Tomorrow’s by-elections arrive just ahead of next week’s parliamentary recess and it is quite clear that we are in silly season. The term was originally coined in an article called “The Silly Season” in the Victorian London weekly, The Saturday Review, on 13 July 1861. The idea was that as the respected parliamentarians and hacks took their late-summer holidays, the mantle was taken up by rookies.
The article claims: “The hands which at other times wield the pen for our instruction are now wielding the gun on a Scotch moor or the Alpenstock on a Swiss mountain. Work is left to feebler hands…In those months the great oracle becomes – what at other times it is not – simply silly.”
Although The Hound is not yet tweed-clad on a Scottish moor or shouting at the Gods like Byron’s Manfred on a lofty snow-peaked Swiss mountain, this great oracle does intend to ask a simply silly question: why are elections always on a Thursday?
In case you hadn’t noticed dear reader, today is Wednesday and tomorrow’s inevitable Tory trouncing will fall, you guessed it, on a Thursday. But why is this always the case?
After many feverish nights in the most solemn and ancient libraries in the country, The Hound leaped from tome to tome in search of an answer.
Some suggested that market days traditionally fell on a Thursday in much of the country – but not all of the country. For example, since 1279, those in Oxford have been selling victuals at their stalls on Wednesdays and Saturdays and by the early 17th century, “it was complained that hucksters made every day a market day.”
Just like market days, traditional half-days fall on different days in different regions.
Historically, Fridays were ruled out as the layman’s vote could be swayed by what he heard someone ranting about in the boozer. Sundays were ruled out as this was equally true of rants from the pulpit.
It must be remembered that for most of our history, most people only had Holy days – hence, holidays – away from the toil of everyday life. What’s more, hardly anyone could vote until relatively recently so there was no need to worry about when everyone could make time to cast a ballot.
In more recent history, some have argued that elections on a Thursday give results by Friday, allowing the incumbent party to “move in” to their new seat of power over the weekend and commence business by Monday morning. This seems the most plausible reason.
Interestingly, one of the only exceptions in modern British history came in 1978 when the Hamilton by-election was held on a Wednesday so as not to interfere with the opening game of the World Cup in Argentina which saw Italy beat France 2-1.
The Hound must hold its paws up and concede that many good things in life are a mystery. And Thursday elections are another one to add to the list.
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