Belfast Falls (UK Parliament constituency)

Falls, a division of Belfast, was a UK parliamentary constituency in Ireland. It returned one Member of Parliament (MP) to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom from 1918 to 1922, using the first past the post electoral system.

Belfast Falls
Former borough constituency for the House of Commons
1918–1922
Seats	1
Created from	Belfast West
Replaced by	Belfast West

Boundaries and Boundary Changes

The constituency was created by the Redistribution of Seats (Ireland) Act 1918 from an area which had been in the Belfast West constituency. It comprised the central third of West Belfast, and contained the then Falls and Smithfield wards of Belfast City Council.^[1] The streets in Falls Ward in 1911 are listed here and here, and the streets in Smithfield Ward in 1911 are listed here and here.^[2]

It was in use at the 1918 general election only, and under the Government of Ireland Act 1920 its area was again part of the Belfast West constituency, with effect at the 1922 general election.

Politics

The constituency was a nationalist area. Joe Devlin defeated Sinn Féin by better than 2 to 1. The Unionists did not contest the seat.

First Dáil

After the 1918 election, Sinn Féin invited all those elected for constituencies in Ireland to sit as TDs in Dáil Éireann rather than in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom.^[3] All those elected for Irish constituencies were included in the roll of the Dáil but only those elected for Sinn Féin sat in the First Dáil.^[4] In May 1921, the Dáil passed a resolution declaring that elections to the House of Commons of Northern Ireland and the House of Commons of Southern Ireland would be used as the election for the Second Dáil and that the First Dáil would be dissolved on the assembly of the new body.^[5] The area of Belfast Falls would then have been represented in the Dáil by the four-seat constituency of Belfast West, which also returned no representatives for Sinn Féin.

Members of Parliament

Election		Member	Party
	1918	Joseph Devlin	Nationalist
1922		constituency abolished

Election

General Election 14 December 1918: Belfast Falls

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Irish Nationalist	Joseph Devlin	8,488	72.3
	Sinn Féin	Éamon de Valera	3,245	27.7
Majority			5,243	44.6
Turnout			11,733	74.5
	Irish Nationalist win (new seat)

References

1. Redistribution of Seats (Ireland) Act 1918, Second Schedule, Part I
2. Redistribution of Seats (Ireland) Act 1918, Second Schedule, Part I
3. "The inaugural public meeting of Dáil Éireann". Dáil 100. Retrieved 22 February 2019.
4. "3. AN ROLLA". Houses of the Oireachtas. 21 January 1919. Retrieved 23 February 2019.
5. "Dáil Éireann debate - Tuesday, 10 May 1921 - PRESIDENT'S STATEMENT. - ELECTIONS". Houses of the Oireachtas. Retrieved 23 February 2019.

• Walker, Brian M., ed. (1978). Parliamentary Election Results in Ireland, 1801–1922. Dublin: Royal Irish Academy. p. 384. ISBN 0901714127.
• Stenton, M.; Lees, S., eds. (1979). 'Who's Who of British members of parliament: Volume III 1919–1945. The Harvester Press.
• (Information about boundaries of the constituency derived from the map of Northern Ireland Parliament constituencies (in force from 1921) and the wards included in the Belfast UK Parliament seats (in force 1922) for which see Northern Ireland Parliamentary Election Results 1921–1972, by Sydney Elliott (Political Reference Publications 1973) and Boundaries of Parliamentary Constituencies 1885–1972, compiled and edited by F.W.S. Craig (Political Reference Publications 1972) respective

External links

• The Irish General Election of 1918
• Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "F"

See also

• List of UK Parliament Constituencies in Ireland and Northern Ireland
• List of MPs elected in the 1918 United Kingdom general election
• Historic Dáil constituencies