1880 Italian general election

← 1876 16 May 1880 (first round) 23 May 1880 (second round) 1882 →
All 508 seats in the Chamber of Deputies 255 seats needed for a majority
Majority party Minority party Third party   Leader Agostino Depretis Marco Minghetti Giuseppe Zanardelli Party Historical Left Historical Right Dissident Left Seats won 218 171 119 Seat change 196 77 New Popular vote 146,096 135,717 70,479 Percentage 40.76% 37.86% 19.66% Swing 29.45pp 9.66pp New
Results by electoral college
Prime Minister before election Benedetto Cairoli Historical Left Subsequent Prime Minister Benedetto Cairoli Historical Left

General elections were held in Italy on 16 May 1880, with a second round of voting on 23 May.^[1]

Campaign

The Historical Left was led by the Prime Minister of Italy, Agostino Depretis, longtime Prime Minister of Italy.

The bloc of the Historical Right was led by Marco Minghetti, a conservative politician and former Prime Minister, from Bologna.

A third large parliamentary group was the Dissident Left, composed by former members of the Left, which were against the alliance with the Right. Also known as La Pentarchia (The Pentarchy), its main leader was Giuseppe Zanardelli, a jurisconsult from Brescia.

Parties and leaders

Results

The Historical Left group emerged as the largest in Parliament, although left-wing dissidents won 119 of the 508 seats, becoming the third parliamentary group.^[2] Only 621,896 men of a total population of around 29 million were entitled to vote.^[3] Benedetto Cairoli was confirmed Prime Minister by the king Umberto I.

Party		Votes	%	Seats	+/–
	Historical Left	146,096	40.76	218	−196
	Historical Right	135,717	37.86	171	+77
	Dissident Left	70,479	19.66	119	New
	Others	6,147	1.71	0	0
Total		358,439	100.00	508	0
Valid votes		358,439	96.96
Invalid/blank votes		11,245	3.04
Total votes		369,684	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		621,896	59.44
Source: National Institute of Statistics