agrarian faction seeking to reform Parliament, abolish " rotten boroughs", restrain forei ...
. It was argued in defence of such boroughs that they provided stability and were also a means for promising young politicians to enter Parliament, with
William Pitt the Elder William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham, (15 November 170811 May 1778) was a British statesman of the Whig group who served as Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1766 to 1768. Historians call him Chatham or William Pitt the Elder to distinguish ...
being cited as a key example. Some MPs claimed that the boroughs should be retained, as Britain had enjoyed periods of prosperity while they were part of the constitution of Parliament. Because British colonists in the
West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Great ...
and
British North America British North America comprised the colonial territories of the British Empire in North America from 1783 onwards. English overseas possessions, English colonisation of North America began in the 16th century in Newfoundland (island), Newfound ...
, and those in the
Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a physiographical region in Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian Ocean from the Himalayas. Geopolitically, it includes the countries of Bangladesh, Bhutan, India ...
, had no representation of their own at Westminster, representatives of these groups often claimed that rotten boroughs provided opportunities for virtual representation in Parliament for colonial interest groups. The Tory politician Spencer Perceval asked the nation to look at the system as a whole, saying that if pocket boroughs were disenfranchised, the whole system was liable to collapse.


Modern usage

The magazine ''Private Eye'' has a column entitled 'Rotten Boroughs', which lists stories of municipal wrongdoing; ''borough'' is used here in its usual sense of a local-government district rather than a parliamentary constituency. In his book ''The Age of Consent'' (2003),
George Monbiot George Joshua Richard Monbiot ( ; born 27 January 1963) is a British writer known for his environmental and political activism. He writes a regular column for ''The Guardian'' and is the author of a number of books. Monbiot grew up in Oxford ...
compared small island states with one vote in the
United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmonizi ...
General Assembly to "rotten boroughs". The term "rotten borough" is sometimes used to disparage electorates used to gain political leverage. In Hong Kong and Macau, functional constituencies (with small voter-bases attached to special interests) are often referred to as "rotten boroughs" by long-time columnist Jake van der Kamp. In
New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 List of islands of New Zealand, smaller islands. It is the ...
, the term has been used to refer to electorates which – by dint of an agreement for a larger party – have been won by a minor party, enabling that party to gain more seats under the country's
proportional representation system Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...
. ''
The Spectator ''The Spectator'' is a weekly British magazine on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first published in July 1828, making it the oldest surviving weekly magazine in the world. It is owned by Frederick Barclay, who also owns ''Th ...
'' has described the London Borough of Tower Hamlets as a "rotten borough", and in 2015 ''
The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publishe ...
'' reported that Tower Hamlets was to be the subject of an investigation into electoral fraud. The Electoral Reform Society produced a list of "Rotten Boroughs" for the 2019 United Kingdom local elections, with Fenland District Council at the top.


