The Correspondence with Enemies Act 1798 (38 Geo.3 c.28) was an Act of the

British Parliament The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative supremacy ...

. France had declared war on Great Britain in 1793, near the beginning of the

French Revolutionary Wars The French Revolutionary Wars (french: Guerres de la Révolution française) were a series of sweeping military conflicts lasting from 1792 until 1802 and resulting from the French Revolution. They pitted French First Republic, France against Ki ...

. In response, the British Parliament had passed the

Correspondence with Enemies Act 1793 The Correspondence with Enemies Act 1793 ( 33 Geo. 3. c. 27) was an Act of the British Parliament passed at the beginning of the French Revolutionary Wars. France had declared war on Great Britain on 1 February; the Act was passed on 7 May to p ...

to prohibit trade with France. In 1795 France invaded the

Republic of the United Provinces The United Provinces of the Netherlands, also known as the (Seven) United Provinces, officially as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands (Dutch: ''Republiek der Zeven Verenigde Nederlanden''), and commonly referred to in historiography ...

(the Netherlands) and founded the

Batavian Republic The Batavian Republic ( nl, Bataafse Republiek; french: République Batave) was the successor state to the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands. It was proclaimed on 19 January 1795 and ended on 5 June 1806, with the accession of Louis Bona ...

there. On 5 April 1798, Parliament passed this Act to extend the provisions of the 1793 Act to the French-occupied Netherlands (still described in the Act as the "United Provinces").

Provisions of the Acts

The 1793 Act had made it

high treason Treason is the crime of attacking a state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to overthrow its government, spying on its military, its diplo ...

for any person resident in

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...

to "knowingly and wilfully" supply materials to France during the war, without a licence from the king. Buying land in France, or lending somebody money with which to buy land in France, was also made treason. Merely travelling to France was punishable with imprisonment for up to 6 months. Any insurance policy relating to any ship or wares belonging to French subjects was made void. The same rules also applied to the Netherlands from 1798. The rules of procedure and evidence contained in the

Treason Act 1695 The Treason Act 1695 (7 & 8 Will 3 c 3) is an Act of Parliament, Act of the Parliament of England which laid down rules of evidence and procedure in high treason trials. It was passed by the English Parliament but was extended to cover Scotland ...

and the

Treason Act 1708 The Treason Act 1708 (7 Ann c 21) is an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain which harmonised the law of high treason between the former kingdoms of England and Scotland following their union as Great Britain in 1707. This Act is partly st ...

applied to treason under these Acts. The Acts did not apply to anyone in the army or navy (but such people were subject to military or naval law instead).

Commencement

The Act contained an unusual feature (also found in the 1793 Act), in that instead of coming into force on one particular date, it instead came into force on different dates in different parts of the world.

Provisions of the Acts

Commencement

See also