The Habeas Corpus Suspension Act 1794 (34 Geo. III, c. 54) was an Act passed by 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 ...

. The Act's long title was ''An act to empower his Majesty to secure and detain such persons as his Majesty shall suspect are conspiring against his person and government''.

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The Act declared:

Whereas a traitorous and detestable conspiracy has been formed for subverting the existing laws and constitution, and for introducing the system of anarchy and confusion which has so fatally prevailed in France: therefore, for the better preservation of his Majesty's sacred person, and for securing the peace and the laws and liberties of this kingdom; be it enacted...That every person or persons that are or shall be in prison within the kingdom of Great Britain at or upon the day on which this act shall receive his Majesty's royal assent, or after, by warrant of his said Majesty's most honourable privy council, signed by six of the said privy council, for high treason, suspicion of high treason, or treasonable practices, or by warrant, signed by any of his Majesty's secretaries of state, for such causes as aforesaid, may be detained in safe custody, without bail or main-prize, until the first day of February one thousand seven hundred and ninety-five; and that no judge or justice of the peace shall bail or try any such person or persons so committed, without order from his said Majesty's privy council signed by six of the said privy council, till the said first day of February one thousand seven hundred and ninety-five; any law or statute to the contrary notwithstanding...

Section III of the Act preserved the

privilege of Parliament Parliamentary privilege is a legal immunity enjoyed by members of certain legislatures, in which legislators are granted protection against civil or criminal liability for actions done or statements made in the course of their legislative duties. ...

Background

Government spies had penetrated the

Society for Constitutional Information The Society for Constitutional Information was a British activist group founded in 1780 by Major John Cartwright, to promote parliamentary reform. It was an organisation of social reformers, many of whom were drawn from the rational dissenting c ...

, and were reporting a surge in its activity and much dangerous talk of a convention rather than parliamentary reform. France sent an agent to Ireland to assess the support a French invasion would have and the agent was arrested in late April 1795. On 12 May the secretary of the

London Corresponding Society The London Corresponding Society (LCS) was a federation of local reading and debating clubs that in the decade following the French Revolution agitated for the democratic reform of the British Parliament. In contrast to other reform associati ...

Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry of William Word ...

, was arrested. The next day another radical,

John Thelwall John Thelwall (27 July 1764 – 17 February 1834) was a radical British orator, writer, political reformer, journalist, poet, elocutionist and speech therapist.

, was arrested and the

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...

, William Pitt, appointed a secret committee of the House of Commons to examine the confiscated papers of the London societies. Although this action only affected the

directly, the

Society of the Friends of the People The Society of the Friends of the People was an organisation in Great Britain that was focused on advocating for Parliamentary Reform. It was founded by the Whig Party in 1792. The Society in England was aristocratic and exclusive, in contrast ...

and other similar societies disbanded out of fear because of this and similar actions taken by the government.Iain Hampsher-Monk. "Civic Humanism and Parliamentary Reform: The Case of the Society of the Friends of the People." (Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 70-89). Journal of British Studies, 1979. On 16 May the committee submitted its first report, saying there was a conspiracy and called for the suspension of ''

habeas corpus ''Habeas corpus'' (; from Medieval Latin, ) is a recourse in law through which a person can report an unlawful detention or imprisonment to a court and request that the court order the custodian of the person, usually a prison official, t ...

'' for eight months. The bill passed the Commons by 146 votes to 28, after fourteen obstructing divisions by

Foxite Foxite was a late 18th-century British political label for Whig followers of Charles James Fox. Fox was the generally acknowledged leader of a faction of the Whigs from 1784 to his death in 1806. The group had developed from successive earlier ...

Whigs. The Act was extended to 1 July 1795 (35 Geo. III, c. 3) in a series of debates in January and February 1795. In June 1795 the government lifted the suspension of ''habeas corpus''.Ehrman, p. 453.

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