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Penal law (British)
In English history, the penal laws were a series of laws that sought to enforce the State-decreed religious monopoly of the Church of England and, following the 1688 revolution, of Presbyterianism in Scotland, against the continued existence of illegal and underground communities of Catholics, nonjuring Anglicans, and Protestant nonconformists. The Penal laws also imposed various forfeitures, civil penalties, and civil disabilities upon recusants from mandatory attendance at weekly Sunday services of the Established Church. The penal laws in general were repealed in the early 19th-century due to the successful activism of Daniel O'Connell for Catholic Emancipation. Penal actions are civil in nature and were not English common law.
In 1553, following the death of her half-brother, Edward VI, and deposing his choice of successor, Lady Jane Grey, Mary I of England seized the throne and soon after repealed both the religious legislation of her half-brother and that of her father Henry VIII through the First Statute of Repeal (1 Mar. Sess. 2. c. 2), re-establishing the Roman Catholic Church as official in England, Wales, and Ireland.
Mary I established an English inquisition[clarification needed] to identify and to coerce into conversion, force into exile, or prosecute persons not conforming to Roman Catholicism. During Mary I's five year reign, over 300 Protestant dissenters were labeled heretics and killed and many more were exiled, leading English Protestants to nickname the queen "Bloody Mary." A list of Protestant martyrs of the English Reformation was published soon after her death.
In 1570 Pope Pius V excommunicated Queen Elizabeth I, citing as his reasons heresy, Caesaropapism, and the religious persecution by the State of the illegal and underground Catholic Church in England and Wales, and in Ireland, by releasing the Papal bull Regnans in Excelsis. In response:
While some of the Penal Laws were much older, they took their most drastic shape during the reign of Charles II, especially the laws known as the Clarendon Code and the Test Act.
The four penal laws collectively known as Clarendon Code are named after Charles II's chief minister Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon, though Clarendon was neither their author nor fully in favour of them. These included:
Combined with the Test Act 1673 (25 Cha. 2. c. 2), the Corporation Act 1661 (13 Cha. 2 St. 2. c. 1) excluded all nonconformists from holding civil or military office, and prevented them from being awarded degrees by the universities of Cambridge and Oxford.
In the late 17th and 18th centuries, many non-conformist Protestants successfully evaded the political disabilities imposed by the Test Act by taking communion in the Church of England as required, while otherwise attending non-conformist meetings. High churchmen and Tories, empowered late in Queen Anne's reign, sought to close this loophole with the passing of the Occasional Conformity Bill in 1711, however the Act was repealed after the Hanoverian Succession with the return to power of the Whig political party, who were generally allied with non-conforming Protestants. This led, as well, to a systematic political purge of both real and suspected Tories.
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Penal law (British) AI simulator
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Penal law (British)
In English history, the penal laws were a series of laws that sought to enforce the State-decreed religious monopoly of the Church of England and, following the 1688 revolution, of Presbyterianism in Scotland, against the continued existence of illegal and underground communities of Catholics, nonjuring Anglicans, and Protestant nonconformists. The Penal laws also imposed various forfeitures, civil penalties, and civil disabilities upon recusants from mandatory attendance at weekly Sunday services of the Established Church. The penal laws in general were repealed in the early 19th-century due to the successful activism of Daniel O'Connell for Catholic Emancipation. Penal actions are civil in nature and were not English common law.
In 1553, following the death of her half-brother, Edward VI, and deposing his choice of successor, Lady Jane Grey, Mary I of England seized the throne and soon after repealed both the religious legislation of her half-brother and that of her father Henry VIII through the First Statute of Repeal (1 Mar. Sess. 2. c. 2), re-establishing the Roman Catholic Church as official in England, Wales, and Ireland.
Mary I established an English inquisition[clarification needed] to identify and to coerce into conversion, force into exile, or prosecute persons not conforming to Roman Catholicism. During Mary I's five year reign, over 300 Protestant dissenters were labeled heretics and killed and many more were exiled, leading English Protestants to nickname the queen "Bloody Mary." A list of Protestant martyrs of the English Reformation was published soon after her death.
In 1570 Pope Pius V excommunicated Queen Elizabeth I, citing as his reasons heresy, Caesaropapism, and the religious persecution by the State of the illegal and underground Catholic Church in England and Wales, and in Ireland, by releasing the Papal bull Regnans in Excelsis. In response:
While some of the Penal Laws were much older, they took their most drastic shape during the reign of Charles II, especially the laws known as the Clarendon Code and the Test Act.
The four penal laws collectively known as Clarendon Code are named after Charles II's chief minister Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon, though Clarendon was neither their author nor fully in favour of them. These included:
Combined with the Test Act 1673 (25 Cha. 2. c. 2), the Corporation Act 1661 (13 Cha. 2 St. 2. c. 1) excluded all nonconformists from holding civil or military office, and prevented them from being awarded degrees by the universities of Cambridge and Oxford.
In the late 17th and 18th centuries, many non-conformist Protestants successfully evaded the political disabilities imposed by the Test Act by taking communion in the Church of England as required, while otherwise attending non-conformist meetings. High churchmen and Tories, empowered late in Queen Anne's reign, sought to close this loophole with the passing of the Occasional Conformity Bill in 1711, however the Act was repealed after the Hanoverian Succession with the return to power of the Whig political party, who were generally allied with non-conforming Protestants. This led, as well, to a systematic political purge of both real and suspected Tories.