Everything about Royal Marriages Act 1772 totally explained
The
Royal Marriages Act of 1772 is an
Act of the
Parliament of Great Britain (12 Geo III c. 11) which made it illegal for any member of the British royal family (defined as all descendants of King
George II, excluding descendants of princesses who marry "into foreign families") under the age of 25 to marry without the consent of the ruling monarch. Any member of the Royal Family over the age of 25 who has been refused the sovereign's consent may marry one year after giving notice to the
Privy Council of their intention to so marry, unless Parliament passes an act against the marriage in the interim.
The Act further made it a crime to perform or participate in an illegal marriage of any member of the Royal Family. This provision was repealed by the
Criminal Law Act 1967. The 1772 Act resulted from the 1771 marriage of
Prince Henry Frederick, Duke of Cumberland, brother of
George III to the commoner
Lady Anne Houghton, a woman George III considered unsuitable.
Couples affected by the Act through history
As the result of the Act, the 1785 marriage of
George IV, then heir to the throne, to
Maria Anne Fitzherbert (a Catholic widow) was deemed illegal; without the Royal Marriages Act, it's possible that the marriage could have excluded George from the throne under the
Act of Settlement 1701.
Other cases included the refusal of Queen Victoria to recognise the marriage of the
second Duke of Cambridge, and
Sarah Louisa Fairbrother (titled "Mrs FitzGeorge" rather than "Duchess of Cambridge").
Augustus, Duke of Sussex, sixth son of
George III of Great Britain, undertook two successive marriages against the provisions of the Act, thus being invalid on British soil. However, his second marriage with
Letitia Underwood was tolerated by Queen Victoria who created her Duchess of Inverness in her own right (as she couldn't legally be styled "Duchess of Sussex"). The Duke and Duchess cohabited, being socially regarded as spouses.
The provisions of the law were used to frustrate the romance of
Princess Margaret (who was then under age 25) with Group Captain
Peter Townsend.
His Majesty's Declaration of Abdication Act 1936 specifically excluded
Edward VIII from the provisions of the Royal Marriages Act upon his abdication, allowing him to marry the divorcee,
Wallis Simpson.
Broad effects
Court precedents determine that the provisions of this Act are personal, that is, they apply to those covered by the requirement of Royal Consent even if they contract marriage outside of the United Kingdom. The effects of the law, not always foreseen, remain very much in force. An example is seen in the royal House of Hanover, which descends from
Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, a younger son of King
George III, who inherited the crown of Hanover according to its semi-
Salic order of succession when the British crown went to his niece,
Victoria. Despite the fact that his descendants lost their royal crown in 1866, and their royal titles in 1918, as male-line descendants of George II they continue to seek permission for their marriages from the British monarch.
Thus, on
11 January 1999, Queen
Elizabeth II issued the following
Order-in-Council: "My Lords, I do hereby declare My Consent to a Contract of Matrimony between His Royal Highness Prince
Ernst August Albert of Hanover, Duke of
Brunswick-Lüneburg and Her Serene Highness
Princess Caroline Louise Marguerite of Monaco...". Without the
Royal Assent, the marriage would have been void in Britain, where the groom's family continues to own substantial property and retains the
right to petition for resumption of the
Duchy of Cumberland, suspended since
World War I (likewise, the
Monégasque court officially notified
France of Caroline's contemplated marriage to Prince Ernst August and received assurance that there was no objection, in compliance with the 1918 Franco-Monégasque Treaty).
By marrying a
Roman Catholic Ernst August forfeited his remote place in Britain's order of succession. But the couple's daughter,
Princess Alexandra of Hanover, born in 1999 and a Protestant, remains bound by both
Monaco's dynastic
house law, which requires prior consent of the reigning Prince for valid marriage, and by Britain's Royal Marriages Act, even though she's approximately #399 in the
Line of succession to the British Throne, whereas she's fifth in Monaco's
order of succession.
All European
monarchies, and many non-European
realms, have laws or traditions requiring prior approval of the monarch for members of the reigning
dynasty to marry. But Britain's is unusual because it hasn't been modified since originally adopted, so that its
ambit has grown rather wide, affecting not only Britain's immediate Royal Family, but more distant relatives of the monarch. Moreover, its purview is growing: Whereas in the past British princesses usually married into foreign dynasties thereby exempting their descendants from the Act, most now marry fellow Britons so that their children become subject in turn to the Act's restrictions, as do their Protestant descendants who marry Britons, and so on potentially without limit. Nor is the law's application confined to those that bear the official style of "princess". For purposes of the Act, that term is deemed to include any legitimate female descendant of George III, since each inherits a claim on the British crown, unless excluded by the Act itself.
Farran exemption
In the 1950s,
Charles Farran theorised that the current act can no longer apply to anyone still living, because all members of the current immediate royal family are arguably descendants of British princesses who married into foreign families.
Due to the inter-marriages common among dynasties, many of George II's descendants in female lines have married back into the British royal family. In particular, the current sovereign and other members of the
House of Windsor descend (through
Queen Alexandra), from as many as two princesses — (
Mary of Great Britain, Landgravine of Hesse and
Louise of Great Britain, Queen of Denmark — who were daughters of George II that married foreign rulers (respectively
Frederick II, Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel, and King
Frederick V of Denmark). This so-called "Farran exemption" hasn't been tested in the courts. Rather, consent to marriages in the Royal Family (including the distantly related and now dethroned
House of Hanover) continues to be sought and granted as if none of the male-line descendants of George II were also his descendants in the female line.
The "Farran exemption" theory is further complicated by the fact that all of the
Protestant descendants of the
Electress Sophia of Hanover, foremother of the United Kingdom's monarchs since 1714, have been entitled to British citizenship pursuant to the
Sophia Naturalization Act 1705 if born prior to 1948, when the act was repealed. Thus, some marriages of British princesses to
continental monarchs and princes were not, in law, marriages to foreigners. For example, the
heiress presumptive Princess Elizabeth's 1947 wedding to
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh who was, by birth, a Greek and Danish prince but who descends from Electress Sophia, would have been a marriage to a British subject even if he hadn't previously undergone the redundant process of being
naturalised in Britain. Theoretically this means, for example, that the entire present royal family of Norway is bound by Britain's Royal Marriages Act because the wedding of
Princess Maud, a daughter of King
Edward VII, to the future King
Haakon VII of Norway, was a marriage to a "British subject", since Haakon descended from the Electress Sophia. It is possible that there are other descendants of George II and/or the Electress Sophia similarly encompassed, at least in theory, by the "Farran exemption" (for example ex-King
Constantine II of Greece).
Canada
The Act is considered a part of Canadian law, although decisions under the Act are deferred to the United Kingdom Privy Council.
Proposal to repeal
The
Succession to the Crown Bill, a private member's bill, presented to the UK Parliament on
December 9,
2004, would have repealed this act in its entirety. However, the bill was withdrawn
January 15,
2005 by its sponsor after being told by the government that the bill would be blocked.
Other legislation
The
Regency Act 1830, which provided for a regency in the event that
Queen Victoria inherited the throne before she was eighteen, made it illegal for her to marry without the regent's consent. Her spouse and anyone involved in arranging or conducting the marriage without such consent would be guilty of
high treason. This was more serious than the offence created by the Act of 1772, which was equivalent to
praemunire. However the Act never came into force as Victoria was over eighteen when she became queen.
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