By-elections in British Politics 1832-1914
Between the 1832 Great Reform Act and the outbreak of World War One in 1914, over 2,600 by-elections took place in Britain. They were triggered by the death, retirement or resignation of sitting MPs or by the appointment of cabinet ministers and were a regular feature of Victorian and Edwardian politics. They furnished political parties and their leaders with a crucial tool for gauging and mobilising public opinion. Yet despite the prominence of by-election contests in the historical records of this period, scholars have paid relatively little attention to them. As this book shows, these elections deserve to be taken as seriously today as people took them at the time. They provided important linkages between local and national politics, between the four parts of the United Kingdom and Westminster, and between foreign and domestic affairs. They are vital to understanding the evolving electioneering machineries, the varying language of electoral contests, the traction that particular issues had with a growing and frequently volatile electorate, and the fluctuating fortunes of the political parties. This book, consisting of original work by leading political historians, provides the first synoptic study of this important subject. It will be required reading for historians and students of modern British political history, as well as specialists in electoral history and politics. T. G. Otte is Professor of Diplomatic History at the University of East Anglia. He is the author and/or editor of some thirteen books. Among the most recent is The Foreign Office Mind: The Making of British Foreign Policy, 1865-1914. Paul Readman is Senior Lecturer in Modern British History at King's College London. He is the author of Land and Nation in England: Patriotism, National Identity and the Politics of Land 1880-1914. Contributors: Luke Blaxill, Angus Hawkins, Geoffrey Hicks, Phillips Payson O'Brien, T.G. Otte, Ian Packer, Gordon Pentland, Paul Readman, Kathryn Rix, Matthew Roberts, Philip Salmon, Anthony Taylor
Attercliffe, 1894: How One Local Liberal Party Failed to Meet the Challenge of Labour
The question of why the Liberal Party failed to absorb and channel the increased political activity of the working class after 1885 is one that historians continue to debate. This paper is an attempt to assess the viability of the Liberal Party as a vehicle for working class political aspirations within the context of a single by-election in Sheffield, a city with a strong tradition of Liberal-Labour cooperation. To put the 1894 by-election in perspective, one must first look briefly at the development of the Liberal Party in relation to the demand for Labour Members of Parliament in the last third of the nineteenth century. 1.The Early Movement Toward Labour Representation The beginning of the movement for direct trade union representation in parliament is usually dated from 1868, when William Newton of the Engineers, William Cremer of the Carpenters and Joiners, and George Howell of the Bricklayers stood for election. All three were defeated despite some Liberal support “notably (if secretly) from party headquarters.” In the following year the Labour Representation League was launched. According to its prospectus, “its principal duty will be to secure the return to Parliament of qualified working men", and it proposed to organize workers' votes regardless of party despite the radical connections of many union leaders. But its party affiliation was soon apparent, and by 1875 the League declared: “we have ever sought to be allied to the great Liberal Party, to which we by conviction belong.”
Chemical-Looping Combustion of Biomass in a 10 kWth Reactor with Iron Oxide As an Oxygen Carrier
Chemical-looping combustion of biomass was carried out in a 10 kWth reactor with iron oxide as an oxygen carrier. A total 30 h of test was achieved with the same batch of iron oxide oxygen carrier. The effect of the fuel reactor temperature on gas composition of the fuel reactor and the air reactor, the proportion of biomass carbon reacting in the fuel reactor, and the conversion of biomass carbon to CO2 in the fuel reactor was experimentally investigated. The results showed that the CO production from biomass gasification with CO2 was more temperature dependent than the CO oxidation with iron oxide in the fuel reactor, and an increase in the fuel reactor temperature produced a higher increase for the CO production from biomass gasification than for the oxidation of CO by iron oxide. Although the conversion of biomass carbon to CO2 in the fuel reactor decreased with the increase of the fuel reactor temperature, there was a substantial increase in the proportion of biomass carbon reacting in the fuel react...