The Crown and Parliament Recognition Act 1689 (2 Will & Mary c 1) was an Act of the

Parliament of England The Parliament of England was the legislature of the Kingdom of England from the 13th century until 1707 when it was replaced by the Parliament of Great Britain. Parliament evolved from the great council of bishops and peers that advised t ...

, passed in 1690. It was designed to confirm the succession to the throne of King

William III William III or William the Third may refer to: Kings * William III of Sicily (c. 1186–c. 1198) * William III of England and Ireland or William III of Orange or William II of Scotland (1650–1702) * William III of the Netherlands and Luxembourg ...

and Queen

Mary II Mary II (30 April 166228 December 1694) was Queen of England, Scotland, and Ireland, co-reigning with her husband, William III & II, from 1689 until her death in 1694. Mary was the eldest daughter of James, Duke of York, and his first wife ...

of England and to confirm the validity of the laws passed by the Convention Parliament which had been irregularly convened following the

Glorious Revolution The Glorious Revolution; gd, Rèabhlaid Ghlòrmhor; cy, Chwyldro Gogoneddus , also known as the ''Glorieuze Overtocht'' or ''Glorious Crossing'' in the Netherlands, is the sequence of events leading to the deposition of King James II and ...

and the end of James II's reign. This Act is still wholly in force in England and Wales (as of 2021).

Reason for the Act

King James II by Sir Godfrey Kneller, Bt

The Act was passed because in 1688 King James II of England was deposed (he was deemed to have abdicated) and replaced as king by William and Mary, who ruled jointly. However this could not be achieved without an

Act of Parliament Acts of Parliament, sometimes referred to as primary legislation, are texts of law passed by the Legislature, legislative body of a jurisdiction (often a parliament or council). In most countries with a parliamentary system of government, acts of ...

to approve it. Since no parliament was in existence at the time, it was necessary to convene one, but under the constitution only the King could summon a parliament. In the absence of a king to do so, the members of the previous parliament convened a new one themselves, without a royal summons, instead asking William to issue the summons, which he did on 22 January 1689. This irregular Parliament sat on 13 February. They declared James to have abdicated, and then chose Mary (his daughter) and William (her husband and first cousin) to succeed him, and passed an Act to make it legal. This Act was the

Bill of Rights 1689 The Bill of Rights 1689 is an Act of the Parliament of England, which sets out certain basic civil rights and clarifies who would be next to inherit the Crown, and is seen as a crucial landmark in English constitutional law. It received Royal ...

. (In Scotland a separate Act was passed, the

Claim of Right The Claim of Right (c. 28) is an Acts of Parliament, Act passed by the Convention of the Estates of Scotland, Convention of the Estates, a sister body to the Parliament of Scotland (or Three Estates), in April 1689. It is one of the key documen ...

, which stated that James had forfeited the throne by his illegal actions and his failure to take the

coronation oath An oath of office is an oath or affirmation a person takes before assuming the duties of an office, usually a position in government or within a religious body, although such oaths are sometimes required of officers of other organizations. Such ...

.) However, doubts arose as to the validity of the Bill of Rights and the other Acts passed by the Convention Parliament. Since the Parliament had not been summoned in the regular way, it was arguable that it was no parliament at all and its legislation was of no legal effect (although this occurrence was not unprecedented in English history). Therefore after the Convention Parliament was dissolved and the next parliament was summoned by the King and Queen in the normal manner, the Crown and Parliament Recognition Act was passed to confirm the validity of the royal succession and the previous parliament's legislative competence.

Controversy

The difficulty with the Act is that if the Convention Parliament had no authority, then the succession of William and Mary was of no legal effect, which meant that they were not capable of giving

Royal Assent Royal assent is the method by which a monarch formally approves an act of the legislature, either directly or through an official acting on the monarch's behalf. In some jurisdictions, royal assent is equivalent to promulgation, while in other ...

to any bill in the next parliament, with the result that even the Crown and Parliament Recognition Act was of no effect either. This very point was argued before the Hereford County Court in 1944 by a

litigant - A lawsuit is a proceeding by a party or parties against another in the civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. The term "lawsuit" is used in reference to a civil actio ...

who represented himself in a

probate Probate is the judicial process whereby a will is "proved" in a court of law and accepted as a valid public document that is the true last testament of the deceased, or whereby the estate is settled according to the laws of intestacy in the sta ...

case called ''Hall v. Hall.'' He argued that the

Court of Probate Act 1857 The Court of Probate Act 1857 (20 & 21 Vict. c. 77) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It transferred responsibility for the granting of probate, and letters of administration, from the ecclesiastical courts of England and Wal ...

