Donald Crawford was a United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 Liberal

Liberal Party (UK)

The Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...

 MP

Member of Parliament

A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...

. He sat for the constituency of Lanarkshire North-East

Lanarkshire (UK Parliament constituency)

Lanarkshire was a county constituency of the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom from 1708 to 1868. It elected one Member of Parliament by the first past the post voting system.-Boundaries:...

 from 1885 to 1895.

In 1884 the Liberal President of the Local Government Board

President of the Local Government Board

The President of the Local Government Board was a ministerial post, frequently a Cabinet position, in the United Kingdom, established in 1871. The Local Government Board itself was established in 1871 and took over supervisory functions from the Board of Trade and the Home Office, including the...

, Sir Charles Dilke

Sir Charles Dilke, 2nd Baronet

Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke, 2nd Baronet PC was an English Liberal and reformist politician. Touted as a future prime minister, his aspirations to higher political office were effectively terminated in 1885, after a notorious and well-publicised divorce case.-Background and education:Dilke was the...

, appointed Crawford to the Scottish Boundary Commission

Boundary Commission (United Kingdom)

Boundary Commissions in the UK are non-departmental public bodies responsible for determining the boundaries of constituencies for elections to the Westminster Parliament, the Scottish Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales. There are four boundary commissions in the United Kingdom: one...

, which was responsible for the redrafting of constituency boundaries in the wake of the Third Reform Act

Representation of the People Act 1884

In the United Kingdom, the Representation of the People Act 1884 and the Redistribution Act of the following year were laws which further extended the suffrage in Britain after the Disraeli Government's Reform Act 1867...

. Crawford, at the time, was the political secretary to Sir John Balfour

John Balfour, 1st Baron Kinross

John Blair Balfour, 1st Baron Kinross, PC, QC was a Scottish lawyer and Liberal politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1880 to 1899....

, then the Lord Advocate

Lord Advocate

Her Majesty's Advocate , known as the Lord Advocate , is the chief legal officer of the Scottish Government and the Crown in Scotland for both civil and criminal matters that fall within the devolved powers of the Scottish Parliament...

. Crawford, in addition, was the distant relative of Dilke's. The Conservative

Conservative Party (UK)

The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...

 Leader

Leader of the House of Commons

The Leader of the House of Commons is a member of the Cabinet of the United Kingdom who is responsible for arranging government business in the House of Commons...

 in the House of Commons

British House of Commons

The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...

, Sir Stafford Northcote

Stafford Northcote, 1st Earl of Iddesleigh

Stafford Henry Northcote, 1st Earl of Iddesleigh GCB, PC , known as Sir Stafford Northcote, Bt, from 1851 to 1885, was a British Conservative politician...

, objected to Crawford's appointment on these grounds, noting that Crawford was "a keen Liberal with a thorough knowledge of Scotland."

Crawford entered parliament the next year as a member for Lanarkshire North-East. This was a new constituency, created by the Boundary Commission's division of Lanarkshire North into two new constituencies (the other being Lanarkshire North-West).

Crawford was married to Virginia Crawford (1862–1948), although the marriage was brief and unhappy. In 1886 Crawford achieved much social and public notoriety when he sued her for divorce, and named Dilke as the correspondent. After a much publicized trial Crawford obtained a decree nisi

Decree nisi

A decree nisi is a court order that does not have any force until such time that a particular condition is met, such as a subsequent petition to the court or the passage of a specified period of time....

and the marriage was dissolved. As for Dilke, the scandal wrecked a promising political career. Virginia Crawford would later convert to Roman Catholicism and join the Catholic Women's League

Catholic Women's League

The Catholic Women's League is a Roman Catholic lay organisation aimed at women in England and Wales. Through emigration in the past, the CWL may be found in some Commonwealth countries. It is especially flourishing in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Hong Kong. -References:* Olivier Rota,...

.

External links