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Guess we should replace ’em, huh?

by Maurice Y. Michaud (he/him)

Joseph Howe (1804–1873)
© Photo — Public domain

In 2025, there are far fewer by-elections than there were a century ago. Seats just don’t seem to become vacant as frequently as they used to. A few factors might explain why.

  • People didn’t live as long as they do today, so deaths in office were a far more common occurrence until the late 20th century.
     
  • Up until the 1930s in most jurisdictions, a person who was named to the cabinet for the first time was required to resign their seat and run in a ministerial by-election soon afterwards. That’s what happened in April 1869 when Joseph Howe, portrayed here, accepted Confederation as a fait accompli and joined the Liberal-Conservative cabinet of John A. Macdonald.
     
  • Up until the middle of the 20th century, unseating a member was commonplace and the mechanism to challenge someone’s election seems to have been very lax when viewed through presentist lens, as many by-elections were held merely because the challenger — often the government or the defeated incumbent — did not like the result.

All jurisdictions combined, there have been 3,227 by-elections since 1866. However, what the table below strikingly illustrates is that their frequency dropped significantly after 1925. In fact, 1,836 (or 56.89%) of all by-elections were held in the first half century or so of Confederation (1866 to 1924).

  • Between 1866 and 1874 inclusively — that’s only nine years, compared to the other slices which are 25 years — there had only been three federal general elections, the last of those being held in January 1874. Never­the­less, in good part due to a frenzy of declaring elections void and unseating members, coupled with ministerial by-elections and normal reasons for seats becoming vacant like resignations, appointments and deaths, 108 by-elections were held from mid-1867 to December 1874. The third parliament alone, which was dissolved in the summer of 1878, had a total of 90 by-elections!
     
  • Between 1875 and 1899, the provincial and territorial legislatures held 509 by-elections, which is an astonishing number considering that Alberta and Saskatchewan did not exist yet, although the North-West Territory, which was their equivalent, did have a legislature from 1888. In addition to those, four provincial or territorial legislatures that exist today were more than three-quarter of a century from coming into existence, which means that none of them contributed to that total of 509.

However, starting in 1925, with the gradual abandonment of ministerial by-elections, the frequency of by-elections has stabilized to more or less what is it today.

By-Elections, 1866–2025
F: Federal    P/T: Provincial/Territorial
Years AB BC MB NB NL NS NT NU NW ON PE QC SK YT Total
F P F P F P F P F P F P F T F T F T F P F P F P F P F T F P
1866—1874 – – 6 12 8 2 8 47 – 15 15 17 – – – – – – 36 42 7 10 28 31 – – – – 108 176
1875—1899 – – 10 56 11 59 23 69 – 4 39 37 – – – – 3 13 123 120 9 42 107 109 – – – – 325 509
1900—1924 3 43 10 53 8 41 15 57 – – 15 42 – – – – 1 8 68 96 4 37 78 100 6 32 1 – 209 509
1925—1949 6 19 8 37 8 19 9 21 – – 7 20 – – – – – – 45 40 2 27 43 40 13 37 – – 141 260
1950—1974 3 19 4 21 6 25 6 20 3 10 4 15 – 6 – – – – 25 35 2 12 29 39 2 16 1 – 85 218
1975—1999 2 13 3 17 2 17 3 17 6 26 2 21 – 7 – – – – 22 27 2 16 23 51 2 20 1 10 68 242
2000—2024 10 18 8 15 8 19 – 17 6 37 2 24 – 4 – 14 – – 23 46 – 8 19 58 2 26 – 3 78 289
Total 25 115 49 211 51 184 64 248 15 92 84 176 – 17 – 14 4 21 342 406 26 154 327 430 25 131 3 13 1,015 2,212
Greyed out cells indicate the absence of the jurisdiction. 3,227

So, compared to the first half-century of Confederation, the number of by-elections is about half of what it was back then, but the number has gone up between 2000 and 2025 compared to the two previous 25-year slices. That could be because there are many more seats to be filled today and, consequently, more chances of vacancies occurring. So we can understand if you felt there are more of them today than before, but like anything, it’s relative.


© 2005, 2025 :: PoliCan.ca (Maurice Y. Michaud)
Pub.:  5 Nov 2022 10:05
Rev.: 19 Apr 2025 16:01 (but data presented dynamically)

© 2005-2025 :: PoliCan.ca
Given that electoral results are by their very nature public information, such data presented in PoliCan are considered to be in the public domain. However, unless indicated otherwise, all other elements — the concept of consolidating these data into a single format, the detailed research on each election, legislature and candidate, the organization and searchability of the data, the programming allowing the entry and maintenance of the data, as well as the analyses, explanatory articles and opinions found in this website — are the intellectual property of Maurice Y. Michaud.