1890 United States House of Representatives elections information
House elections for the 52nd U.S. Congress
1890 United States House of Representatives elections
← 1888
June 3, 1890 – November 4, 1890
1892 →
All 332 seats in the United States House of Representatives 167 seats needed for a majority
Majority party
Minority party
Third party
Leader
Charles Frederick Crisp
Thomas Brackett Reed
Jerry Simpson
Party
Democratic
Republican
Populist
Leader's seat
Georgia 3rd
Maine 1st
Kansas 7th
Last election
152 seats
179 seats
0 seats
Seats won
238[1][a]
86[1][a]
8[1][a]
Seat change
86
93
8
Popular vote
4,945,756
4,173,605
182,797
Percentage
50.71%
42.80%
1.87%
Swing
2.03%
4.56%
New
Results: Democratic gain Republican gain Democratic hold Republican hold Populist gain
Speaker before election
Thomas Reed
Republican
Elected Speaker
Charles Crisp
Democratic
The 1890 United States House of Representatives elections were held for the most part on November 4, 1890, with five states holding theirs early in between June and October. They occurred in the middle of President Benjamin Harrison's term. Elections were held for 332 seats of the United States House of Representatives, representing 44 states, to serve in the 52nd United States Congress. Special elections were also held throughout the year.
A stagnant economy which became worse after the Panic of 1890, combined with a lack of support for then-Representative William McKinley's (defeated in the election) steep tariff act, which favored large industries at the expense of consumers, led to a sharp defeat for Harrison's Republican Party, giving a large majority to the Democratic Party and presaging Harrison's defeat in the 1892 United States presidential election. The Republican-controlled Congress was highly criticized for its lavish spending, and it earned the unflattering nickname of The Billion Dollar Congress. Democrats promised to cut the outlandish budget.
Furthermore, aggressive Republican promotion of controversial English-only education laws enacted by Wisconsin and Illinois in 1889, accompanied by a surge in nativist and anti-Catholic sentiment within the state parties, had greatly hollowed out the party's support base in these former strongholds. A rare multi-confessional alliance of mainly German clergy rallied their flocks in defense of language and faith to the Democratic Party, which tore through incumbent Republican majorities in both states, capturing a total of 11 formerly Republican seats between them alone.[2] Bitterly divisive struggles over temperance laws had also been alienating immigrants from the increasingly prohibitionist Republican Party across the Midwest more broadly. Dramatic losses in the previous year's gubernatorial elections in Iowa and Ohio (which would lose another 14 Republican congressional seats between them during this election) were due in no small part to wet immigrant communities, especially Germans, expressing their resentment toward Republican efforts to ban or otherwise curtail alcohol consumption by throwing their support behind the Democratic candidates.[3]
This election also saw the Populist Party, a coalition of farmers and laborers who wanted to overhaul the nation's financial system, make a small mark on Congress.
^ abcMartis, p. 144–145.
^Jensen, Richard J. (1971). "5: The Winning of the Midwest: Social and Political Conflict, 1888-1896". Education, the Tariff, and the Melting Pot. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. pp. 122–153. ISBN 9780226398259.
^Jensen, p. ch. 4: Iowa, Wet or Dry?. pp. 89-121.
Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).
and 29 Related for: 1890 United States House of Representatives elections information
The 1890UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections were held for the most part on November 4, 1890, with five states holding theirs early in between...
The UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections in California, 1890 was an election for California's delegation to the UnitedStatesHouseof Representatives...
The 1892 UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections were held for the most part on November 8, 1892, with Oregon, Maine, and Vermont holding theirs...
The 1888 UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections were held for the most part on November 6, 1888, with three states holding theirs early between...
The 1974 UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections were elections for the UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentatives on November 5, 1974, to elect members...
UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections in Florida will be held on November 5, 2024, to elect the 28 U.S. representatives from the state of Florida...
The 1902 UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections were held for the most part on November 4, 1902, with Oregon, Maine, and Vermont holding theirs...
The 1896 UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections were held for the most part on November 3, 1896, with Oregon, Maine, and Vermont holding theirs...
The 1908 UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections were held for the most part on November 3, 1908, with Oregon, Maine, and Vermont holding theirs...
The 1900 UnitedStatesHouseofRepresentativeselections were held for the most part on November 6, 1900, with Oregon, Maine, and Vermont holding theirs...
Global Information
