Politics in Middlemarch operates as a form of ambient, background noise. Even explicitly political characters like Arthur Brooke are not overly invested in the political process, yet many of the characters discuss politics. A regular topic of political debate is the Reform Act of 1832. The Reform Act was a law passed by the British Parliament in 1832 which made sweeping changes to the British electoral system. Though the Reform Act did not give the vote to everyone, many middle-class people were franchised. Working-class men and all women continued to be excluded from the electoral system, through the steady progress in increasing the number of people allowed to vote was a controversial move in Britain at the time.

The Reform Act was a direct response to years of political agitation about the nature of the electoral system in Great Britain. At the beginning of the 19th century, elections were not open to the vast majority of people. The only people who were permitted to vote in elections were people who either owned a certain amount of land or those who paid certain taxes. As a result, the vast majority of people in the country were excluded. The nature of the electoral system was also deemed unfair.