Habeas Corpus Act 1679

The statute that fortified the great writ against unlawful detention

Overview

Parliament passed the Habeas Corpus Act to stop courts and jailers evading the ancient writ through procedural games, imposing strict timelines and penalties for defying judges who demanded a prisoner be produced. It hardened the guarantee that detention must be justified before a court, at a moment of fierce struggle over the succession and political prosecutions. Suspension of the act became the marker of emergencies, debated from the Napoleonic wars to the world wars. Its principle traveled into the American Constitution and dozens of founding instruments.