ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the internal and external political relationships which existed between the three societies of Chartered Accountants in Scotland during the period 1853 to 1916. It explains why the Scottish societies were able to obtain individual charters in the 1850s, whereas the position in England resulted in the successful application for a national charter in 1880. The chapter reviews the efforts of the Scottish chartered societies to open up membership ranks in response to criticism from politicians, advised by their own Civil Servants and examines the campaign to establish appropriate and acceptable federal institutions in the form of the General Examining Board in 1893 and the Joint Committee of Councils in 1915. There has always been some dispute on the reasons for the formation of Scottish societies during the middle nineteenth century. Brown saw formation being concerned with differences between Scottish and English law and this interpretation has been accepted subsequently by a number of writers.
