The 1913

Whitechapel Whitechapel () is an area in London, England, and is located in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is in east London and part of the East End of London, East End. It is the location of Tower Hamlets Town Hall and therefore the borough tow ...

by-election was a Parliamentary by-election held on 30 April 1913. The constituency returned one Member of Parliament (MP) to the

House of Commons of the United Kingdom The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. The House of Commons is an elected body consisting of 650 memb ...

, elected by the

first past the post First-past-the-post (FPTP)—also called choose-one, first-preference plurality (FPP), or simply plurality—is a single-winner voting rule. Voters mark one candidate as their favorite, or First-preference votes, first-preference, and the cand ...

voting system.

Vacancy

Sir Stuart Samuel the Liberal MP for

undertook a contract for the Public Service, which required him to resign his seat and face re-election.

Electoral history

Candidates

Sir Stuart Samuel had been Liberal MP for the seat since 1900 and the seat had been Liberal since it was created in 1885. He was opposed by Edgar Browne, who had been his Unionist opponent in December 1910.

Campaign

Votes for women

The

National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies The National Union of Women Suffrage Societies (NUWSS), also known as the ''suffragists'' (not to be confused with the suffragettes) was an organisation founded in 1897 of women's suffrage societies around the United Kingdom. In March 1919 it w ...

, following the adoption of their new policy to not support Liberal candidates, chose not to support either candidate and instead opened a local office from which to carry out propaganda work. The smaller

Women's Freedom League The Women's Freedom League was an organisation in the United Kingdom from 1907 to 1961 which campaigned for women's suffrage, pacifism and sexual equality. It was founded by former members of the Women's Social and Political Union after the Pa ...

, a breakaway group from the

Women's Social and Political Union The Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) was a women-only political movement and leading militant organisation campaigning for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom founded in 1903. Known from 1906 as the suffragettes, its membership and p ...

who favoured direct action but opposed violence, also set up a local campaign office. However, the WFL's position on by-elections was specifically anti-government, so they campaigned against the return of the Liberal candidate Samuel and thus by definition in support of his Unionist opponent, Browne.Standard, 22 April 1913

Result

Stuart Samuel Stuart Samuel may refer to: * Stuart Samuel (politician), British banker and politician * Stuart Samuel (physicist), American physicist {{hndis, Samuel, Stuart ...

retained the seat for the Liberal Party.

Aftermath

Samuel retired from politics in 1916 and the Liberals held the resulting by-election unopposed.