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'pounds (all feu-duties being deducted), shall be and are capable to vote in the election of commissioners of Parliaments, and to be elected commissioners to Parliaments, ex'cepting alwayes from this act all noblemen and their vassals.'

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By the subsequent statute, 1681, c. 21, the qualification was put on the footing on which it still rests at the present day. By that act it was provided, That none shall have vote in the election of commissioners for shires or stewartries, which have been in use to be represented in Parliament and conventions, but those who at that time shall 'be publickly infeft in property or superiority, and in pos'session of a forty shilling land of old extent, holden of the king or prince, distinct from the feu-duties in feu-lands; or, where the said old extent appears not, shall be infeft in lands lyable in public burden for his majesty's supplies, for 'four hundred pounds of valued rent, whether kirk-lands now holden off the king, or other lands holding feu, waird, or ⚫ blench off his majesty, as king or prince of Scotland.'

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By this act also, permission to vote was given to apprizers or adjudgers, after expiry of the legal, to proper wadsetters, to apparent heirs in possession, by their predecessors' infeftment of the holding extent and valuation foresaid, to liferenters, and to husbands in right of their wives. The statute farther ordered the freeholders of each shire to make up a roll of the fiars, liferenters, and husbands having right to vote, and to revise it annually.

The dignified clergy, who, even after the Reformation, had continued to sit in the Scottish Parliament for a considerable period, were finally deprived of that right about the time of the Revolution, when Episcopacy was finally abolished'.

By the Treaty of Union between England and Scotland it was provided, that the kingdom of Great Britain should be represented by one Parliament, to be called the Parliament of 1 Wight, p. 75.

Great Britain. By the twenty-second article of that treaty, it was provided, That of the Scots Peers at the time of the Union, sixteen should be the number to sit and vote in the House of Lords; and that forty-five representatives should be sent from Scotland to the House of Commons. It was subsequently declared, by the act 1707, c. 8, of the Scots Parliament, which is held as equally valid as if it constituted a part of the Articles of Union, that the sixteen peers should be chosen by the peers of Scotland, out of their own number, by plurality of voices; and that of the forty-five commoners, thirty should be sent by the shires, and fifteen by the royal boroughs; of which boroughs Edinburgh should send one member, and the remainder should be divided into fourteen districts, each of which districts should also send one member. It was also provided, that none should be capable to elect, or be elected, to represent a shire or borough in the Parliament of Great Britain, but such as might elect, or be elected, to represent a shire or borough in the Parliament of Scotland.

It being thus established by the Treaty of Union, that representatives should be sent to the British Parliament from the peerage, the counties, and the boroughs of Scotland, the subject of the following pages naturally divides itself into three parts: the first relating to the election of the representatives from the Peers: the second to that of the representatives from the Shires; and the third to that of the representatives from the Boroughs.

2

PART I.

OF THE ELECTION OF THE REPRESENTATIVE PEERS OF SCOTLAND.

In considering the subject of the election of the representative peers of Scotland, there are two points which merit separate attention; 1st, The qualifications necessary to vote in this election, and to be elected; and, 2dly, The mode of proceeding at the election. These subjects shall be considered in their order.

CHAPTER I.

OF THE QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY TO VOTE IN THE ELECTION OF THE SIXTEEN PEERS OF SCOTLAND, OR TO BE ELECTED.

IMMEDIATELY after the Treaty of Union, a roll of the whole peers of Scotland was returned to the House of Peers, by the Lord Clerk-Register, by order of that House'. This list has experienced some alterations and additions, but still forms the basis of the roll which is called at the election of peers at the present day2.

Those who claim a right to vote, in virtue of a title not on the roll, may vote at the election under protest; and it will rest with the House of Lords to determine the weight due to their votes when challenged3.

1 A copy of this roll will be found in the Appendix, No. 7. 2 Wight, p. 125, Note.

3 Ibid.

1

By the Scottish act 1707, c. 8, passed after the conclusion of the Treaty of Union, but before it took effect, it is declared, that the sixteen peers of Scotland shall be elected by the peers of Scotland, whom they represent, their heirs and successors, to their dignities and honours, out of their own ' number, and that by open election and plurality of voices ' of the peers present, and of the proxies."

It was resolved by the House of Lords, in the month of January 1708, That a peer of Scotland claiming to sit in 'the House of Peers, by virtue of a patent passed under 'the Great Seal of Great Britain, after the Union, and who now sits in the Parliament of Great Britain, had no right ' to vote in the election of the sixteen peers, who are to re( present the peers of Scotland in Parliament'.'

English peers, however, having also Scottish peerage, were allowed to vote.

The grounds on which the elective privilege was denied to Scottish peers created British peers, are stated by Bishop Burnet to have been, that it would create an inequality among peers, if some had a vote by representation, as well as in person; that, by creating some of the chief families in Scotland British peers, they would be able to carry the whole election of the sixteen as they pleased; that the case of a Scottish and an English peer having a British peerage, was distinguished in this respect, that a Scottish and an English peerage are held under two different crowns, and by two different great seals; but that Great Britain including Scotland as well as England, the Scottish peerage sunk in that of Great Britain; and that there having been only five peers of both kingdoms before the Union, it was of no great consequence giving them a double vote3, whilst, in the case

1 Robertson's Proceedings relative to the Scotch Peerage, p. 42. 2 History of his Times. Oxford ed. 1823, vol. v. p. 386.

3 It is stated in a note by the Earl of Dartmouth, printed in the above edition, that the English peers got this privilege through the influence of

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