Unlawful Societies Act 1799
The Unlawful Societies Act 1799
Synopsis
The
The Act was aimed at restricting the activities of
During the passage of the Bill exemptions were introduced to avoid unwanted consequences of the broadly-drafted law. Papers that Parliament itself had ordered to be printed, for instance, were not required to carry an imprint.
The Act was not particularly effective, as radical political organisations continued in more secret or less formal ways. Even where prosecutions could have been made under the Act, other legislation was preferred. Significant parts of the law were repealed under the Newspapers Printers and Reading Rooms Repeal Act 1869, while others continued in force (albeit obsolete and deprecated) until the Criminal Justice Act 1967. The most long-lived provision of the Act has been the requirement for printers to place an "imprint" on their work. This provision was relaxed in the Printer's Imprint Act 1961 to exclude simple documents like greetings cards or invoice books.[5] At that time apparently some unscrupulous customers requested the printer omit their imprint, and then refused to pay their bills on the grounds that the work had been conducted illegally.[citation needed] The imprint requirement as amended in 1961 is technically still in force, but widely considered obsolete. A similar, but more detailed, provision was introduced in section 143 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 to require the disclosure of printer, publisher and promoter of any material produced as part of an election campaign.[6]
References
- ^ short title was authorised by the Short Titles Act 1896, section 1 and the first schedule. Due to the repeal of those provisions it is now authorised by section 19(2) of the Interpretation Act 1978.
- ^ "The Romantic Period, 1780–1832" (PDF). University of East Anglia Digital Repository.
- ^ "Partial text of the Act". Division of Continuing Studies, University of Victoria.
- ^ Prescott, Andrew. ""The Unlawful Societies Act of 1799"". Pietre-Stones Review of Freemasonry. Retrieved 17 December 2017.
- ^ "Printer's Imprint Act 1961". legislation.gov.uk. Hansard. Retrieved 17 December 2017.
- ^ "s.143 Political Parties Elections and Referendums Act 2000". legislation.gov.uk. Retrieved 17 December 2017.