In popular culture

Literature *In the satirical novel ''Melincourt, or Sir Oran Haut-Ton'' (1817) by
Thomas Love Peacock Thomas Love Peacock (18 October 1785 – 23 January 1866) was an English novelist, poet, and official of the East India Company. He was a close friend of Percy Bysshe Shelley and they influenced each other's work. Peacock wrote satirical novels, ...
, an orang-utan named Sir Oran Haut-Ton is elected to parliament by the "ancient and honourable borough of Onevote". The election of Sir Oran forms part of the hero's plan to persuade civilisation to share his belief that orang-utans are a race of human beings who merely lack the power of speech. "The borough of Onevote stood in the middle of a heath, and consisted of a solitary farm, of which the land was so poor and intractable, that it would not have been worth the while of any human being to cultivate it, had not the Duke of Rottenburgh found it very well worth his while to pay his tenant for living there, to keep the honourable borough in existence." The single voter of the borough, Mr Christopher Corporate, elects two MPs, each of whom "can only be considered as the representative of half of him". *In the parliamentary novels of
Anthony Trollope Anthony Trollope (; 24 April 1815 – 6 December 1882) was an English novelist and civil servant of the Victorian era. Among his best-known works is a series of novels collectively known as the '' Chronicles of Barsetshire'', which revolves ...
rotten boroughs are a recurring theme. John Grey, Phineas Finn, and Lord Silverbridge are all elected by rotten boroughs. *In Chapter 7 of the novel 'Vanity Fair'' (published 1847-1848), author
William Makepeace Thackeray William Makepeace Thackeray (; 18 July 1811 – 24 December 1863) was a British novelist, author and illustrator. He is known for his Satire, satirical works, particularly his 1848 novel ''Vanity Fair (novel), Vanity Fair'', a panoramic portra ...
introduces the fictitious borough of "Queen's Crawley", so named in honour of a stopover in the small Hampshire town of Crawley by
Queen Elizabeth I Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". Eli ...
, who, delighted by the quality of the local beer, instantly raised the small town of Crawley into a borough, giving it two members in Parliament. At the time of the story, set in the early-19th century, the place had lost population, so that it was "come down to that condition of borough which used to be denominated rotten". Queen's Crawley re-appears in Thackeray's '' The Virginians'' (published in 1857-1859). *In
Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian e ...
' novel '' Our Mutual Friend'' (1864-1865), a borough called "Pocket-Breaches" elects Mr. Veneering as its MP. *The novel ''Rotten Borough'' was a controversial story published by Oliver Anderson under the pen name
Julian Pine Julian may refer to: People * Julian (emperor) (331–363), Roman emperor from 361 to 363 * Julian (Rome), referring to the Roman gens Julia, with imperial dynasty offshoots * Saint Julian (disambiguation), several Christian saints * Julian (give ...
in 1937, republished in 1989. *In Diana Wynne Jones' 2003 book ''
The Merlin Conspiracy ''The Merlin Conspiracy'' is a children's fantasy novel by Diana Wynne Jones, published by HarperCollins in April 2003, simultaneously in Britain and America. It is a sequel to ''Deep Secret'' (1997). In the 2004 poll of ''Locus'' readers to co ...
'', Old Sarum features as a character, with one line being "I'm a rotten borough, I am." *In the Aubrey–Maturin series of sea-faring tales, the pocket borough of Milport (also known as Milford) is initially held by General Aubrey, the father of protagonist Jack Aubrey. In the twelfth novel in the series, ''The Letter of Marque'' (1988), Jack's father dies and the seat is offered to Jack himself by his cousin Edward Norton, the "owner" of the borough. The borough has just seventeen electors, all of whom are tenants of Mr Norton. *In the 1969 first novel of
George MacDonald Fraser George MacDonald Fraser (2 April 1925 – 2 January 2008) was a British author and screenwriter. He is best known for a series of works that featured the character Flashman. Biography Fraser was born to Scottish parents in Carlisle, England, ...
's '' The Flashman Papers'' series, the eponymous antihero, Harry Flashman, mentions that his father, Sir Buckley Flashman, had been in Parliament, but "they did for him at Reform" - implying that the elder Flashman's seat was a rotten or pocket borough. Television *In the episode " Dish and Dishonesty" of the BBC television comedy ''Blackadder the Third'', Edmund Blackadder attempts to bolster support for the Prince Regent in
Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. ...
by getting the incompetent Baldrick elected to the fictional rotten borough of " Dunny-on-the-Wold". He easily accomplished this with a result of 16,472 to nil, even though the constituency had only one voter (Blackadder himself). Video games *The video game '' Assassin's Creed III'' briefly mentions pocket and rotten boroughs in a database entry entitled "''Pocket Boroughs''", with Old Sarum identified as one of the worst examples of a pocket borough. In the game, shortly before the Boston Massacre a
non-player character A non-player character (NPC), or non-playable character, is any character in a game that is not controlled by a player. The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster ...
(NPC) can be heard speaking to a group of people on the colonies' lack of representation in Parliament and listing several rotten boroughs, including Old Sarum.


