Soria (Spanish Congress Electoral District)

Soria is one of the 52 electoral districts (circunscripciones) used for the Spanish Congress of Deputies - the lower chamber of the Spanish

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

Parliament, the Cortes Generales

Cortes Generales

The Cortes Generales is the legislature of Spain. It is a bicameral parliament, composed of the Congress of Deputies and the Senate . The Cortes has power to enact any law and to amend the constitution...

. It has the third smallest electorate of all the 52 districts, with only the autonomous cities of Ceuta

Ceuta (Spanish Congress Electoral District)

Ceuta is one of the 52 electoral districts used for the Spanish Congress of Deputies - the lower chamber of the Spanish Parliament, the Cortes Generales...

and Melilla

Melilla (Spanish Congress Electoral District)

Melilla is one of the 52 electoral districts used for the Spanish Congress of Deputies - the lower chamber of the Spanish Parliament, the Cortes Generales...

having fewer voters, which resulted in it losing a seat for the 2008 election.

Boundaries and electoral system

Under Article 68 of the Spanish constitution
the boundaries must be the same as the province of Soria

Soria (province)

Soria is a province of central Spain, in the eastern part of the autonomous community of Castile and León. Most of the province is in the mountainous Sistema Ibérico areaIt is bordered by the provinces of La Rioja, Zaragoza, Guadalajara, Segovia, and Burgos....

and under Article 140 this can only be altered with the approval of congress. Voting is on the basis of universal suffrage

Universal suffrage

Universal suffrage consists of the extension of the right to vote to adult citizens as a whole, though it may also mean extending said right to minors and non-citizens...

in a secret ballot

Secret ballot

The secret ballot is a voting method in which a voter's choices in an election or a referendum are anonymous. The key aim is to ensure the voter records a sincere choice by forestalling attempts to influence the voter by intimidation or bribery. The system is one means of achieving the goal of...

. The electoral system used is closed list

Closed list

Closed list describes the variant of party-list proportional representation where voters can only vote for political parties as a whole and thus have no influence on the party-supplied order in which party candidates are elected...

proportional representation

Proportional representation

Proportional representation is a concept in voting systems used to elect an assembly or council. PR means that the number of seats won by a party or group of candidates is proportionate to the number of votes received. For example, under a PR voting system if 30% of voters support a particular...

with seats allocated using the D'Hondt method

D'Hondt method

The d'Hondt method is a highest averages method for allocating seats in party-list proportional representation. The method described is named after Belgian mathematician Victor D'Hondt who described it in 1878...

. Under article 12 of the constitution, the minimum voting age is 18.

Eligibility

Article 67.3 of the Spanish Constitution prohibits dual membership of the Cortes and regional assemblies, meaning that candidates must resign from Regional Assemblies if elected. Article 70 also makes active judges, magistrates, public defenders, serving military personnel, active police officers and members of constitutional and electoral tribunals ineligible.

Number of members

Soria returned three members to the Spanish Congress when it was recreated for the 1977 General Election, a figure that was reduced to two members for the 2008 general election. This was the first time since the restoration of democracy that any province elected just two members, the legal minimum representation for a province.

Under Spanish electoral law, all provinces are entitled to a minimum of 2 seats with a remaining 248 seats apportioned according to population. These laws are laid out in detail in the 1985 electoral law. (Ley Orgánica del Régimen Electoral General) The practical effect of this law has been to overrepresent smaller provinces at the expense of larger provinces like Madrid and Barcelona. Soria has been the main beneficiary of this law. In 2004 for example Spain had 34,571,831 voters giving an average of 98,777 voters per deputy 2004 Spanish election. In Soria however the ratio was 26,177 voters per deputy, the lowest ratio of all 52 districts. In contrast in the two largest provinces, the number of voters per deputy was 129,269 in Barcelona Barcelona 2004 election and 127,377 in Madrid.

Summary of seats won 1977-2008

	1977	1979	1982	1986	1989	1993	1996	2000	2004	2008
Democratic Centre Union (UCD)	3	2	1
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party Spanish Socialist Workers' Party The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in... (PSOE)		1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1
People's Party People's Party (Spain) The People's Party is a conservative political party in Spain.The People's Party was a re-foundation in 1989 of the People's Alliance , a party led and founded by Manuel Fraga Iribarne, a former Minister of Tourism during Francisco Franco's dictatorship... (PP)			1	2	2	2	2	2	2	1

Seats shown for the People's Party include seats won by their predecessors, the Popular Alliance and the Popular Coalition before 1989.

