1239 James Weir

Constituency  :  Ross  and  Cromarty  1892-1911

We  now  come  to  the  new  Liberal  winners  in  the   1892 election. The  Liberals  recovered sufficiently  to  just  nudge  ahead  of  the  Tories  in  terms  of  seats  with  a  net  gain  of  80. Their recovery  was  particularly  marked  in  the  North  West, Eastern  England, London  and  the  South West. The  Liberal  Unionists  had  a  tough  time. Their  numbers  had  already  been  diminished  by defections  and  by-election  defeats  and  now  they  were  down  to  44  seats. Only  in  Scotland   and  the  Midlands  did  they  have  10  or  more  seats  and  in  Wales, the  North  East  and   Yorkshire  they  had  no  representation  at  all. The  Irish  MPs  not  them  now  held  the  balance  of  power.

James  took  over  from  the  former  Crofter  MP  Roderick  McDonald  with  a  sound  enough   victory  over  a  Liberal  Unionist.

James  was  a  builder's  son  educated  at  Dollar  Academy  before  moving  to  London  as  a  young man. He  worked  as  a  sales  rep  before  setting  up  his  own  business  in  1863  importing  sewing machines. He  made  enough  money  to  retire  in  1880  and  pursue  a  political  career.  He  stood against  John  Ramsay  at  Falkirk  Burghs  as  an  Independent  Liberal  but  came  a  distant  third. In 1892  he  became  a  Progressive   councillor  on  the  LCC.

James  scored  consistently  easy  victories  and  was  unopposed  in  December  1910.

James  racked  up  nearly  5,000  contributions  to  Parliament, many  of  them  questions  on Highland  concerns.

He  died  in  1911  aged  71.