France had adopted the principle of universal suffrage in 1848, but in Great Britain, although the Act of 1884 had increased the number of voters from four to five millions, the franchise was not universal, and plural voting was possible for persons owning houses or premises in several constituencies. In Sweden three-quarters of the citizens were denied the right to vote, and in Holland a property qualification was still in force, although it was reduced from ten florins to one in 1896; Belgium introduced a system of plural voting in 1893, whereby supplementary voting rights were granted to heads of families, citizens owning property worth 2,000 francs or providing an income of 100 francs, and those who had reached a certain level of education. But the proportion of voters to the population as a whole remained generally low: in France, 26·6 per cent (1898), in Belgium, 22 per cent (1900), in Holland, 11·9 per cent (1900), in Norway, 18·6 per cent (1900) and, in Sweden, 7·4 per cent (1902).

The bicameral system was in operation everywhere, but this system was always tempered by the extensive powers of the upper Chamber, drawn from a much narrower sector of the population than the lower Chamber, and also by the influence—considerable but highly variable—that still remained in the hands of the head of state.

The parliamentary system was as yet securely established only in a small number of nations: in Norway since 1880, in Denmark since 1901, and in Great Britain—a model admired by liberals everywhere, where the queen always chose as her Prime Minister the leader of the majority party.