Peel's Acts (as they are commonly known) were Acts of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. They consolidated provisions from a large number of earlier statutes which were then repealed. Their purpose was to simplify the criminal law. The term refers to the Home Secretary who sponsored them, Sir Robert Peel.

Some writers apply the term Peel's Acts to the series of Acts passed between 1826 and 1832.[1] Other writers apply the term Peel's Acts specifically to five of those Acts, namely chapters 27 to 31 of the session 7 & 8 Geo 4 (1827).[2]

According to some writers, the Criminal Law Act 1826 was the first of Peel's Acts.[3]

The Acts were the product of a failed[4] attempt to codify the criminal law.

The acts 7 & 8 Geo. 4. cc. 27 to 31 edit

These acts are:

The Criminal Law (Ireland) Act 1828 (9 Geo. 4. c. 54), and the acts 9 Geo. 4. cc. 53, 55 and 56, made similar provision for Ireland.[7]

The acts replaced by the Criminal Law Consolidation Acts 1861 edit

James Edward Davis said that the Criminal Law Consolidation Acts 1861 are new editions of Peel's Acts.[8] The acts listed below were replaced by the Criminal Law Consolidation Acts 1861. There were two separate sets of broadly identical Acts for England and Ireland respectively.

The first four acts on this list consolidated 316 acts, representing almost four-fifths of all offences.[citation needed]

England edit

Ireland edit

  • (Repeals) (9 Geo. 4. c. 53)
  • 9 Geo. 4. c. 55, sometimes referred to as the Larceny Act 1828[9] or the Larceny (Ireland) Act 1828[10][11]
  • 9 Geo. 4. c. 56, sometimes referred to as the Malicious Injuries to Property Act 1828 or the Malicious Injuries to Property (Ireland) Act 1828[12]

Offences Against the Person (Ireland) Act 1829
Act of Parliament
 
Citation10 Geo. 4. c. 34
  • 10 Geo. 4. c. 34,[13] sometimes referred to as the Offences Against the Person (Ireland) Act 1829[14][15] and as the Offences Against the Person Act (Ireland) 1829[16][17]

Sources edit

Citations edit

  1. ^ James Fitzjames Stephen. A History of the Criminal Law of England. Macmillan and Co. London. 1883. Volume 2. Pages 216 and 217. Encyclopædia Britannica. Eleventh Edition. 1911. Volume 7. Page 485. "Stephen's History of the Criminal Law" (1883) 133 Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine 731 at 735 (No 812 June). "Art IX - The Criminal Law of England" (1864) 18 Law Magazine and Law Review 139 at 153 and [1].
  2. ^ William Robinson. An Analysis of, and Digested Index to the Criminal Statutes. Saunders and Benning. London. 1829. Page v.
  3. ^ "Preliminary Note". Halsbury's Statutes of England. (The Complete Statutes of England). First Edition. 1929. Volume 4. Page 255.
  4. ^ No Criminal Code was passed
  5. ^ Thomas James Arnold. The Law Relating to Municipal Corporations in England and Wales. Page x.
  6. ^ Evan James MacGillivray. Insurance Law relating to all Risks other than Marine. Sweet and Maxwell, Limited. Chancery Lane, London. 1912. Page xi
  7. ^ "Criminal Laws - Ireland" in "Abstract of Important Public Acts". The Companion to the Almanac, or Year-Book of General Information; for 1829. (The British Almanac). Charles Knight. London. Page 161. Thomas Stephen. The Book of the Constitution of Great Britain. Glasgow. 1835. Pages 319 and 320.
  8. ^ James Edward Davis. The Criminal Law Consolidation Statutes of the 24 & 25 of Victoria, Chapters 94 to 100. Butterworths. London. Hodges, Smith & Co. 1861. Pages vi and vii.
  9. ^ Dyson and Green. "The properties of the law". Dyson (ed). Unravelling Tort and Crime. Cambridge University Press. 2014. Chapter 14. pp 389–400.
  10. ^ Vaughan, William Edward (2009). Murder Trials in Ireland, 1836–1914. New History of Ireland (Irish Legal History Society). Vol. 19. Four Courts Press. pp. 433, 448. ISBN 9781846821585.
  11. ^ O'Connor, James; Farran, Edmond Chomley; Byrne, William; Kough, C. Norman (1911). The Irish Justice of the Peace. Dublin: E. Posonby. p. xii.
  12. ^ William Edward Vaughan. Murder Trials in Ireland, 1836–1914. pp. 384 and 448.
  13. ^ The Statutes of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Vol. 1225. His Majesty's Statute and Law Printers. 1829 – via Google Books.
  14. ^ Turner (editor). Russell on Crime (12th ed.). Stevens. 1964. Volume I. Page cxxxiv.
  15. ^ The Irish Jurist, 1968, vol. 3, p 150
  16. ^ R v Brown [1994] 1 AC 212 at 248, (1993) 157 JP 360, HL, per Lord Lowry
  17. ^ 86 Journal of the House of Commons 165