(which undermined his case) was of no legal effect whatsoever, since it had never received Royal Assent. It had received Royal Assent from

Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 21 ...

, but according to his argument Victoria had never legally inherited the throne, because the Bill of Rights and the

Act of Settlement 1701 The Act of Settlement is an Act of the Parliament of England that settled the succession to the English and Irish crowns to only Protestants, which passed in 1701. More specifically, anyone who became a Roman Catholic, or who married one, bec ...

(which also altered the line of succession to the throne) were of no effect, since both had been assented to by William III, who was not the real king. Therefore Victoria had never been the real queen and so the Probate Act (like every other Act passed since 1689) was not the law. Predictably, the judge ruled against him, and the point has never been argued in court since. Although the judge did not give detailed reasons for his decision, a counterpoint to the above argument has been advanced by academics: "One possible answer, deducible from rationalizations of later medieval practice when usurpations of the throne were not uncommon, is that ... a matter of State necessity ... a ''

de facto ''De facto'' ( ; , "in fact") describes practices that exist in reality, whether or not they are officially recognized by laws or other formal norms. It is commonly used to refer to what happens in practice, in contrast with ''de jure'' ("by la ...

'' King had been regarded as competent to summon a lawful Parliament."

Text of the Act

Ireland

In the

Kingdom of Ireland The Kingdom of Ireland ( ga, label=Classical Irish, an Ríoghacht Éireann; ga, label=Modern Irish, an Ríocht Éireann, ) was a monarchy on the island of Ireland that was a client state of England and then of Great Britain. It existed from ...

another Act, entitled ''An Act of Recognition, of their Majesties undoubted Right to the Crown of Ireland'' was passed in 1692 by the

Parliament of Ireland The Parliament of Ireland ( ga, Parlaimint na hÉireann) was the legislature of the Lordship of Ireland, and later the Kingdom of Ireland, from 1297 until 1800. It was modelled on the Parliament of England and from 1537 comprised two chamb ...

, which made similar provision.4 Will. & Mar. c.1 In the

Republic of Ireland Ireland ( ga, Éire ), also known as the Republic of Ireland (), is a country in north-western Europe consisting of 26 of the 32 counties of the island of Ireland. The capital and largest city is Dublin, on the eastern side of the island. A ...

this was repealed by section 1 of, and th
Schedule
to, the

Statute Law Revision (Pre-Union Irish Statutes) Act 1962 The Statute Law Revision (Pre-Union Irish Statutes) Act 1962 (No 29) is an Act of the Oireachtas. The Act repealed various Acts of the pre-Union Parliament of Ireland, passed from 1459 to 1800, either wholly or in part, including the Crown of Ir ...

References

External links

Official text of the Crown and Parliament Recognition Act 1689
as amended and in force today within the United Kingdom, from the

UK Statute Law Database legislation.gov.uk, formerly known as the UK Statute Law Database, is the official web-accessible database of the statute law of the United Kingdom, hosted by The National Archives. It contains all primary legislation in force since 1267 and a ...

Official text of the Crown Recognition Act (Ireland) 1692
as amended and in force today within the United Kingdom, from the

"Of the King and His Title,"
chapter 3 of book 1 of the ''

Commentaries on the Laws of England The ''Commentaries on the Laws of England'' are an influential 18th-century treatise on the common law of England by Sir William Blackstone, originally published by the Clarendon Press at Oxford, 1765–1770. The work is divided into four volume ...

'',

William Blackstone Sir William Blackstone (10 July 1723 – 14 February 1780) was an English jurist, judge and Tory politician of the eighteenth century. He is most noted for writing the ''Commentaries on the Laws of England''. Born into a middle-class family i ...