Statute Law Revision Acts

Statute Law Revision Acts. A number of general Acts were passed from the year 1861 to 1927 inclusive, for the purpose of expressly and specifically repealing Acts or parts of Acts which had been either impliedly repealed by subsequent statutes on the ground that leges posteriores priores contrarias abrogant, or which (see the preambles to the various Acts) 'might be regarded as spent, or had by lapse of time or otherwise become unnecessary' from various causes, or had become obsolete, and also partly with the view of clearing the way for two editions of 'Statutes Revised,' that is, statutes in force only, as distinguished from the 'Statutes at Large,' or statutes just as they are passed. In 1890, as explained in an Introductory Note to vol. 4 of the 2nd edition of the Revised Statutes, a Select Committee of the House of Commons considered the subject of statute law revision, and recommended the omission from the Revised Statutes of 'any preambles' [but see that title] 'to an act, or introductory words to a s., which though not dead were practically inoperative'; and the two Statute Law Revision Acts of that year, which repeal such matter for the first time, authorize the insertion in the Revised Statutes of such brief statements as such omission may render necessary. See ACT OF PARLIAMENT.