Definition
The Nullum Tempus Act refers to the English statute 3 Geo. III, c. 16 (1769), which limited the Crown's right to bring suit to a period of sixty years. The Act took its popular name from the Latin maxim it was designed to abrogate: nullum tempus occurrit regi — "no time runs against the king" — meaning that ordinary statutes of limitation did not apply to the sovereign. By imposing a sixty-year cap on Crown suits, the Act introduced a form of temporal accountability for the government that had not previously existed in English law.
The underlying maxim had two common formulations:
1. Nullum tempus occurrit regi: No lapse of time bars the king. The principle rested on the legal fiction that the Crown is perpetually occupied with the cares of governance and therefore cannot be charged with laches.
2. Nullum tempus aut locus occurrit regi: No time or place affects the king. A broader statement encompassing both limitations of time and jurisdictional venue constraints.
A parallel maxim — nullum tempus occurrit reipublicae — extended the same immunity to the public or commonwealth, a formulation that became significant in American law as courts and legislatures applied the doctrine to state governments in the absence of a sovereign monarch.
Common Confusion
The Nullum Tempus Act is not itself the maxim nullum tempus occurrit regi — it is the statute that limits and partially overrides that maxim. Researchers encountering the phrase "nullum tempus" in historical sources must determine from context whether the reference is to the common law doctrine of Crown immunity from limitation statutes, to the 1769 English Act that curtailed it, or to the reipublicae variant applied to American state governments. The three concepts are closely related but legally distinct: the maxim asserts immunity, the Act imposes a limit on that immunity, and the reipublicae formulation extends analogous immunity to republics and states.
Why It Matters in Research
The principal research challenge with this term is jurisdictional and temporal fragmentation. In English sources, the Nullum Tempus Act refers specifically to 3 Geo. III, c. 16, and its successors, particularly 32 Geo. III, c. 58, and 7 Will. c. 3. American researchers must navigate carefully: the United States has no Crown, and the English statute has no direct federal or state equivalent by that name. However, the underlying doctrine — that statutes of limitation do not run against the sovereign — was transplanted into American jurisprudence through the reipublicae maxim and was litigated extensively in state courts throughout the nineteenth century.
Researchers working in American corpus materials will encounter the nullum tempus doctrine invoked by state attorneys general resisting limitations defenses, particularly in cases involving public lands, tax collection, and state debt recovery. State legislatures responded to this common law immunity unevenly: some codified limitations periods applicable to the state, effectively enacting their own "nullum tempus acts" by statute; others left the common law immunity intact. American legal dictionaries of the nineteenth century, including Bouvier and Rapalje, often treat the maxim and the Act together without flagging this jurisdictional gap, which can mislead researchers into assuming an English statutory scheme applies to American state practice.
A secondary trap: Burrill's citation of the statute as "9 Geo. III. c. 16" conflicts with the citation in Black's and Bouvier's, both of which give "3 Geo. III. c. 16." Burrill's citation appears to be a transcription error. Researchers relying on Burrill alone for citation purposes should verify against Black's or Bouvier's.
Finally, because the doctrine involves sovereign immunity and its limitations, corpus connections run to statutes of limitation generally, to Crown prerogative and its American analogues, and to the doctrine of laches as applied to governmental plaintiffs.
Historical Dictionary Support
The historical dictionaries are in agreement on the core function of the Act: it limited Crown suit to sixty years in derogation of the common law maxim. Black's Law Dictionary (both editions) and Bouvier's Law Dictionary are consistent in citing 3 Geo. III, c. 16 and characterizing the Act as a deliberate legislative override of the nullum tempus maxim. Bouvier additionally notes the successor statutes 32 Geo. III, c. 58 and 7 Will. c. 3, making Bouvier the most complete of the shelf sources for English statutory lineage.
Rapalje & Lawrence treat the Act briefly but usefully situate the underlying maxim in its doctrinal context, citing Chitty's Prerogative for the proposition that laches cannot be imputed to the sovereign — a point that remains essential for understanding why the Act was necessary at all.
Burrill, while substantively aligned, introduces the citation discrepancy noted above (9 Geo. III rather than 3 Geo. III) and should be treated with caution on the specific statutory reference. No historical dictionary in this set adequately addresses the American reipublicae variant or the uneven state-by-state reception of nullum tempus doctrine, which represents the most practically significant gap in the shelf sources for modern corpus researchers.
Jurisdictional Note
The Nullum Tempus Act of 1769 is an English statute with no direct American counterpart. In the United States, the underlying common law doctrine — that limitations statutes do not run against the sovereign — was received through the reipublicae maxim and applied variably to state governments. Many American states have since abrogated or modified the doctrine by statute, but the common law immunity survives in jurisdictions that have not expressly waived it. Federal sovereign immunity from limitations statutes is governed by separate statutory frameworks.