McGrady paid tribute to Powell, recognising the respect he was held by both Unionists and Nationalists in the constituency.

Some of the Unionists held extensive landed estates in Ireland and feared these would be broken up or confiscated if Ireland had its own government, while Hartington had suffered a personal loss at the hands of Irish Nationalists in 1882 when his brother was killed during the Phoenix Park Murders.

While the Whiggish wing of the Liberal Unionists cooperated informally with the Conservative Government ( and supplied it with a cabinet minister ), the party's Radical Unionist wing held a series of meetings with their former Liberal colleagues.

The STV system was the subject of criticism from grassroots Unionists but because the three-year period ended during the Labour government of 1924, the Stormont government decided not to provoke the known egalitarian sympathies of many Labour backbenchers and held the second election on the same basis.

This change helped the Unionists, as they held only two of the University seats but won all four of the newly-created seats.

The Unionists held Lanark, and the national result gave the Conservatives under Churchill a small but working majority of seventeen.

In 1918, it became a Labour hold who have held it since, except for between 1931 to 1935 when it held by the National Unionists.

"... an important conference of Trade Unionists was held in Sydney to further the idea of one big union ... to get the Unionists formed into a one big union organization which, at any time, by the proclamation of a general strike, could stop all production and transport, and force from any government in office whatever concessions were demanded ...

In 1978 he became the President of the Conservative Trade Unionists, a position he held for two years.

The day after the rally a MORI opinion poll in Northern Ireland found that 75 % of Protestant Unionists would vote ' No ' if a referendum was held on the Agreement, with 65 % of Catholic Nationalists saying they would vote ' Yes '.

For a while it looked as though Unionists might gain a majority due to an elected independent nationalist John Joe McCusker being ineligible, however in the end he held his seat.

Carson held his seat in the October 1974 election but was deselected by the local Ulster Unionists over his support for the minority Labour government.

Bradford held the seat for the next seven years, though in February 1978 he and the rump of Vanguard reunited with the Ulster Unionists.

The Stormont seat was held by John William Nixon ( independent Unionist ) from 1929 to 1950, Ulster Unionists Robert Harcourt ( 1950-1955 ) and Neville Martin ( 1955-1958 ), Billy Boyd of the Northern Ireland Labour Party until 1965 then finally John McQuade, who was variously Ulster Unionist, independent Unionist and Democratic Unionist until the seat was abolished in 1972.

Of the 183 seats, 102 were held by Republicans, 44 by Democrats, 23 by Unionists, and five others by one party each.

After 1886, the Conservatives allied with the part of the Liberal Party known as the Liberal Unionists who opposed their party's support for Irish Home Rule and held office for all but three of the following twenty years.

In special elections held in June 1861, Unionists captured nine of Kentucky's ten congressional seats and obtained two-thirds majorities in both houses of the state legislature.

The Unionists held 90 percent of the jobs but foreign industries were hiring Catholics, thus reducing the strength of the Protestants.

Two small third parties, the Constitutional Unionists and States ' Rights parties, quickly collapsed prior to this election, while the anti-slavery Free Soil Party held onto its four seats.

The area of Northern Ireland was seen as the maximum area within which Unionists could be expected to have a safe majority.

Labour had already lost its majority in the House of Commons when he became Prime Minister and lost further seats at by-elections and through defections, forcing Callaghan to deal with minor parties such as the Liberal Party especially in the Lib-Lab pact from 1977 to 1978, the Ulster Unionists, Scottish National Party and even Independents.

The Conservatives and Liberal Unionists took 393 seats in the House of Commons and a comfortable majority.

' Chamberlain used his popularity and the cause of imperialism in the election to devastating effect, and with the Liberals split over the issue of the war, the Unionists won a huge majority in the House of Commons of 219.

Thus, Chamberlain had to make the best of a hopeless situation, writing fatalistically that ' I consider the Unionist cause is hopeless at the next election, and we shall certainly lose the majority of the Liberal Unionists once and for all.

The majority of Liberal Unionists, including Hartington, Lord Lansdowne, and George Goschen, were drawn from the Whig faction of the party and had been expected to split from the Liberal Party anyway, for reasons connected with economic and social policy.

The Liberal Unionists, despite providing the necessary margin for Salisbury's majority, continued to sit on the opposition benches throughout the life of the parliament, and Hartington and Chamberlain uneasily shared the opposition Front Bench with their former colleagues Gladstone and Harcourt.

With a few exceptions, the remaining Liberal Unionists were now firm supporters of tariffs, as were now the majority of the Conservative MPs.

Northern Ireland as defined by the Act, amounting to six of the nine counties of Ulster, was seen as the maximum area within which Unionists could be expected to have a safe majority.

Unionists tend to lean towards preserving the grammar schools as they are, with academic selection at the age of 11, whereas republican politicians lean towards scrapping the Eleven Plus, despite vehement protestations from the majority of Catholic Grammar Schools, most notably by the board of governors at Rathmore Grammar School in Finaghy, ( a south Belfast suburb ) and Lumen Christi ( although co-educational ) in Londonderry.

Bruce had won the seat with a smaller majority than Francis Duncan had for the Unionists in 1885.

Home Rule was opposed by most Protestants in Ireland, who formed a majority of the population in the northern province of Ulster and favoured maintenance of the Union with Great Britain ( and were therefore called Unionists ).

It would be the third Home Rule Bill, introduced in 1912, which would lead to the crisis in Ireland between the majority Nationalist population and the Unionists in Ulster.

With the defeat of his bill he dissolved parliament and called an election for July 1886, the result swinging in the other direction, Conservatives and Liberal Unionists between them winning a clear majority.

Within this context their support grew, and the emergence of the Labour Party as a threat to the middle-classes resulted in the Scottish Unionists achieving a majority of Scottish seats in the 1924 election, 37 out of Scotland's 73.

In the 1959 election that saw the Unionists ' sister Conservative party increase their overall majority in the Commons, the Scottish Unionists ' own vote declined, and four MPs lost their seats.

However the Liberal Party, although relying upon Home Rule MPs for its Commons majority, in response to threats from the Ulster Unionists of a civil war, began to entertain the idea of exempting some or all of Ulster from Irish self-government.

In the 1860 election, the Constitutional Unionists received the great majority of their votes from former southern Whigs or Know-Nothings.

Crucially they lost two seats to the Ulster Unionist Party ( UUP ) giving Unionists a one seat majority on the council, which they retained in 1993.

As Major's Government had lost its majority in Parliament and was depending on the Unionists to stay in power, it was widely accused of pro-Unionist bias as a result.

Carson's victory came despite a majority of votes being cast for pro-Sunningdale candidates, albeit split between the Pro-Assembly Unionists, the Social Democratic and Labour Party and the Northern Ireland Labour Party.

With the Conservative Party's pro-unionist policy, and joined by a group of Liberal Unionists on this issue, the consequent majority could block any such bill from passing the Commons.