The 1871 British Columbia general election was held from October to December 1871. Formerly a British colony, British Columbia became a province of Canada on July 20, 1871. An interim Cabinet was appointed by the lieutenant governor of British Columbia, and election writs for the first general election as a province of Canada were issued to choose 25 members of the first provincial legislature from 12 ridings (electoral districts). These ridings were:
The election was held from October through December 1871, and was conducted by means of a show of hands on nomination day and, if required, an open poll book on polling day. There were no organized political parties.
Each voter could cast as many votes as there were seats to fill. Where multiple members were elected, the seats were filled through plurality block voting; elsewhere, first-past-the-post voting was used. [1]
Vancouver Island
Mainland:
Note that these figures refer to votes actually cast, not the population per se nor the total of the potential voters' list.
Note: There is no arrangement to the ridings and members, other than by rough alphabetical order, as all were technically independents. Actual seating of the House or political alignments are not represented.
| Results of British Columbia general election, 1871 | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Government | Opposition | ||||||||||||
| Member | Riding & party | Riding & party | Member | ||||||||||
| Cornelius Booth | Cariboo [ disambiguation needed ] | Comox | John Ash | ||||||||||
| Joseph Hunter | Cowichan | John Paton Booth | |||||||||||
| George Anthony Boomer Walkem 1 | William Smithe | ||||||||||||
| Henry Cogan | Esquimalt | Kootenay | John Andrew Mara | ||||||||||
| Alexander Rocke Robertson | Charles Todd | ||||||||||||
| Thomas Basil Humphreys | Lillooet | Nanaimo | John Robson | ||||||||||
| Andrew Thomas Jamieson | New Westminster | William James Armstrong | |||||||||||
| Henry Holbrook | New Westminster City | Josiah Charles Hughes | |||||||||||
| Arthur Bunster | Victoria | Victoria City | Robert Beaven | ||||||||||
| Amor De Cosmos | Simeon Duck | ||||||||||||
| James Robinson | Yale | John Foster McCreight 2 | |||||||||||
| Charles Augustus Semlin | James Trimble | ||||||||||||
| Robert Smith | |||||||||||||
| 1 Premier-Elect | 2 Incumbent premier | ||||||||||||
| Source: Elections BC | |||||||||||||
Two sets of byelections were held to confirm appointments to the Executive Council (cabinet), as was the custom in earlier times. Ministerial candidates in this series of byelections were all confirmed by acclamation (so there were no actual polling dates). These byelections were:
Other byelections were also held due to deaths and other appointments; all were contested:
Note: Government/Opposition status applies to candidate at time of election in 1871, not at time of dissolution in 1875.
| Composition of 2nd British Columbia Parliament at Dissolution, 1875 | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Government | Opposition | ||||||||||||
| Member | Riding & party | Riding & party | Member | ||||||||||
| John George Barnston | Cariboo | Comox | John Ash | ||||||||||
| Joseph Hunter | Cowichan | John Paton Booth | |||||||||||
| George Anthony Boomer Walkem | William Smithe | ||||||||||||
| Henry Cogan | Esquimalt | Kootenay | John Andrew Mara | ||||||||||
| Alexander Rocke Robertson | Charles Todd | ||||||||||||
| Thomas Basil Humphreys | Lillooet | Nanaimo | John Robson | ||||||||||
| William M. Brown | New Westminster | William James Armstrong | |||||||||||
| Henry Holbrook | New Westminster City | Josiah Charles Hughes | |||||||||||
| William Archibald Robertson | Victoria | Victoria City | Robert Beaven | ||||||||||
| William Fraser Tolmie | Simeon Duck | ||||||||||||
| James Robinson | Yale | John Foster McCreight | |||||||||||
| Charles Augustus Semlin | James Trimble | ||||||||||||
| Robert Smith | |||||||||||||
| Source: Elections BC | |||||||||||||
| General elections | |
|---|---|
| Municipal elections | |
| Referendums | |
See also: List of British Columbia by-elections | |
The following is an alphabetical list of articles related to the Canadian province of British Columbia.
