Bodmin was the name of a parliamentary constituency in Cornwall from 1295 until 1983. Initially, it was a parliamentary borough, which returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons of England and later the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom until the 1868 general election, when its representation was reduced to one member.
The old borough was abolished with effect from the 1885 general election, but the name was transferred to a county constituency, which elected a single member until the constituency was abolished with effect from the 1983 general election, when the area it then covered was divided between the existing North Cornwall and the new Cornwall South East.
Boundaries
1885–1918: The Boroughs of Bodmin and Liskeard, the Sessional Division of East, South, and West Hundred, part of the Sessional Division of Powder Tywardreath, and the parishes of Bodmin, Helland, and Lanivet.
1918–1950: The Boroughs of Bodmin, Fowey, Liskeard, Lostwithiel, and Saltash, the Urban Districts of Callington, Looe, and Torpoint, the Rural Districts of Liskeard and St Germans, in the Rural District of St Austell the parishes of St Sampson and Tywardreath, and part of the Rural District of Bodmin.
1950–1974: The Boroughs of Bodmin, Fowey, Liskeard, Lostwithiel, and Saltash, the Urban Districts of Looe and Torpoint, the Rural Districts of Liskeard and St Germans, in the Rural District of St Austell the parishes of Lanlivery, Luxulyan, and St Sampson, and in the Rural District of Wadebridge the parishes of Blisland, Cardinham, Helland, Lanhydrock, Lanivet, and Withiel.
1974–1983: The Boroughs of Bodmin, Liskeard, and Saltash, the Urban Districts of Looe and Torpoint, the Rural Districts of Liskeard and St Germans, the Rural Borough of Lostwithiel, in the Rural District of St Austell the parishes of Lanlivery, Luxulyan, and St Sampson, and in the Rural District of Wadebridge and Padstow the parishes of Blisland, Cardinham, Helland, Lanhydrock, Lanivet, and Withiel.
History
Borough constituency (1295–1885) The borough which was represented from the time of the Model Parliament consisted of the town of Bodmin though not the whole of the parish. Unlike many of the boroughs in Cornwall which were represented in the Unreformed House of Commons, Bodmin was a town of reasonable size and retained some importance; for most purposes, indeed, it was considered the county town of Cornwall. In 1831, the population of the borough was 3,375, and contained 596 houses.
The right to vote, however, was held not by the residents at large but by the town's corporation, consisting of a Mayor, 11 aldermen and 24 common councilmen. Contested elections were quite unknown before the Reform Act, the choice of the two MPs being left entirely to the "patron". However, this power did not arise, as in many rotten boroughs, from the patron being able to coerce the voters; in Bodmin, the patron was expected to meet the public and private expenses of the corporation and its members in return for their acquiescence at election time.
Early in the 18th century, the Robartes family (Earls of Radnor) were the accepted patrons. Their interest was inherited by George Hunt, whose mother was the Robartes heiress, but he ran into difficulties and could not afford to retain complete control. By the 1760s another local magnate, Sir William Irby, secured enough of the town's goodwill to have a say in the choice of one member, while Hunt continued to select the other. In 1816, the patron was Lord de Dunstanville, nominating both MPs, but he found himself so overburdened with debts that he was forced to give it up, and The Marquess of Hertford was induced to take over the patronage, and the corporation's debts.
While the MP was not expected to assume the same financial obligations as the patron, nor to attend to the needs of his constituents in the manner of a modern MP, they were expected to attend the election ball, a high point in the social calendar for the wives and daughters of the otherwise undistinguished corporation members. John Wilson Croker, elected in 1820, described the Bodmin ball as "tumultuous and merry " but "at once tiresome and foolish".
Bodmin retained both its MPs under the Reform Act, but its boundaries were extended to bring in more of Bodmin parish and the whole of the neighbouring parishes of Lanivet, Lanhydrock and Helland. This increased the population to 5,258, although only 252 were qualified to vote.