Definition
A charter of pardon is a formal written instrument, historically issued under the great seal of the Crown, by which a sovereign grants forgiveness of a felony or other criminal offense to a named individual. The effect of the instrument was to discharge the recipient from criminal liability and, typically, from any attendant penalties, forfeitures, or legal disabilities flowing from the offense.
The term is primarily a historical one rooted in English law. Before modern executive clemency procedures replaced elaborate sealed instruments, a charter of pardon was the operative legal document through which the pardon power was exercised. Receiving such a charter did not erase the fact of the offense but lifted the legal consequences the Crown had the authority to remit.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): "Charter" in general usage refers to a document granting rights, powers, or privileges — as in a corporate charter or a charter of rights. "Pardon" in common usage means forgiveness, whether interpersonal or official.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): Webster's defines "charter" as "a written instrument, executed with usual forms, given as evidence of a grant, contract, or whatever is done between man and man" and "pardon" as "the act of remitting a penalty."
The compound term "charter of pardon" combines both senses in a way that is more specific and technical than either word suggests alone. A modern reader might understand the phrase loosely as "a document granting forgiveness," but the legal meaning is precisely tied to the formal mechanism of sovereign clemency — a sealed royal instrument with defined legal consequences including restoration of civil standing — not a general or informal forgiveness.
Common Confusion
Charter of pardon should not be confused with charter party (a shipping contract) despite sharing the word "charter." The terms occupy entirely different branches of law. Researchers encountering "charter" in historical sources must identify context before assuming either meaning.
The term also should not be conflated with a general pardon (a pardon extended to a class of offenders, often by statute or proclamation) or with a nolle prosequi (a prosecutorial decision not to proceed). A charter of pardon was a specific, individual, sealed instrument — its formal nature distinguished it from other acts of clemency in both procedure and legal effect.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in early English criminal law records, colonial legal materials, or pre-modern common law sources will encounter this term as the standard instrument of executive clemency. Its significance in primary sources lies not in what it says but in what it does: a charter of pardon in a court record typically marks the conclusion of criminal proceedings through clemency rather than acquittal or conviction, and its presence explains otherwise puzzling gaps in punishment records.
The term drops out of practical American legal usage after independence. The American constitutional pardon power — vested in the President under Article II and in state governors under their respective constitutions — evolved away from sealed-instrument formalism. Modern pardons are still formal documents but the specific term "charter of pardon" is not used. Researchers examining American sources after the late eighteenth century will rarely find the phrase, though the underlying concept persists under different vocabulary.
A research trap in historical sources: the word "charter" alone sometimes appears in abbreviated records without clarifying it is a charter of pardon rather than, for example, a charter of liberties or a corporate charter. The Latin form charta perdonationis (preserved in Burrill) is more diagnostically precise and may appear in Latin-language court rolls or legal Latin sources where the English phrase does not.
The term connects materially to related doctrines: the effect of a pardon on civil disabilities, the question of what a pardon could and could not remit (including private civil claims), and the distinction between a pardon of course and a pardon under special circumstances — all live questions in both historical English law and ongoing American clemency jurisprudence.
Historical Dictionary Support
The three source dictionaries are in substantial agreement. Black's, Bouvier's, and Burrill's all define a charter of pardon as a sealed instrument under the great seal granting forgiveness of a felony or other offense. This uniformity reflects that the term was well-settled and not contested at the time these dictionaries were compiled.
Burrill adds the most value among the three by preserving the Latin form charta or carta perdonationis, which is useful for researchers working in Latin legal sources, early Year Books, or Plea Rolls. Bouvier's simply cross-references Black's, offering no independent analysis. Black's treatment, while brief, is authoritative for the period.
What all three sources omit — and what modern researchers need — is any account of the practical legal effects of the charter: whether it operated automatically upon delivery, what pleading was required in court to give it effect, or how courts treated pardons that were defective in form. Those questions are addressed in historical treatises and in the Year Book literature rather than in these dictionaries.
Jurisdictional Note
The charter of pardon is an institution of English law and has no direct American statutory or constitutional equivalent by name. American pardon practice descends from the English model in principle but shed the specific sealed-instrument formalism. Researchers working in jurisdictions that were English colonies will encounter this term in Crown records, pardon rolls, and colonial court documents; it does not appear as operative terminology in post-independence American legal materials.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Clemency, Pardon, and Commutation — The Law Mind Criminal Law Encyclopedia
The Pardon Power: Scope, Limitations, and Self-Pardons — The Law Mind Constitutional Law Encyclopedia