I have to agree with David about it being common - it was very much the norm for MPs at the turn of the century to represent several seats over their career - even Lord Randolph had to move to South Paddington when his Woodstock seat was abolished in 1885.
Where Jonathan is right is in the unusual circumstances of Churchill gaining and losing seats. A lot of seat changes of the day were down to electoral calculation. (On at least two occasions, Gladstone simultaneously stood in two seats to be sure he would win at least one of them.) Churchill seemed to fly in the face of this. Churchill lost North-West Manchester in 1908 because it was electorally unpromising territory which he nonetheless chose to contest.It was an interesting case - having just defected from the Conservatives to the Liberals in 1904, he stood a good chance of holding on to his current seat at Oldham, which was a two-member Con/ Lib marginal, and in a good year for Liberals (like 1906) his return would have been guaranteed. Instead, in 1906 he chose to move to a neighbouring seat held by the Conservatives, but which he narrowly gained from them. When he narrowly lost the same seat in the 1908 by- election, nobody could say he hadn't tried to do something fairly daring. On Nov 6, 10:09 pm, [email protected] wrote: > It was not common. Churchill lost and gained seats mainly because he stood > up for what he believed in and stood countless times against his political > party. > > > > ------Original Message------ > From: Perpetuo991 > Sender: [email protected] > To: ChurchillChat > ReplyTo: [email protected] > Subject: [ChurchillChat] Churchill and Seats in Parliament > Sent: Nov 6, 2009 3:26 PM > > Churchill held numerous seats in Parliament; Oldham, Epping, Dundee, > etc. Was this fact unique to Churchill or was it a common occurrence > in British politics? > > P > > Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry- Hide quoted text - > > - Show quoted text - -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "ChurchillChat" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/churchillchat?hl=.
