CORPORATION ACT

Definition

The Corporation Act refers specifically to the English statute 13 Car. II, St. 2, c. 1 (1661), enacted during the reign of Charles II. The Act required that no person could be elected to office in any corporate town unless that person had, within the preceding year, received the sacrament of the Lord's Supper according to the rites of the Church of England. Officers so elected were also required to take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy. The Act was a central instrument of religious conformity in Restoration England, effectively barring nonconformists — Protestant Dissenters, Catholics, and others outside the established Church — from municipal public office. The term does not refer to a general law governing the formation or operation of corporations in the modern sense. It is a proper name for a specific historical English statute.

Common Confusion

The phrase "Corporation Act" is easily mistaken for modern corporate formation legislation — the kind of statute that authorizes incorporation, defines corporate powers, or regulates corporate governance. That is not what this term means in historical legal sources. A researcher encountering "Corporation Act" in a 17th- or 18th-century English legal text should understand it as religious test legislation, not business law. The confusion is compounded by the fact that later American and Commonwealth jurisdictions enacted statutes colloquially called "corporation acts" that do govern business entities. Context and date are essential to accurate identification.

Why It Matters in Research

The Corporation Act is almost exclusively relevant to researchers working in English constitutional history, ecclesiastical law, or the history of civil disabilities based on religious nonconformity. It belongs to a cluster of Restoration-era statutes — alongside the Act of Uniformity (1662), the Conventicle Act, and the Five Mile Act — collectively known as the Clarendon Code. Researchers studying this period should understand the Corporation Act as one piece of that coordinated legislative scheme, not an isolated text. For corpus researchers, the principal trap is terminological: "Corporation Act" in 17th- and 18th-century sources invariably means this statute. In 19th- and 20th-century sources, particularly American ones, "corporation act" shifts to denote general incorporation legislation. Failing to recognize this shift will produce category errors in any comparative or longitudinal research project. The Act was repealed by the Roman Catholic Relief Act of 1829 (10 Geo. IV, c. 7), which dismantled the main structure of religious test requirements for public office in England, though the broader framework had already been substantially undermined by annual Indemnity Acts passed from 1727 onward that effectively suspended enforcement against Dissenters in practice. Researchers should be aware that the Act's practical significance diverged from its formal legal status for over a century before repeal — a distinction that matters when reading period commentary. The Act has no operative American equivalent and no direct role in U.S. corporate law. References to it in American legal sources are invariably historical or comparative.

Historical Dictionary Support

The three source dictionaries are in close agreement on the substance of this entry. All three identify the statute as 13 Car. II and describe the sacramental test requirement for municipal office-holders. Black's second edition adds the oath of allegiance and supremacy requirement, which is a useful supplement and consistent with Rapalje & Lawrence's citation to Blackstone's Commentaries (4 Bl. Com. 58). None of the historical dictionaries situates the Act within the broader Clarendon Code framework, and none addresses the practical suspension of the Act through annual Indemnity Acts. For a researcher relying solely on these dictionary entries, the Act can appear to have been an operative constraint for the full period between 1661 and 1829, which understates how substantially nonconformists were accommodated in practice by the 18th century. Blackstone's Commentaries provide fuller context and should be consulted alongside the dictionary sources.

Jurisdictional Note

The Corporation Act is an English statute with no operative jurisdiction outside England and Wales. It was never received into American law. Researchers working in Scottish, Irish, or Commonwealth legal history should note that parallel but distinct religious test legislation applied in those jurisdictions.

Encyclopedia Cross-Reference

The Corporation Act is not a business formation statute and does not connect naturally to modern corporate law topics. For background on how corporations — as legal entities — were understood and formally constituted in later periods, the following Law Mind Business Organizations & Corporate Law Encyclopedia entries provide relevant context: - Corporate Formation — Corporate Purpose, Powers, and Ultra Vires Doctrine (business_39) - Corporate Formation — Corporate Types (Close, Professional, Benefit Corporations) (business_43) These entries address the corporate law tradition that eventually developed independently of religious-test legislation, and may be useful for understanding how far the modern concept of a "corporation act" has traveled from the Restoration-era statute.

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