Party Representation in English and Welsh Constituencies, 1690-1740

The Whig and Tory parties played an important role in British politics in the decades following the Glorious Revolution. Scholars have used The History of Parliament series as a key source for data on political parties, yet most editions omit tabular data on the party affiliation of individual MPs. In this paper, we introduce newly created data on the political affiliation of all MPs serving in England and Wales between 1690 and 1740. We then measure the strength of Whig Party representation across English and Welsh constituencies and for the first time present maps of party representation. The Whigs are shown to be more strongly represented in municipal boroughs compared to counties and they were stronger in small and oligarchical boroughs compared to large and more democratic boroughs. We also find that the Whigs were stronger in southeastern boroughs and counties. The patterns are broadly similar during the Rage of Party (1690 to 1721) and the Walpole Era (1722 to 1740). The main difference is that the Whigs lost strength in the North during the Walpole Era and they were weaker in constituencies with contested elections under Walpole.