Kent was a parliamentary constituency covering the county of Kent in southeast England. It returned two "knights of the shire" (Members of Parliament) to the House of Commons by the bloc vote system from the year 1290. Members were returned to the Parliament of England until the Union with Scotland created the Parliament of Great Britain in 1707, and to the Parliament of the United Kingdom after the union with Ireland in 1801 until the county was divided by the Reform Act 1832.
History Boundaries The constituency consisted of the historic county of Kent. (Although Kent contained eight boroughs, each of which elected two MPs in its own right for part of the period when Kent was a constituency, these were not excluded from the county constituency, and the ownership of property within the borough could confer a vote at the county election. This was even the case for the city of Canterbury, which had the status of a county in itself: unlike those in almost all other counties of cities, Canterbury's freeholders were entitled to vote for Kent's MPs.)
The constituency boundaries may have theoretically encompassed a much larger area and population than would at first appear. After the American Revolution, it was apparently solemnly argued in Parliament that the rebels' complaint of no taxation without representation was mistaken, since "all the grants of land in America were to be held of the Manor of Greenwich in the County of Kent, and therefore the Knights of the Shire for the County of Kent represented all Americans". However, this somewhat flimsy argument - relying on an obsolete legal fiction dating back to the land ownership laws of the feudal system - seems not to have been received entirely respectfully even in the 18th century, and it is certainly not recorded that Kent's returning officer was ever bothered by American colonists demanding their right to vote.
Franchise In medieval times, the custom in Kent, as elsewhere, was for the MPs for the county and those for its boroughs to be elected on the same day at the county court, by the suitors to the court, which meant the tiny handful of the local nobility who were tenants in chief of the Crown. Thus we find it recorded that in the second year of the reign of Henry V, "In the County Court of Kent, held at Rochester, Four Coroners and Eight others present, chose the Knights for the County, and the same person elect two Citizens for Canterbury, and two for Rochester."
From 1430, the Forty Shilling Freeholder Act extended the right to vote to every man who possessed freehold property within the county valued at £2 or more per year for the purposes of land tax; it was not necessary for the freeholder to occupy his land, nor even in later years to be resident in the county at all.
Except during the period of the Commonwealth in the mid 17th century, Kent had two MPs elected by the bloc vote method, under which each voter had two votes. In the nominated Barebones Parliament, five members represented Kent. In the First and Second Parliaments of Oliver Cromwell's Protectorate, however, there was a general redistribution of seats and Kent elected 11 members, though most of the county's boroughs lost one or both of their MPs. The traditional arrangements were restored from 1659.
Political character At the time of the Great Reform Act in 1832, Kent had a population of approximately 480,000, though only between 8,000 and 9,000 of these were qualified to vote at the start of the 19th century, and fewer than 4,000 actually voted at the last contested election, in 1818. It has been estimated that in this period around a third of Kent's voters were urban, spread among a couple of dozen medium-sized and small towns: Canterbury, Maidstone, Dover, Deal, Chatham and the growing resorts of Ramsgate and Margate were the biggest, but at the election of 1802 the pollbooks show that only Canterbury (with 384 voters) contributed more than 250 to the poll.
With the villages outvoting the towns by two to one, no particular local interest predominated. By custom, the choice was generally one member from East Kent and one from West Kent. The county's MPs were generally drawn from the leading local families of gentry, but rarely from the nobility, and the voters jealously guarded their independence: although important peers wielded significant influence at times - the Earl of Westmorland and Earl of Winchelsea at the turn of the 18th century for example, the Duke of Dorset sixty years later - it always fell far short of control over the outcome.
Elections were held at a single polling place, and voters from the rest of the county had to travel to the county town to exercise their franchise. It was normal for voters to expect the candidates for whom they voted to meet their expenses in travelling to the poll, making the cost of fighting an election substantial. Contested elections were therefore rare in most counties, but Kent was something of an exception: voters went to the polls at 14 of the 29 general elections between 1700 and 1832, a total exceeded only by Surrey among the other English counties.
Those elections which were contested seem rarely to have been decided on party lines, and too great an adherence to party loyalty by the MPs was sometimes resented. The voters also expected the solicitous attention of their members. Jupp reprints the resolutions passed by a County meeting of Kent freeholders in 1820: 1. That it is essential to the honour and credit of this County, that it should be represented by two gentlemen constantly resident therein.2. That it is the opinion of this Meeting that this county was in the last Parliament very inefficiently represented by one of its members, inasmuch as his residence was elsewhere, and the Freeholders were thereby deprived of that easy access and free communication which are essential between the constituent and the representative.3. That it is the opinion of this meeting that the conduct of a County member in Parliament should be at all times marked by independence, equally free from subserviency to any Administration and unshackled by any Party indiscriminately hostile thereto.4. That we cannot recognise in Mr Honywood's uniform opposition to every measure recently proposed in Parliament, for the purpose of restraining the career of sedition, blasphemy and crime, the influence of that elevated spirit, which should direct the actions of an independent representative for this great and enlightened County. These sentiments were clearly not held universally, however, since the apostrophised Mr Honywood was re-elected at that year's election.
