Sir William Constantine was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons of England

House of Commons of England

The House of Commons of England was the lower house of the Parliament of England from its development in the 14th century to the union of England and Scotland in 1707, when it was replaced by the House of Commons of Great Britain...

  from 1640 to 1643. He suported the Royalist side in the English Civil War

English Civil War

The English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists...

Constantine was of an ancient and respectable family of Poole, Dorset. He was educated at the Middle Temple

Middle Temple

The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers; the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn and Lincoln's Inn...

, of which he was chosen reader. He settled at Merly, about five miles from Poole and was admitted a burgess of Poole on 16 September 1631. He was appointed recorder of the borough on 10 December 1639.

In April 1640, Constantine was elected Member of Parliament

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,...

 for Poole in the Short Parliament

Short Parliament

The Short Parliament was a Parliament of England that sat from 13 April to 5 May 1640 during the reign of King Charles I of England, so called because it lasted only three weeks....

. He was re-elected in November 1640 for the Long Parliament

Long Parliament

The Long Parliament was made on 3 November 1640, following the Bishops' Wars. It received its name from the fact that through an Act of Parliament, it could only be dissolved with the agreement of the members, and those members did not agree to its dissolution until after the English Civil War and...

 but was disabled in September 1643 for his support of the king. Constantine was charged with intending to deliver the town of Poole to the king and was discharged from the recordership of Poole. His estate was sequestered by the house and he was sent to London for imprisonment in the King's Bench prison.

After the Restoration, Constantine was restored to his position as recorder on 26 July 1660. He stood for parliament at Poole in 1661 for the Cavalier Parliament

Cavalier Parliament

The Cavalier Parliament of England lasted from 8 May 1661 until 24 January 1679. It was the longest English Parliament, enduring for nearly 18 years of the quarter century reign of Charles II of England...

where he was the choice of resident freemen but they were outvoted by no-resident voters. He was displaced from his position as recorder by the commissioners under the corporation act on 17 October 1662.

Constantine was knighted in 1668 and died two years later at the age of 58.