ThomasMoreAI Erskine May API
Base URL: https://erskinemay-api.parliament.uk/api
OpenAPI 3 spec: https://erskinemay-api.parliament.uk/swagger/v1/swagger.json
(cached at _specs/erskinemay.json).
What it covers
The full, current 25th edition of Erskine May (Parliament's authoritative procedure manual) as a structured tree:
- Parts — the top-level divisions (e.g. "Privilege").
- Chapters — numbered chapters within each part.
- Sections — sub-chapter sections; each section has step navigation.
- Paragraphs — individual numbered paragraphs (the smallest cited unit, e.g. "20.5").
- Index terms — the back-of-book index, browseable A–Z and searchable.
Common entry points
| Use case | Endpoint |
|---|---|
| List all Parts | GET /Part |
| One Part | GET /Part/{partNumber} |
| One Chapter | GET /Chapter/{chapterNumber} |
| One Section | GET /Section/{sectionId} |
| Section navigation step | GET /Section/{sectionId},{step} (e.g. /Section/12345,next) |
| Paragraph by reference | GET /Search/Paragraph/{reference} (e.g. 20.5) |
| Full-text search of paragraphs | GET /Search/ParagraphSearchResults/{searchTerm} |
| Full-text search of sections | GET /Search/SectionSearchResults/{searchTerm} |
| Browse index A–Z | GET /IndexTerm/browse?startLetter=A |
| One index term | GET /IndexTerm/{indexTermId} |
| Full-text search of index | GET /Search/IndexTermSearchResults/{searchTerm} |
Worked example
# Find paragraphs about "casting vote"
curl -s 'https://erskinemay-api.parliament.uk/api/Search/ParagraphSearchResults/casting%20vote' \
| jq '.searchResults[] | {ref: .reference, text: (.contentTextHtml | gsub("<[^>]+>"; "") | .[0:160])}'
# Or pull a paragraph directly by its reference
curl -s 'https://erskinemay-api.parliament.uk/api/Search/Paragraph/20.5'
Notes
- References (e.g.
20.5) are stable across reprints within an edition but may change between editions. - HTML in paragraph text contains semantic markup (
<em>,<a>-style cross-references); strip tags for plain text or render as HTML. - Erskine May is © House of Commons / House of Lords; the API is available under the Open Parliament Licence for reuse.
Using the CLI
This skill ships with a Node CLI alongside the documentation. From the repo root:
node bin/parl.mjs em --help
Or after npm link (one-time install):
parl em --help
Wraps the Erskine May API (parliamentary procedure manual).
Examples
parl em parts
List Parts.
parl em paragraph 20.5
Pull paragraph 20.5 by reference.
parl em search "casting vote"
Search paragraphs.
parl em search-sections "privilege"
Search sections.
parl em index --start-letter A
Browse the index from A.
Library use (Node + browser)
Same surface as a JS module:
import * as fac from '../../lib/facilities/erskine-may.mjs';
// Each function is async and returns parsed JSON (or bytes for
// download endpoints). See the .mjs source for the full export list.
The library uses only fetch / URL / AbortController, so the
same source runs in Node 18+ and in modern browsers.