ACT OF PARLIAMENT is a resolution or law passed by all the three branches of the legislature—the king [or queen). lords, and commons. The expression is generally used to signify the record of an A. of P., and such records are strictly synonymous with the term "statutes," or "statutes of the realm." An A. of P. thus made is the highest legal authority acknowledged by the constitution. It binds every subject in the land, and even the sovereign himself, if named therein. And in England it cannot be altered, amended, dispensed with, suspended, or repealed, but in the same forms and by the same authority of parliament. In Scotland, however, a long course of contrary usage or of disuse may have the effect of depriving a statute of its obligation; for, by the Scotch law, a statute may become obsolete by disuse, and cease to be legally binding. It was formerly held in England that the king might in many cases dispense with penal statutes; but by the statute 1 W. and M. st. 2, c. 2, it is declared that the suspending or dispensing with laws by royal authority, without consent of parliament, is illegal.
An A. of P. or statute is either public or private. A public act regards the whole community, but the operation of a private act is confined to particular persons and pri vate concerns, and some private acts are local, as affecting certain places only. As the law till lately stood, the courts of law were bound ex officio to take judicial notice, as it is called, of public acts—that is, to recognize these acts as known and published law, without the necessity of their being specially pleaded and proved; but it was otherwise in regard to private acts; so that in order to claim any advantage under a private act, it was necessary to plead it, and set it forth particularly. But now, by the 13 and 14 Viet. c. 21, s. 7, every act made after the then next session of parliament is to be taken to be a public one, and judicially noticed as such, unless the contrary be expressly declared.
Acts of P. are also sometimes described as declaratory, or penal, or remedial, accord ing to the nature of their object or proVislons. Declaratory statutes are where the old custom of the kingdom has almost fallen into disuse, or become disputable, in which case the parliament has thought proper (in perpetuum rei testimanium, and for avoiding all doubts and difficulties) to declare what the common law is and ever has been. Penal
acts are those which merely impose penalties or punishments for an offense, as in the case of the statutes relative to game. Remedial acts are such as supply some defect in the existing law, and redress some abuse or inconvenience with which it is found to he attended, without introducing any provision of a penal character. There is also a dis• tinction of Acts of P. as being either enlarging or restraining, enabling or disabling acts.
An A. of P. begins to operate from the time when it receives the royal assent, unless sonic other time be fixed for the purpose by the act itself. The rule on this subject, in England, was formerly different; for at common law, every A. of P., which had no pro vision to the contrary, was considered, as soon as it passed (i.e., received the royal assent), as having been in force, retrospectively, from the first day of the session of par liament iu which it passed, though, in fact, it might not have received the royal assent, or even been introduced into parliament, until long after that day; and this strange prin ciple was rigidly observed for centuries. The ancient acts of. the Scotch parliament were proclaimed in all the county towns, burghs, and even in the baron courts. This mode of promulgation was, however, gradually dropped as the use of printing became common; and in 1581 an act was passed declaring publication at the market cross of Edinburgh to be sufficient. British statutes require no formal promulgation; and in order to fix the time from which they shall become binding, it was enacted by the 33 Geo. III. c. 13, that every A. of P. to be passed after Eth April. 1703, shall commence from the date of the indorsement by the clerk of parliament, stating the day, month, and year when the act was passed and received the royal assent, unless the commence ment shall, in the act itself, be otherwise provided for.
An A. of P. consists of various parts—such as the title, the preamble, the enacting sections and clauses; and sometimes certain forms or schedules added by way of appen dix—and it is referred to by the year of the sovereign's reign, and the chapter of the statutes for that year. The old acts of the Scotch parliament, before the union with England, are cited by the year in which they were passed, and the order of the number Or chapter. See STATUTES, SCOTCH STATUTES, and PARLIAMENT.