The Great Seal Act 1688 (1 Will & Mary c 21) is 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 ...
. section 1 of the Act is still in force in Great Britain.
[The ]Chronological Table of the Statutes
The Chronological Table of the Statutes is a chronological list of the public Acts passed by the Parliament of England (1235–1706), the Parliament of Great Britain (1707–1800), and the Parliament of the United Kingdom (from 1801), as we ...
, 1235 - 2010. The Stationery Office
The Stationery Office (TSO) is a British publishing company created in 1996 when the publishing arm of His Majesty's Stationery Office was privatised. It is the official publisher and the distributor for legislation, command and house papers, ...
. 2011. . Part I. Page 68, read with pages viii and x.
The Act was passed because the office of
Lord Chancellor
The lord chancellor, formally the lord high chancellor of Great Britain, is the highest-ranking traditional minister among the Great Officers of State in Scotland and England in the United Kingdom, nominally outranking the prime minister. Th ...
had been put in commission (that is, divided between several officers at the same time, instead of being held by a single individual). Section 1 of the Act states that the commissioners are to be called Lords Commissioners of the Great Seal of England, and that each lord commissioner is to have the same powers as the Lord Chancellor has. Each lord commissioner is to rank in the
order of precedence
An order of precedence is a sequential hierarchy of nominal importance and can be applied to individuals, groups, or organizations. Most often it is used in the context of people by many organizations and governments, for very formal and state o ...
after the
Speaker of the House of Commons Speaker of the House of Commons is a political leadership position found in countries that have a House of Commons, where the membership of the body elects a speaker to lead its proceedings.
Systems that have such a position include:
* Speaker of ...
. The office was last in commission in 1850.
the Lord Chancellor is
Brandon Lewis
Brandon Kenneth Lewis (born 20 June 1971) is a British politician who served as Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor from September to October 2022. He previously served as Chairman of the Conservative Party from 2018 to 2019 and ...
.
Repeals
The rest of the Act has been repealed. Sections 2 and 3 were repealed b
section 8(2)of, and Part I o
Schedule 5to, the
Justices of the Peace Act 1968
A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a panel of judges. A judge hears all the witnesses and any other evidence presented by the barristers or solicitors of the case, assesses the credibility a ...
. Sections 4 to 6 were repealed by Schedule 4 to the
Local Government (Clerks) Act 1931. Sections 7 and 8 were repealed by Schedule 1 to the
Statute Law Revision Act 1948. Section 9 was repealed by section 4 of the
Lancaster County Clerk Act 1871.
References
*
Halsbury's Statutes,
External links
The Great Seal Act 1688 as amended from the
National Archives.
Acts of the Parliament of England
1688 in law
1688 in England
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