Vote share summary 1977-2008

	1977	1979	1982	1986	1989	1993	1996	2000	2004	2008
Democratic Centre Union (UCD)	58.6	57.2	18.7
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party Spanish Socialist Workers' Party The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in... (PSOE)	17.9	25.6	35.3	35.8	33.0	36.8	34.3	32.0	38.8	42.6
Independent Independent (politician) In politics, an independent or non-party politician is an individual not affiliated to any political party. Independents may hold a centrist viewpoint between those of major political parties, a viewpoint more extreme than any major party, or they may have a viewpoint based on issues that they do... (Ind)	7.5
People's Party People's Party (Spain) The People's Party is a conservative political party in Spain.The People's Party was a re-foundation in 1989 of the People's Alliance , a party led and founded by Manuel Fraga Iribarne, a former Minister of Tourism during Francisco Franco's dictatorship... (PP)	6.3	10.0	37.3	42.1	47.9	50.7	55.2	58.5	50.8	49.8
Popular Socialist Party Popular Socialist Party (Spain) The People's Socialist Party was a Spanish political party.The origins of the party dated back to 1954 when the University professor, Enrique Tierno Galván published various academic studies of a Marxist character. In 1965, working together with Raúl Morodo, he formed the Castillian Socialist... (PSP)	4.8
United Left United Left (Spain) The United Left is a political coalition that was organized in 1986 bringing together several political organisations opposed to Spain joining NATO. It was formed by a number of groups of leftists, greens, left-wing socialists and republicans, but was dominated by the Communist Party of Spain... (IU)	2.0	2.8	1.2	2.6	5.1	5.6	7.9	4.3	2.1	2.2
Democratic and Social Centre (CDS)			4.7	14.1	9.4	3.7	0.3	1.3	0.1
Soria Development Initiative (IDS)									5.1

Results

Soria produced the same result at every election from 1986 to 2004, with the Partido Popular

People's Party (Spain)

The People's Party is a conservative political party in Spain.The People's Party was a re-foundation in 1989 of the People's Alliance , a party led and founded by Manuel Fraga Iribarne, a former Minister of Tourism during Francisco Franco's dictatorship...

winning two seats and the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party

Spanish Socialist Workers' Party

The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in...

winning one seat. The reduction in representation which took effect for the 2008 election resulted in the PP losing their second seat.

2008 General Election
Spanish general election, 2008
Legislative elections for the Spanish Cortes Generales were held on March 9, 2008. The elections were for 350 seats in the Congress of Deputies, and the 208 directly elected seats in the upper house, the Senate, determining the Prime Minister of Spain...

People's Party (Spain)

Spanish Socialist Workers' Party

United Left (Spain)

The United Left is a political coalition that was organized in 1986 bringing together several political organisations opposed to Spain joining NATO. It was formed by a number of groups of leftists, greens, left-wing socialists and republicans, but was dominated by the Communist Party of Spain...

|align="right" |1,253
|align="right" |2.24
|align="right" |0
|-
|align=left|Union, Progress and Democracy

Union, Progress and Democracy

Union, Progress and Democracy is a Spanish political party founded in September 2007.It is a progressivist party, between social democracy and social liberalism. One of its goals is to build a federal system for Spain and European Union, with clear responsibilities distributed among local...

|align="right" |1,106
|align="right" |1.97
|align="right" |0
|-
|align=left|Others
|align="right" |929
|align="right" |1.69
|align="right" |0
|-
|}

2004 General Election

Summary of the 14 March 2004 Congress of Deputies election results

Spanish legislative election, 2004

Legislative elections were held in Spain on 14 March 2004. At stake were all 350 seats in the lower house of the Cortes Generales, the Congress of Deputies, and 208 seats in upper house, the Senate. The governing People's Party was led into the campaign by Mariano Rajoy, successor to outgoing...

People's Party (Spain)

Spanish Socialist Workers' Party

(Partido Socialista Obrero Español)
|align="right" |22,287
|align="right" |38.79
|align="right" |1
|-
|align=left|Soria Development Initiative
|align="right" |2,934
|align="right" |5.11
|align="right" |0
|-
|align=left|United Left

United Left (Spain)

|align="right" |1,230
|align="right" |2.14
|align="right" |0
|-
|align=left|Others
|align="right" |566
|align="right" |3.16
|align="right" |0
|-
|}

Source:

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.