Yale was a federal electoral district in British Columbia, Canada, that was represented in the House of Commons of Canada from 1872 to 1892 and from 1917 to 1953.
Cariboo District was a federal electoral district in British Columbia, Canada, that was represented in the House of Commons of Canada from 1871 to 1872.
Cariboo was one of the twelve original electoral districts created when British Columbia became a Canadian province in 1871. Roughly corresponding to the old colonial electoral administrative district of the same name, it was a three-member riding until the 1894 election, when it was reduced through reapportionment and became a two-member riding until the 1916 election, after which it has been a single-member riding. It produced many notable Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs), including George Anthony Boomer Walkem, third and fifth holder of the office of Premier of British Columbia and who was one of the first representatives elected from the riding; John Robson, ninth Premier of British Columbia; and Robert Bonner, a powerful minister in the W.A.C. Bennett cabinet, and later CEO of MacMillan Bloedel and BC Hydro.
Victoria District was a federal electoral district in British Columbia, Canada, that was represented in the House of Commons of Canada from 1871 to 1872.
The 1875 British Columbia general election was held in 1875. Many of the politicians in the House had served with the Legislative Council or Assembly or the Executive Council, or had otherwise been stalwarts of the colonial era - some supporters of Confederation, others not. Some were ranchers or mining bosses from the Interior, others were colonial gentry from the Island and New Westminster, and others direct arrivals from Britain, Ireland or "Canada", which was still considered a different place not only in the minds of the politicians but in the language used in Hansard during this period.
The 1878 British Columbia general election was held in 1878.
The 1882 British Columbia general election was held in 1882.
The 1886 British Columbia general election was held in 1886. The number of members was increased for this election from 25 to 27, and the number of ridings increased to 13.
The 1890 British Columbia general election was held in 1890. The number of members was increased for this election from 27 in the previous election to 33, although the number of ridings was decreased to 18.
The 1894 British Columbia general election was held in 1894. The number of members remained at 33 with the number of ridings increased to 26 as a result of the partition of the Yale and Westminster ridings.
The Legislative Council of British Columbia was an advisory body created in 1867 to the governor of the "new" Colony of British Columbia, which had been created from the merger of the old Colonies of Vancouver Island and British Columbia. The new colony, like its predecessors, did not have responsible government, and while its debates and resolutions carried considerable weight, executive power remained in the hands of the governor, who at the time of the council's founding was Frederick Seymour.
An electoral redistribution was undertaken in 2008 in British Columbia in a process that began in late 2005 and was completed with the passage of the Electoral Districts Act, 2008 on April 10, 2008. The redistribution modified most electoral boundaries in the province and increased the number of MLAs from 79 to 85. The electoral boundaries created by the redistribution were first used in the 2009 provincial election.
An electoral redistribution in British Columbia was undertaken by the BC Electoral Boundaries Commission beginning in 2014 and was formalized by the passage of Bill 42, the 2015 Electoral Districts Act, during the 40th British Columbia Parliament. The act came into effect on November 17, 2015. The redistribution added two seats to the previous total, increasing the number of MLAs in the province from 85 to 87. The electoral boundaries came into effect for the 2017 election. The next redistribution is required to occur following the 2020 British Columbia general election.
The 2022 British Columbia municipal elections were held on 15 October 2022. Municipal elections took place in all municipalities and regional district electoral areas in the Canadian province of British Columbia to elect mayors, school board trustees, rural directors and city councillors. Elections BC administered campaign financing, disclosure and advertisement of candidates; however, voting, ballots and candidate nominations were administered by each jurisdiction's local electoral officer.
An electoral redistribution in British Columbia is underway by the BC Electoral Boundaries Commission. On October 21, 2021, the Government of British Columbia appointed Justice Nitya Iyer, Linda Tynan and Chief Electoral Officer Anton Boegman to serve as the 2021 commissioners. Justice Iyer was appointed the chair.
