Irish Parliamentary Party - Parnellism Reigns

Parnellism Reigns

The result of these reforms and reorganisation were fully reflected in the first general election of November–December 1885 with extended suffrage under the 1884 Reform Act. The Reform Act had increased from 220,000 to 500,000 the number of Irishmen who had a right to vote, many of whom were small farmers. The election increased the total Irish Party representation from sixty three to eighty-five seats, which included seventeen in Ulster. In January 1886 the INL had developed to 1,262 branches and could claim to contain the vast body of Irish Catholic public sentiment. It acted not merely as an electoral committee for the Irish Party, but as local law-giver, unofficial parliament, government, police and supreme court. Parnell’s personal authority in the organisation was enormous. The INL was a formidable political machine built in the traditional political culture of rural Ireland. It was an alliance of tenant-farmers, shopkeepers and publicans. No one could stand against it. After another Reform Act in 1884, the IPP emerged from the 1885 General Election holding the balance of power. However, the Liberal Party split on the issue of Irish Home Rule, leading to another general election in 1886 in which the Conservatives were the largest party and were enabled to form a minority government by the fragment of Liberalism opposed to Home Rule, the Liberal Unionist Party.

Unusually, the party even secured a seat in the English city of Liverpool, where T. P. O'Connor won the Liverpool Scotland seat in 1885 and retained it in every election until his death in 1929 - even after the demise of the actual party (O'Connor being returned unopposed in the elections of 1918, 1922, 1923, 1924, and 1929).

Parnell’s new Irish Parliamentary Party emerged swiftly as a tightly disciplined, and on the whole, energetic body of parliamentarians with strict rules. The inauguration of the ‘party pledge’ in 1884 decisively reinforced that each member was required to sit, act and vote with the party, one of the first instances of a whip (Richard Power) in western politics. The members were also paid stipends, or expense allowances from party funds, which helped both to increase parliamentary turnout and enabled middle-class members such as William O’Brien or later D. D. Sheehan attend parliament, long before other MPs first received state pay in 1911. The profiles of the 105 Irish MPs had changed considerably since 1868 when 69% were landlords or landlords’ sons, reduced to 47% by 1874. Those with professional background increased from 10% to 23% in the same period, by the early 1890s professionals exceeding 50%.