Talk:Treason Act 1708

Forging seals

Section 31 of the Forgery Act 1830 repealed "so much of [the Treason Act 1708] as relates to counterfeiting Her Majesty's Seals, appointed by the Twenty-fourth Article of the Union to be kept, used and continued in Scotland..."(Googlebooks, p.415) (but this did not apply in Scotland: section 29). Forging the seals was still treason in England and Wales under section 2 of the 1830 Act, but this was repealed by the Forgery Act 1861, which abolished this as a category of treason. Richard75 (talk) 16:48, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Richard, I'd first like to thank you for explaining your revert on this talk page. According to my source (which is the official online legislation database provided by the National Archives at www.legislation.gov.uk), section 12 of the Treason Act 1708 is still in force in England and Wales and Scotland. I see from the text of the 1830 Forgery Act (thanks for the Googlebooks link) that section 12 of the 1708 Act - counterfeiting of the Royal Seals in Scotland - was repealed in England and Wales by section 31 of the Forgery Act. It is possible that the current version of the 1708 Act on the National Archive site is erroneous, but I think this bears further investigation.

The Forgery Act 1861 does not explicitly abolish any category of treason, but does indeed make the forgery of Royal Seals a felony as stated in the article. (Perhaps the article ought to also note that this provision was itself repealed in 1913.) The introduction to the 1861 Act describes it as "An Act to consolidate and amend the Statute Law ... relating; to ... Forgery.", but not Treason. The question of whether or not making an offence a felony necessarily disqualifies it from being (high) treason is a complex one. The author of this commentary [1] seemed rather certain, but I don’t know what his authority was.

In conclusion, I can understand your position now that I have seen the text of the 1830 Act (which is not available on the legislation.gov.uk site). There seems to have been a great deal of re-defining of treason and the crimes it encompasses in the nineteenth century (see e.g. the Treason Felony Act 1848). Since I’m not qualified to comment on the implications of the 1861 Forgery Act for the forging and counterfeiting of Royal Seals, I will no longer dispute the article text. I accept your revert and wish to thank you for dealing with the matter so promptly. Alfrew (talk) 22:54, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

You're welcome. To clarify, the 1861 Act repealed the 1830 Act, so there was no longer legislation remaining in England and Wales still making it treason to forge seals, that's all. Richard75 (talk) 23:05, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

PS: the author you cite above says in Part V chapter 3 (page 637) that "the forgery of the Queen's seals is now reduced from treason to felony." Richard75 (talk) 09:18, 17 June 2013 (UTC)