Reform Act Of 1867: The Path To Democracy In Britain

Democracy is government by the people, for the people. The second reform act of 1867 advanced Britain on its path to democracy although there remained many undemocratic aspects in the governance of Britain.

The 1867 reform bill did many things to increase democracy in Britain. It increased the electorate by a million meaning that one in three adult males were enfranchised. The act also redistributed seats in recognition of the shift from a large rural population to an urban one.
52 seats were abolished and these seats were given to new cities such as Leeds and
Manchester and the larger counties gained MP's as all counties, regardless os size getting 2
MPs was deemed unfair.

Despite the changes which the second reform act
Although there was a lot of seat redistribution in the 1867 reform act with 52 borough seats being abolished, the distribution of seats still did not accurately reflect Britain's population distribution. The counties still had a lower proportion of voters to seats than the boroughs and the south was over represented.

In a democracy all votes are equal and there is one vote per person. This was not the case in
1868 due to the existence of plural voting. 'This meant that people who lived in one constituency and owned a business in another, or who had graduated from one of the universities that possessed their own parliamentary seats, were allowed extra seats'
(Goodlad).
For example Joseph Chamberlain had six votes and it is estimated that half a million people had plural votes in 1880. They were finally abolished in 1948.

Democracy means that the government of the country is carried out by the people or their elected representatives. However the House of Lords had the power to veto legislation passed in the House of Commons. This meant that a non-elected body determined the outcome