Quotations

* " orough representation isthe rotten part of the
constitution A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed. When these princip ...
." —
William Pitt the Elder William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham, (15 November 170811 May 1778) was a British statesman of the Whig group who served as Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1766 to 1768. Historians call him Chatham or William Pitt the Elder to distinguish ...
* "The county of Yorkshire, which contains near a million souls, sends two county members; and so does the county of Rutland which contains not a hundredth part of that number. The town of Old Sarum, which contains not three houses, sends two members; and the town of Manchester, which contains upwards of sixty thousand souls, is not admitted to send any. Is there any principle in these things?"
Tom Paine Thomas Paine (born Thomas Pain; – In the contemporary record as noted by Conway, Paine's birth date is given as January 29, 1736–37. Common practice was to use a dash or a slash to separate the old-style year from the new-style year. In th ...
, from ''Rights of Man'', 1791 * From '' H.M.S. Pinafore'' by
Gilbert and Sullivan Gilbert and Sullivan was a Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the dramatist W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) and the composer Arthur Sullivan (1842–1900), who jointly created fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which '' H.M.S. ...
: :Sir Joseph Porter: ::I grew so rich that I was sent ::By a pocket borough into Parliament. ::I always voted at my party's call, ::And I never thought of thinking for myself at all. :Chorus: ::And he never thought of thinking for himself at all. :Sir Joseph: ::I thought so little, they rewarded me ::By making me the Ruler of the Queen's Navee! * From '' Iolanthe'' by
Gilbert and Sullivan Gilbert and Sullivan was a Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the dramatist W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) and the composer Arthur Sullivan (1842–1900), who jointly created fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which '' H.M.S. ...
: ::Fairy Queen: Let me see. I've a borough or two at my disposal. Would you like to go into Parliament? * From ''The Letter of Marque'' by
Patrick O'Brian Patrick O'Brian, CBE (12 December 1914 – 2 January 2000), born Richard Patrick Russ, was an English novelist and translator, best known for his Aubrey–Maturin series of sea novels set in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars, and cen ...
:: 'Could you not spend an afternoon at Milport, to meet the electors? There are not many of them, and those few are all my tenants, so it is no more than a formality; but there is a certain decency to be kept up. The writ will be issued very soon.' * The Borough of Queen's Crawley in Thackeray's '' Vanity Fair'' is a rotten borough eliminated by the Reform Act of 1832: ::'When Colonel Dobbin quitted the service, which he did immediately after his marriage, he rented a pretty country place in Hampshire, not far from Queen's Crawley, where, after the passing of the Reform Bill, Sir Pitt and his family constantly resided now. All idea of a peerage was out of the question, the baronet's two seats in Parliament being lost. He was both out of pocket and out of spirits by that catastrophe, failed in his health, and prophesied the speedy ruin of the Empire.'


See also

*
Apportionment (politics) Apportionment is the process by which seats in a legislative body are distributed among administrative divisions, such as states or parties, entitled to representation. This page presents the general principles and issues related to apportionme ...
* Functional constituencies in Hong Kong and Macau *
Gerrymandering In representative democracies, gerrymandering (, originally ) is the political manipulation of electoral district boundaries with the intent to create undue advantage for a party, group, or socioeconomic class within the constituency. The m ...


References

Notes Further reading * Namier, Lewis (1957) 929''
The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III ''The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III'' was a book written by Lewis Namier. At the time of its first publication in 1929 it caused a historiographical revolution in understanding the 18th century by challenging the Whig view ...
'' * Spielvogel, Jackson J. (2003) ''Western Civilization – Volume II: Since 1500'' p. 493 {{DEFAULTSORT:Rotten And Pocket Boroughs Electoral fraud Corruption in the United Kingdom Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom Political history of the United Kingdom Apportionment by country