The Newtown Act (21 George II c.10) was an act of the Parliament of Ireland regulating municipal corporations, in particular the manner in which parliamentary boroughs elected members to the Irish House of Commons. Provisions Clauses 1 to 7 aimed to curtail faggot voters by requiring a rentcharge property qualification for the franchise to be either over ten pounds or else held for over one year prior to the election. This restricted temporary conveyancing of parts of a freehold from its true owner to multiple fictitious owners. These provisions were an uncontentious technical amendment of an act passed in 1745 (19 George II c.11). The oath required of electors under the 1745 act was amended by clause 5 of the Newtown Act to reflect the changed property restrictions. The revised oath restated unchanged the portion which prohibited Irish Roman Catholics from voting: I am not a Papist, or married to a Papist, nor do I educate, or suffer to be educated, any of my children under the age of fourteen years in the popish religion. Clause 8 was controversially appended to the bill at a late stage. It explicitly permitted non-residents to become burgesses (members of the corporation). Burgesses were the sole parliamentary electors in corporation boroughs, and in freeman boroughs they were also crucial since they had the power to grant or refuse freeman status. The patrons of pocket boroughs ensured the burgesses were loyal placemen. Permitting non-resident burgesses was necessary as only members of the established Church of Ireland could be burgesses, and many boroughs were rotten boroughs or otherwise underdeveloped places where few Protestants were willing to settle. This provision was stated to apply to boroughs other than those with city status. The 1835 Report of the Commissioners on Municipal Corporations in Ireland questioned whether it was applicable in the case of Armagh and Tuam, both being episcopal sees and hence "cities" in William Blackstone's definition in Commentaries on the Laws of England. In fact, non-residents had served on both corporations. Enactment The act's common name comes from Newtownards in County Down, where the Newtownards constituency was the subject of litigation between Brabazon Ponsonby, 1st Earl of Bessborough and Alexander Stewart. In 1744 Stewart bought from Bessborough's unstable stepson Robert Colvill the manor of Newtown (later renaming its seat Mount Stewart). Bessborough had been managing the borough within the manor for Colvill, and Stewart set about replacing