Guildford candidates
Can any other Local Meeting equal the record of Guildford, which had not only one but two candidates standing in the general election: Sue Doughty, a former Liberal Democrat MP, and John Morris from the Peace Party?

Guildford has form in the parliamentary stakes. William Penn is reported to have been a frequent visitor to Guildford and played a prominent part in the election of Algernon Sydney. Sydney, however, was regarded as a dangerous opponent of the court; so the sheriff declared his opponent elected instead on the ground that Sydney was not a free man of the borough, Len Clark tells us.

Sydney was a fascinating man, a Republican who was later to die on the scaffold, and of whom it was said: ‘He was a man of extraordinary courage, a steady man, even to obstinacy, sincere, but of a rough or boisterous temper, that could not bear contradiction, but would give foul language upon it.’

Does this remind you of any politician today?

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Comments

• Posted by Vernon White on May 05, 2010

  +++Quaker representation in Guildford constituency+++
  James Bell, who was married in Cockermouth Meeting House and probably was a Quaker, was MP for Guildford from 1852 to 1857.  He later changed his name to Spencer-Bell. He a member of a Quaker delegation to Mr Gladstone and Mr W.E. Forster representing Friends views on the Elementary Education Bill of 1870 (Times 14 May 1870 page 12).