[20] An article The Machinery of Politics and Proportional Representation from 1872 by William Robert Ware, in the American Law Review, was reprinted in London by the Representative Reform Association, a group of allies of Hare set up with support from Walter Morrison who funded George Howell as its secretary from 1868 to 1874, also involving Edmond Beales.

[23] Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) built on the classification used by Ware of voting systems, in his 1884 pamphlet The Principles of Parliamentary Representation, to give a general formulation and to emphasize larger district magnitude in multi-member districts and each voter casting one vote only.

[5][28][29] Initially a Conservative Party supporter, Hare was a free trader opposed to the Corn Laws.

[31] Hare differed from Mill in relying heavily on Edmund Burke as a political authority, in particular the Reflections on the Revolution in France.

[32] The Dictionary of National Biography article by William Prideaux Courtney on Hare states: Hare's energies were concentrated in an attempt to devise a system which would secure proportional representation of all classes in the United Kingdom, including minorities in the House of Commons and other electoral assemblies.

[33] His son Rowland Hill, for the South Australian Colonization Commission, took an interest during the 1830s in a reformed electoral system for the colony, and drew on his father's ideas.

Danish thinker Carl Christoffer Georg Andræ developed a similar system independently in 1855.

[9] Hare's ideas intended to make political representation more closely reflect the ideals of participatory democracy, where all constituents could be heard.

[36] Hare's original electoral system concept included each voter casting a single preferential vote in an at-large district covering the entire United Kingdom.

In the preface to the fourth edition of Treatise on the Election of Representatives, Hare stated his belief that proportional representation would "end the evils of corruption, violent discontent and restricted power of selection or voter choice".

[37] A great deal of writing on that theory developed and several societies were formed in the world for its adoption although Hare pointed out that his scheme was not meant to bear the title "representation for minorities".

Hare and his wife gave a font and stained glass window to St Paul's Church, Hook, London.

Hare was survived by seven children, and his will divided his estate equally between them, in a trust: they were three sons (Sherlock, Alfred, Lancelot) and four daughters (Marian, Alice, Katharine, Lydia Mary).