1861 Italian general election
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All 443 seats to the Chamber of Deputies of the Kingdom of Italy | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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General elections were held in Italy on 27 January 1861, with a second round of voting on 3 February.[1] The newly elected Parliament first convened in Turin on 4 March 1861, where it declared the unification of the country as the Kingdom of Italy.[2]
The election was carried out according to the 1848 electoral law of the Kingdom of Sardinia, in which only literate men over the age of 25 and paying a certain level of taxation were allowed to vote.[1] Candidates were elected in single member constituencies, with a second round required in cases when no candidates received over 50% of the vote or the equivalent of one-third of the registered voters in the constituency.[3] The Pope demanded that Catholics did not take part in the elections.[3]
The race
The Historical Right was led by the former Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Sardinia, Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, a long-time statesman and a leading figure in the movement toward Italian unification.
On the other hand, the bloc of the Historical Left was led by Urbano Rattazzi, a liberal politician who was among the founders of the Italian left-wing parliamentary group.
In opposition to the two main blocs there were a third party known as The Extreme, a far-left coalition, under the leadership of Giuseppe Mazzini, an Italian revolutionary and a key figure of the Unification.
Only 418,696 men of a total population of around 22 million were entitled to vote.[4] Right-wing candidates emerged as the largest bloc in Parliament with around 43% of the 443 seats.[5] They were largely aristocrats representing rentiers from the north of the country, and held moderate political views including loyalty to the crown and low government spending.[6] The right-wing leader Camillo Benso di Cavour was elected as the first Prime Minister in the history of Italy.
Parties and leaders
| Party | Ideology | Leader | |
|---|---|---|---|
| bgcolor="Template:Historical Right/meta/color" | | Historical Right | Conservatism, Monarchism | Camillo Benso di Cavour |
| bgcolor="Template:Historical Left/meta/color" | | Historical Left | Liberalism, Centrism | Urbano Rattazzi |
| bgcolor="Template:Historical Far Left/meta/color" | | Historical Far Left | Radicalism, Republicanism | Giuseppe Mazzini |
Results
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| Party | Votes | % | Seats | +/− | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| style="background-color:Template:Historical Right/meta/color"| | Historical Right | 46.1 | 342 | New | |
| style="background-color:Template:Historical Left/meta/color"| | Historical Left | 20.4 | 62 | New | |
| style="background-color:Template:Historical Far Left/meta/color"| | Historical Far Left | 2.3 | 14 | New | |
| style="background-color:Template:Independent/meta/color"| | Independent | 3.9 | 23 | New | |
| style="background-color:Template:Other/meta/color"| | Others | 27.3 | – | ||
| Invalid/blank votes | – | – | – | ||
| Total | 239,583 | 100 | 443 | ±0 | |
| Registered voters/turnout | 418,696 | 57.2 | – | – | |
| Source: Nohlen & Stöver | |||||
Vote by geographical area
| Party | North | Centre | South | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| bgcolor="Template:Historical Right/meta/color" | | Historical Right | 52.48% | 68.00% | 34.16% |
| bgcolor="Template:Historical Left/meta/color" | | Historical Left | 31.21% | 15.00% | 27.72% |
| bgcolor="Template:Historical Far Left/meta/color" | | Historical Far Left | 1.42% | 1.00% | 3.96% |
| bgcolor="Template:Other/meta/color" | | Others | 14.89% | 16.00% | 34.16% |