Abolition The constituency was abolished in 1832 by the Great Reform Act, being divided into two two-member county divisions, Eastern Kent and Western Kent.
Members of Parliament MPs 1290–1660
Constituency created (1290) ParliamentFirst memberSecond member 1372 James Peckham 1376–1388 Sir Thomas Fogge 1377 (Oct) James PeckhamJohn Freningham 1378 Sir Thomas Fogge 1380 (Nov) Sir Thomas FoggeWilliam Guildford 1381 John Freningham Sir Thomas Fogge 1383 (Feb) James Peckham Sir Thomas Fogge 1383 (Oct) Sir Thomas Fogge 1384 (Nov) Sir Thomas FoggeWilliam Guildford 1386 William BettenhamGeoffrey Chaucer 1388 (Feb) Sir Thomas Fogge James Peckham 1388 (Sep) William Bettenham 1390 (Jan) Sir Arnold Savage John Cobham 1390 (Nov) Sir Thomas Cobham 1391Nicholas Potyn 1393 Sir William Burcester 1394 Sir William Pecche John Cobham 1395 Sir Nicholas Haute Thomas Brockhill 1397 (Jan) Nicholas Potyn 1397 (Sep) Sir William Pecche John Cobham 1399 John Freningham Thomas Brockhill 1401Sir Arnold Savage Robert Clifford 1402 Thomas Brockhill 1404 (Jan) Sir Reynold Braybrooke 1404 (Oct) Sir Thomas Clinton Henry Horne 1406 Richard ClitheroeRobert Clifford 1407 John Darell 1410 returns lost 1411 Reynold Pympe William Nutbeam 1413 (Feb) returns lost 1413 (May) John Darell John Butler I 1414 (Apr) Sir Thomas Clinton 1414 (Nov) Sir Arnold Savage II Robert Clifford 1415 returns lost 1416 (Mar) William Cheyne John Wilcotes 1416 (Oct) returns lost 1417 John Darell Roger Rye 1419 William Haute Edward Guildford 1420 William Rickhill Thomas Town 1421 (May) returns lost 1421 (Dec) Thomas Ellis Roger Honyton 1422 Geoffrey Lowther Reginald Lowther 1426 Edward Guildford 1430 William Scott 1435 Edward Guildford 1445–1446 Thomas Browne 1449 John Cheyne 1450 William Haute 1455 Gervase Clifton Sir Thomas Kyriell 1461–1462 Sir John Fogge Sir Thomas Kyriell 1463–1465 Sir John Fogge 1467 Sir John Scott 1478 Sir John Fogge 1483 Sir John Fogge 1489-1495 Sir Richard Guildford (3 times) 1510No names known 1512 ?Sir Edward Poynings ? 1515 ?Sir Thomas Nevill ? 1523 ? 1529 Sir Edward Guildford, died and replaced Oct 1534 by Sir John Dudley Sir Henry Guildford 1536 ?Thomas Cromwell ? 1539 Sir Thomas Cheyne Gregory Cromwell 1542 Sir Thomas Cheyne Sir Thomas Wyatt, died and replaced Jan 1543 by Sir John Guildford 1545 Sir Thomas Cheyne George Harper 1547 Sir Thomas Cheyne Sir Thomas Wyatt II 1553 (Mar) Sir Thomas Cheyne Sir Henry Sidney 1553 (Oct) Sir Thomas Cheyne Sir Robert Southwell 1554 (Apr) Sir Thomas Cheyne Sir John Baker 1554 (Nov) Sir Thomas Cheyne Sir John Baker 1555 Sir John Baker Sir Robert Southwell 1558 Sir Thomas Cheyne Sir John Baker 1558–9 Sir Anthony St. Leger I Sir Richard Sackville, sat for Sussex, repl. Feb 1559 by Sir Thomas Kempe 1562–3 Sir Henry Sidney Sir Henry Cheyne 1571 Sir Thomas Scott Sir Henry Sidney 1572 Sir Henry Sidney Sir Thomas Scott 1584 (Nov) Sir Philip Sidney Edward Wotton 1586 (Oct) Sir Henry Brooke alias Cobham I Sir Thomas Scott 1588 (Oct) Henry Brooke alias Cobham II Sir Henry Brooke alias Cobham I 1593Sir Edward Hoby Moyle Finch 1597 (Sep) Sir Robert Sidney Sir William Brooke alias Cobham, killed in duel and replaced Jan 1598 by Percival Hart1601Francis FaneSir Henry NevillParliament of 1604-1611 Sir John Scott John LevesonAddled Parliament (1614) Sir Peter Manwood Sir Thomas WalsinghamParliament of 1621-1622 Viscount Lisle Sir George FaneHappy Parliament (1624–1625) Nicholas Tufton Sir Edwin SandysUseless Parliament (1625) Mildmay Fane Sir Albertus MortonParliament of 1625-1626 Sir Edward Hales Sir Edward Scott Parliament of 1628-1629 Thomas Finch Sir Dudley Digges No Parliament summoned 1629-1640
MPs 1640–1832