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Carrickfergus and Belfast was a constituency in Ireland, that returned a single Member of Parliament to sit in the House of Commons of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland. It was represented in the three Protectorate Parliaments, between 1654 and 1659. ==Representation and Electorate== Ireland was united with England and Scotland under a republican government, after the defeat of the Royalists in the English Civil War and related conflicts, which had affected all three kingdoms. Under the Instrument of Government, of 15 December 1653, the Lord Protector and the English Council of State were given power to provide for Irish representatives in the Westminster Parliament. Provision for thirty Members of Parliament was made by ''An Ordinance by the Protector for Elections in Ireland'' of 27 June 1654. ''Carrickfergus and Belfast'' was one of the constituencies established by the Ordinance. The place of election was at Belfast. ''Belfast'' was a borough, which had been enfranchised in 1613. According to Samuel Lewis in ''A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland'' in Parliament of Ireland elections the voters were the free burgess members of the corporation (the local Council). This group numbered twelve in the 18th century, although many Irish boroughs had larger corporations in earlier times than in the 18th century. ''Carrickfergus'', one of the oldest Parliamentary boroughs in Ireland, was a county of itself. This was a status similar to the later County Boroughs. The town had been enfranchised in 1326, before County Antrim existed as a sub-division of Ireland and ''Carrickfergus'' was included in that geographical county (but not for the purposes of administration). In Irish Parliament elections it was one of the few boroughs with a fairly large electorate. According to Samuel Lewis in ''A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland'' it consisted of the mayor, aldermen, burgesses, and freemen of the town as well as the freeholders of land valued at 40 shillings per annum or more. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Carrickfergus and Belfast (constituency)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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