Writ of Summons

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Writ of Summons is a term from English and British nobility law. It refers to a writ that allows a peer to sit in parliament. Members of the House of Lords cannot take their seats until they have received their written summons. Each eligible peer will receive such an invitation prior to the meeting of each parliament.

history

The English parliament goes back to the council of the English king ( Curia Regis ). From the 13th century onwards, English nobles, whose council the king wished, received a written invitation to attend the regular meetings of the royal council. As far as the invitee not already held a peer title, this form justified the invitation, called writ of summons for the invitees a hereditary barony , called hereditary peer and gradually a right, besides the bishops and the aristocracy, the Earls on to attend the council meetings of the king. This right was also preserved in the 14th century when the royal council was divided into the upper house and lower house , with the upper house consisting of the high clerical dignitaries (archbishops, bishops and abbots) and secular dignitaries (dukes, earls and barons, later also the newly introduced marquesses and viscounts), while the representatives of the counties and selected cities, elected by a few eligible voters, gathered in the lower house.

Baronies by writ

Since the king was free to appoint men of his confidence to his council or to the upper house, writs of summons were repeatedly given to persons chosen by the king in the following two centuries, who thereby became hereditary barons and members of the upper house. It was not until the 15th century that the king also appointed people to barons through letters of nobility (by letters patent ). The difference between the two forms of baronies was that baronies by letters patent could only be passed on to male descendants, while baronies by writ could also pass to female heirs, but only ever to one. If there were several daughters, the barony fell into a dormant state ( Abeyance ), which could only be ended when there was only one or one entitled descendant or the king chose one from the number of entitled heirs and sent him a writ of summons and so the dormant barony restituted (called call out of abeyance). Originally there were only baronies by writes, but from the 16th century onwards the number of barons created by letters patent increased until the creation of baronies by writes came to a complete standstill at the beginning of the 18th century. The last barony by writ was the Barony Percy , created in 1722 for Algernon Seymour , who later became the 7th Duke of Somerset.

Writ of Acceleration

A special variant of the Writ of Summons is the so-called Writ of Acceleration (also writ in acceleration ). Here the eldest son and title heir ( Heir Apparent ) of a peer who holds several titles is asked by Writ of Summons to a seat in the upper house to take under a subordinate title of his father, which he inherits prematurely. This first happened in 1482 when Thomas FitzAlan , son of William FitzAlan, 16th Earl of Arundel , 6th Baron Maltravers, inherited his father as 7th Baron Maltravers ; when his father died in 1487, he also inherited his remaining title as 17th Earl of Arundel . Most recently, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, Viscount Cranborne , before he inherited his father as the 7th Marquess of Salisbury on the death of his father in 2003 , was appointed to the House of Lords on April 29, 1992 by Writ of Acceleration as the 13th Baron Cecil . Writs of Acceleration have not been practiced since the House of Lords Act 1999 , as hereditary titles no longer entitle them to a seat in the House of Lords.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Glossary entry Writ of summons at parliament.uk
  2. ^ The London Gazette : No. 52911, p. 7756 , May 5, 1992.