Tracy Neal of the NZ Herald reports - under 'Court action follows Tasman couple’s refusal to pay rates based on 1649 proclamation' (5 July) - on a pseudolaw argument by Robert (Dave) and Janis (Jan) Richardson in refusing to pay rates.
The Richardsons modestly argue the Local Government Rating Act 2002 (NZ) is invalid because “all statutes in New Zealand were Ultra Vires” (unlawful) and that the court has no jurisdiction, thus providing a letter stating “Thank you for your invitation to appear in court but we decline your offer”. The couple designated the land as allodial, reportedly claiming absolute ownership of the land and not being bound by any law.
The Herald reports
The Richardsons claimed in a letter sent to the council’s rates team in December, which was read out in court, that on January 30, 1649 – the day on which Charles I was beheaded in the Tower of London, an Act of Parliament was passed “prohibiting the proclamation of any person as King of England, Ireland or the Dominions”.
I note that Charles was not beheaded in the Tower.
The Richardsons reportedly believe that the Act mean every monarch proclaimed after the execution of Charles I was “a traitor to the Parliament of England and subsequently New Zealand”. On that basis the Governor General supposedly signed the Rating Act “on behalf of the treasonous Queen Elizabeth II of England”, and in doing so, became a traitor to New Zealand’s Parliament, which made the Act ultra vires. Further, “persons working under the purported authority of the illegal Act” acted in bad faith and may be liable for criminal or civil action.
It is unclear what that action would involve, given that all statute law in NZ since British settlement would supposedly be ultra vires
The Herald notes
Judge Zohrab noted their challenge to the court’s jurisdiction curiously relied on District Court rules, which were a product of statute.
“Surprisingly, given they maintain all statutes are unlawful they then purport to rely on the Local Government Act, the Crimes Act, Imperial Laws Application Act, and the Criminal Procedures Act,” Judge Zohrab said.
Meanwhile 'The Travels of Treason' by Michael Lobban in Modern Law Review (online July 2023) comments
The law of treason has been criticised for being based on ‘outdated’ statutes which are inflexible and unsuitable for modern needs. However, a historical examination of the evolution of treason in Britain and its empire suggests that the law was often adaptable. In nineteenth century England, jurists wished to rein in older constructive treasons, to leave the 1351 Act as the appropriate law for wartime treasons, while the more lenient 1848 Act was to be used against ‘political’ conspiracies to subvert the state by force. However, the ‘constructive’ treasons remained part of the law, and were given new life in imperial contexts. In Ireland and Canada, the idea that plotting the king's ‘political’ death was treason remained central to understandings of the 1351 Act. In India, the interpretation of the provision of the penal code against ‘waging war’ against the government was influenced by old English ideas of ‘constructive’ treason and used against those who challenged British rule. Imperial understandings of treason were also shaped by cases arising out of the Boer war, where the underlying law was Roman-Dutch law. Rather than being restrictive and unable to adapt to modern needs, the law of treason was flexible and malleable.
The law of treason has attracted a good deal of attention in recent years. Much of it has focused on the fact that the basis of the law remains a statute of 1351 which codified the medieval law of treason. At the heart of the offence is the betrayal of one's allegiance to one's king. This statute defines three central manifestations of treason: compassing and imagining the king's death; levying war against the king in his realm; and giving aid and comfort to the king's enemies, either in his realm or elsewhere. A number of modern critics have argued that the ‘obscure and difficult’ language of this statute makes it hard to apply to contemporary situations, and have called for a reform of the law to modernise it. Treasonable offences can also be punished under the 1848 Treason Felony Act. Under this statute, a term of life imprisonment can be imposed on anyone who ‘within the United Kingdom or without’ shall ‘compass imagine devise or intend’ to ‘deprive or depose’ the monarch ‘from the style, honour, or royal name of the imperial crown of the United Kingdom’. A similar sentence can be imposed on those who conspire to use force to compel a change of policy or to overawe parliament, as well as on those who stir up any foreigner or stranger to invade. Although often overlooked, this legislation has also been subject to criticism. In 2003 Lord Steyn described it as ‘a relic of a bygone age’ which ‘does not fit into the fabric of our modern legal system.’ Such comments seem to suggest that the English law of treason is archaic, unworkable and in need of reform. The 1381 Act is often seen as unusable because it is too narrow and restrictive in its formulation, while the 1848 Act is seen as being too broad to be applied in practice.
Given the repeated recent calls to revisit or reform the law of treason, this article seeks to enrich our understanding of it by offering a historical re-examination of the evolution of treason in Britain and its empire from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. It shows that the law of treason was more adaptable and flexible than is sometimes assumed, and that it operated differently in different parts of the empire. It will be seen that in Britain, the law of treason was developed in the mid-nineteenth century in a way to provide distinct tools (with distinct penalties) for different kinds of offences against the state. From the late eighteenth century onwards, attempts were made to rein in the reach of the medieval statute – which had been expanded by judges in the early modern era to cover a wide range of ‘constructive’ treasons, including political offences which did not threaten the life of the king – in order to make it primarily a legal tool to use in times of war. The legislation of 1848 was developed to provide a lesser penalty for political treasons. Despite its broad wording, the Treason Felony Act was not intended to facilitate the prosecution of newspaper editors seeking constitutional reform (or the abolition of the monarchy) but was aimed at Irish Republicans wishing to obtain a change of government policy by force. This was to adapt the law of treason in a changing political society in which the franchise was expanding and space was increasingly allowed for political protest, at least of a non-violent kind. However, as shall be seen, the law of treason was not limited to England. In an age of imperial expansion, questions were asked about what constituted treason beyond metropolitan shores. Both the medieval and Victorian statutes were applied elsewhere in the empire, but the way in which they were applied, and the meanings attributed to them could vary according to context. Within the empire, the law of treason might be used in far less liberal ways than was the case at the metropole; and ways which might, in turn, exert an influence on how the English saw their own law.
