1919 Sallian parliamentary election
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All 650 seats to the House of Commons of Sallia 326 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Opinion polls | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Registered | 14,888,201 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Turnout | 11,991,735 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The 1919 Sallian parliamentary election took place on 27 January 1919. The 4th Parliament of Sallia had been dissolved after the closing of the First World War on 2nd January 1919. The election resulted in a landslide victory for the National Government. The 5th Parliament of Sallia, dubbed the "Parliament of the National Government", first met on 10 February 1919.
Campaign
At the beginning of the campaign, all of the parties (save for the Labour Party) were campaigning to keep the National Government intact. However, divisions soon arose in the Liberal Party, and the Henry Brewer split from the main party to form the National Liberal Party. 170 Liberal MPs joined the new party. The damaged main Liberal Party was now being led by former Prime Minister James Cooper. One Labour MP, William Redmond, soon began campaigning for the National Government to remain intact. After Labour Leader George Williamson ordered the Labour Party to campaign against the National Government, Redmond and three other Labour MPs ceded from the main party to form the National Labour Party.
Campaigning ended on 26 January 1919.
Opinion polls
Main article: Opinion polling for the 1919 Sallian parliamentary election
Endorsements
| Newspaper | Endorsement |
|---|---|
| The People's Paper | Labour Party |
| The Daily News | National Government |
| The Daily Post | National Government |
Results
Seats
- Conservative Party - 418 seats
- National Liberal Party - 158 seats
- Labour Party - 51 seats
- Liberal Party - 18 seats
- National Labour Party - 3 seats
- Republican Party - 1 seat
- The Speaker of the House - 1 seat
Popular vote
- Conservative Party - 4,269,058 (35.6%)
- National Liberal Party - 2,266,438 (18.9%)
- Labour Party - 2,327,596 (19.41%)
- Liberal Party - 2,278,430 (19.0%)
- National Labour Party - 574,404 (4.79%)
- Republican Party - 250,627 (2.09%)
- The Speaker of the House - 25,183 (0.21%)
Despite losing around 10% in vote share, the Conservative Party won the most amount of votes ever cast for one political party up until that point (beating the Liberal Party's 1905 record) and the most amount of seats ever won by a political party up until that point: 418 (beating their 1900 record). It was a landslide victory in its own right, but the victory the National Government had was much larger.
Aftermath
The National Government won a landslide victory of 580 seats (a majority of 511). As per the Unity Agreement, the leader of the largest party in the National Government would become the Prime Minister, and so Henry Brewer resigned the premiership and called for Andrew Christian on 28 January 1919. Christian became the fifth Prime Minister of Sallia upon Brewer's resignation. He soon appointed Brewer the first Deputy Prime Minister of Sallia and formed the Second National Government.
On 29 January, George Francois announced the end of the Republican Party, and de-registered it as a political entity. Its one MP joined the Conservative Party when he took his seat on 10 February. The National Government continued until the Prime Minister Andrew Christian called a snap election in June 1922 so the Conservatives could go solo in government.
The 5th Parliament of Sallia was dissolved on 2 June 1922 for a parliamentary election on 27 June 1922. The Leader of the Liberal Party James Cooper, who was now 60, decided it would "most likely" be the last election he would contest as Leader.