This chapter will evaluate changes affecting the governance of policing during the second half of the nineteenth century: this period witnessed the responsibility for the conduct of police affairs being altered so that the Home Office and the chief constables began to perform an important role in police governance. The reasons surrounding these changes and the ‘mechanics’ of them (for example, the expanded use of Home Office Circulars after 1856 and the development of organisation to provide a collective voice for chief constables) will be fully evaluated. Additionally, the deficiencies in police governance that arose from these developments will be explored. This chapter will then examine developments associated with police governance in the period 1900–1964: it will analyse the move towards the centralisation and standardisation of policing as a consequence of the 1919 Police Act and will also explore the tensions affecting police governance arising from the more vigorous application of the principle of constabulary independence—an issue that was encapsulated in the 1930 Fisher v. Oldham Corporation judgement. Key disputes that illustrate tensions between chief constables and police authorities (such as that in Nottingham in 1959) will be explored as a background to the 1964 Police Act that is discussed in the following chapter.