Bruce by-election, April 1865
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The April 1865 Bruce by-election was a New Zealand by-election held in the multi-memberelectorate of Bruce during the 3rd New Zealand Parliament on 8 April 1865 triggered by the resignation of Thomas Gillies.
Five candidates were nominated but two of them, both who had nominated other electors earlier in the meeting, were disallowed by the Returning Officer stating that it was childish for the electors to behave like this on what he thought was a "serious duty". Also one of them, Henry Clapcott, withdrew prior to the election. Arthur John Burns was the successful candidate, defeating William John Dyer.
The by-election was one of three by-elections in the electorate that was also in the 3rd Parliament.
Gillies was a cabinet minister in the Domett Ministry (August 1862) and then the Whitaker–Fox Ministry (October 1863 – November 1864). He was a strong separationist, but did not get majority support in the ministries or from parliament as a whole, and he resigned his parliamentary seat in early 1865 as he could not achieve separation of the South Island. The question of separation was also not universally supported by his electorate. Gillies first talked about having resigned on 6 January 1865 and the resignation eventually took effect on 3 March that year.
...
Wikipedia