The constituency was based upon the town of
Bradford, in the
West Riding of Yorkshire. It was enfranchised as a two-member
parliamentary borough from 1832. Before 1832 the area was only represented as part of the county constituency of
Yorkshire. After 1832 the non-resident
Forty Shilling Freeholders of the area continued to qualify for a county vote (initially in the
West Riding of Yorkshire seat, and from 1865 in a division of the West Riding).
Bradford, as a new parliamentary borough, had no voters enfranchised under the ancient rights preserved by the
Reform Act 1832. All voters qualified under the new uniform, borough householder franchise.
The area was incorporated as a
municipal borough in 1847, covering the parishes of Bradford, Horton and
Manningham. Bradford was expanded in 1882 to include
Allerton,
Bolton,
Bowling,
Heaton,
Thornbury and
Tyersall. However the parliamentary boundaries were not affected until the redistribution of 1885.
^
abTurner, Michael J. (January 2001). "Radical Opinion in an Age of Reform: Thomas Perronet Thompson and the "Westminster Review"". History. 86 (281): 18–40.
doi:
10.1111/1468-229X.00175.
JSTOR24425286.
^
abTurner, Michael J. (2005). ""Raising up Dark Englishmen": Thomas Perronet Thompson, Colonies, Race, and the Indian Mutiny". Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History. 6 (1).
doi:
10.1353/cch.2005.0025.
S2CID162384082.
^
abTurner, Michael J. (2005). "'Setting the captive free': Thomas Perronet Thompson, British Radicalism and the West Indies, 1820s–1860s". Slavery & Abolition. 26 (1): 115–132.
doi:
10.1080/01440390500058921.
S2CID143566796.
^Milgate, Murray (1999).
"Thomas Perronet Thompson". Economists at Queens'. Queens' College, Cambridge. Archived from
the original on 25 September 2006. Retrieved 17 April 2018.