Subsequent History of The Riot Act in The UK
The Riot Act caused unfortunate confusion during the Gordon Riots of 1780, when the authorities felt uncertain of their power to take action to stop the riots without a reading of the Riot Act. After the riots, Lord Mansfield observed that the Riot Act did not take away the pre-existing power of the authorities to use force to stop a violent riot; it only created the additional offence of failing to disperse after a reading of the Riot Act.
The death penalty created by sections 1 and 4 and 5 of the Act was reduced to transportation for life by section 1 of the Punishment of Offences Act (1837).
The Riot Act drifted into disuse. The last time it was definitely read in the United Kingdom was in Birkenhead on 3 August 1919, during the second police strike when large numbers of police officers from Birkenhead, Liverpool and Bootle joined the strike. Troops were called in to deal with rioting and looting that sprang up, and a magistrate read out the Riot Act. None of the rioters subsequently faced the charge of a statutory felony. Earlier in the same year, at the battle of George Square on 31 January, in Glasgow, the city's sheriff was in the process of reading the Riot Act to a crowd of 90,000 – when the sheet of paper he was reading from was ripped out of his hands by one of the rioters. However, it was claimed to be read at a bonfire in the village of Chiddingfold, Surrey, in 1929.
The Act was repealed on 18 July 1973 for the United Kingdom by the Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1973 (by which time riot was no longer punishable by death).
Read more about this topic: Riot Act
Famous quotes containing the words subsequent, history, riot and/or act:
“... the outcome of the Clarence Thomas hearings and his subsequent appointment to the Supreme Court shows how misguided, narrow notions of racial solidarity that suppress dissent and critique can lead black folks to support individuals who will not protect their rights.”
—bell hooks (b. c. 1955)
“We don’t know when our name came into being or how some distant ancestor acquired it. We don’t understand our name at all, we don’t know its history and yet we bear it with exalted fidelity, we merge with it, we like it, we are ridiculously proud of it as if we had thought it up ourselves in a moment of brilliant inspiration.”
—Milan Kundera (b. 1929)
“The bowl will ensnare and enchant
men who crouch by the hearth
till they want
but the riot of stars in the night;
those who dwell far inland
will seek ships.”
—Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)
“The soul, which is the first principle of life, is not a body, but the act of a body; just as heat, which is the principle of calefaction, is not a body, but an act of a body.”
—Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225–1274)