| Election Name: | 1865 United Kingdom general election |
| Country: | United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland |
| Type: | parliamentary |
| Ongoing: | no |
| Previous Election: | 1859 United Kingdom general election |
| Previous Year: | 1859 |
| Previous Mps: | outgoing members |
| Next Election: | 1868 United Kingdom general election |
| Next Year: | 1868 |
| Seats For Election: | All 658 seats in the House of Commons |
| Majority Seats: | 330 |
| Elected Mps: | elected members |
| Leader1: | Viscount Palmerston |
| Leader Since1: | 12 June 1859 |
| Party1: | Liberal Party (UK) |
| Leaders Seat1: | Tiverton |
| Last Election1: | 356 seats, 65.8% |
| Seats1: | 369 |
| Seat Change1: | 13 |
| Popular Vote1: | 508,821 |
| Percentage1: | 59.5% |
| Swing1: | 6.3% |
| Leader2: | Earl of Derby |
| Leader Since2: | July 1846 |
| Party2: | Conservative Party (UK) |
| Leaders Seat2: | House of Lords |
| Last Election2: | 298 seats, 34.2% |
| Seats2: | 289 |
| Seat Change2: | 9 |
| Popular Vote2: | 346,035 |
| Percentage2: | 40.5% |
| Swing2: | 6.3% |
| Prime Minister | |
| Posttitle: | Prime Minister after election |
| Before Election: | Viscount Palmerston |
| Before Party: | Liberal Party (UK) |
| After Election: | Viscount Palmerston |
| After Party: | Liberal Party (UK) |
| Map Size: | 438px |
| Map2 Image: | File:1865 UK GE Composition diagram.svg |
| Map2 Caption: | Composition of the House of Commons after the election |
The 1865 United Kingdom general election saw the Liberals, led by Lord Palmerston, increase their large majority over the Earl of Derby's Conservatives to 80. The Whig Party changed its name to the Liberal Party between the previous election and this one.
Palmerston died in October the same year and was succeeded by Lord John Russell as Prime Minister. Despite the Liberal majority, the party was divided by the issue of further parliamentary reform, and Russell resigned after being defeated in a vote in the House of Commons in 1866, leading to minority Conservative governments under Derby and then Benjamin Disraeli.
This was the last United Kingdom general election until 2019 where a party increased its majority after having been returned to office at the previous election with a reduced majority.
The 1865 general election was regarded by contemporaries as being a generally dull contest nationally, which exaggerated the degree of corruption within individual constituencies. In his PhD thesis, Cornelius O'Leary described The Times as having reported "the testimony is unanimous that in the General Election of 1865 there was more profuse and corrupt expenditure than was ever known before". As a result of allegations of corruption, 50 election petitions were lodged, of which 35 were pressed to a trial; 13 ended with the elected MP being unseated. In four cases a Royal Commission had to be appointed because of widespread corrupt practices in the constituency.
As a result, when he became Prime Minister in 1867, Benjamin Disraeli announced that he would introduce a new method for election petition trials, which were then determined by a committee of the House of Commons, resulting in the Parliamentary Elections Act 1868, whereby two Judges of the Court of Common Pleas, Exchequer of Pleas or Queen's Bench would be designated to try election petitions with full judicial salaries.
Many new constituencies were used for this election:
See main article: List of MPs elected in the 1865 United Kingdom general election. |- class="sortbottom" style="font-weight: bold; text-align: right; background: #f2f2f2;"! colspan="2" style="padding-left: 1.5em; text-align: left;" | Total| | 658| | | +4| 100| 100| 854,856| |}
| Party | Candidates | Unopposed | Seats | Seats change | Votes | % | % change | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 433 | 133 | 311 | 5 | 457,289 | 60.0 | ||||
| 347 | 115 | 244 | 1 | 304,538 | 40.0 | ||||
| Total | 780 | 248 | 555 | 761,827 | 100 | ||||
| Party | Candidates | Unopposed | Seats | Seats change | Votes | % | % change | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 359 | 88 | 251 | 406,978 | 59.0 | |||||
| 308 | 94 | 213 | 4 | 291,238 | 41.0 | ||||
| Total | 667 | 182 | 464 | 4 | 698,216 | 100 | |||
| Party | Candidates | Unopposed | Seats | Seats change | Votes | % | % change | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 51 | 30 | 42 | 2 | 43,480 | 85.4 | ||||
| 17 | 7 | 11 | 2 | 4,305 | 14.6 | ||||
| Total | 68 | 37 | 53 | 47,785 | 100 | ||||
| Party | Candidates | Unopposed | Seats | Seats change | Votes | % | % change | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 21 | 15 | 18 | 3 | 4,565 | 74.0 | ||||
| 16 | 12 | 14 | 3 | 1,600 | 26.0 | ||||
| Total | 37 | 27 | 32 | 6,165 | 100 | ||||
See main article: United Kingdom general election, 1865 (Ireland).
| Party | Candidates | Unopposed | Seats | Seats change | Votes | % | % change | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 83 | 28 | 58 | 8 | 51,532 | 55.6 | ||||
| 59 | 27 | 45 | align=right rowspan=1 | 8 | 41,497 | 44.4 | align=right rowspan=1 | ||
| Total | 142 | 55 | 103 | 93,029 | 100 | ||||
| Party | Candidates | Unopposed | Seats | Seats change | Votes | % | % change | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 2 | 6 | 7,395 | 76.5 | |||||
| 2 | 0 | 0 | 2,266 | 23.5 | |||||
| Total | 8 | 2 | 6 | 9,661 | 100 | ||||
Source: