Act of Parliament | |
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Long title | An Acte agaynste the bringing in and putting in Execution of Bulls and other Instruments from the Sea of Rome. |
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Citation | 13 Eliz. 1. c. 2 |
Territorial extent | England and Wales |
Dates | |
Royal assent | 29 May 1571 |
Commencement | 1 July 1571 [a] |
Repealed | 1 January 1970 |
Other legislation | |
Amended by | |
Repealed by | Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969 |
Status: Repealed | |
Text of statute as originally enacted |
The Bulls, etc., from Rome Act 1571 (13 Eliz. 1. c. 2) was an act of the Parliament of England during the English Reformation, with the long-title An Act against the bringing in and putting in execution of bulls writings or instruments and other superstitious things from the See of Rome.
The act punished with high treason those who published papal bulls and Roman Catholic priests and their converts. [1] This Act was a response to Pope Pius V's Regnans in Excelsis .
In 1911, Pope Pius X excommunicated Arnold Mathew from the Catholic Church. The Times reported on this excommunication and included an English language translation of the Latin language document which described Mathew, among other things, as a "pseudo-bishop". [2] [3] Mathew's attorney argued, in the 1913 trial Mathew v. "The Times" Publishing Co., Ltd., that publication of the excommunication by The Times in English was high treason under the act. The trial was, according to a 1932 article in The Tablet , the last time this principle was invoked and the judge, Charles Darling, 1st Baron Darling, "held that it was not unlawful to publish a Papal Bull in a newspaper simply for the information of the public." [4] [5]
Breaching the act ceased to be a crime in 1846,[ which? ] but remained unlawful until the act was repealed. [6]
The whole act so far as unrepealed was repealed by section 1 of, and part II of the schedule to, the Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1969. [7]