Five Mile Act 1665
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| Five Mile Act 1665 | |
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| Name | Five Mile Act 1665 |
| Enacted by | Parliament of England |
| Long title | An Act for restraining Nonconformists from inhabiting in Corporations and Market Towns |
| Year | 1665 |
| Citation | 17 Cha. 2 c. 2 |
| Royal assent | 1665 |
| Repealed by | Toleration Act 1689 (partially), Occasional Conformity Act 1711 (contextual) |
| Status | repealed |
Five Mile Act 1665 The Five Mile Act 1665 was an English statute enacted by the Parliament of England under the reign of Charles II of England to restrict the movements and activities of clergy and laymen of the Puritan and broader Nonconformist communities following the Restoration of the monarchy. Passed in the aftermath of the Act of Uniformity 1662 and the Conventicle Act 1664, it formed part of the Clarendon Code, alongside statutes associated with figures such as Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon and political forces including the Cavalier Parliament.
Background and legislative context
The Act followed expulsions enforced by the Act of Uniformity 1662 which affected ministers ejected during the Great Ejection and related episodes involving clergy like Richard Baxter, John Owen, and George Fox. Debates in the Cavalier Parliament drew on incidents from the English Civil War era, the influence of proponents such as Edward Hyde, and fears raised by events like the Peyton's plot-era anxieties and the ongoing fallout from the Anglo-Dutch Wars. The statute must be seen in the sequence of laws known as the Clarendon Code, which included the Corporation Act 1661, the Conventicle Act 1664, and the Act of Uniformity 1662, and responded to pressures from factions such as the Tory landed interest and clerical authorities aligned with William Sancroft and Gilbert Sheldon.
Provisions of the Act
The Five Mile Act prohibited ejected ministers and other specified persons from coming within five miles of any corporate town or any place where they had formerly served, unless they swore an oath of non-resistance to Charles II of England and promised not to attempt to alter the laws of church or state. It required affected individuals to swear to the validity of the Book of Common Prayer and to refuse to exercise ministry without episcopal license from figures like John Bramhall. The statute named categories of people including ministers ejected under the Act of Uniformity 1662, graduates of universities such as University of Oxford and University of Cambridge who had taken part in dissent, and laypersons involved in informal assemblies associated with leaders like Henry Vane the Younger and Oliver Cromwell.
Enforcement and penalties
Enforcement relied on local magistrates, sheriffs, and justices of the peace, often connected to bodies such as the Commission of the Peace. Penalties for violation included fines and imprisonment, with citation processes initiated by complainants drawn from institutions such as municipal corporations, guilds like the Worshipful Company of Merchant Taylors, or episcopal officials including bishops of Canterbury and London. The statute intersected with prosecutions under the Conventicle Act 1664 and was implemented unevenly in jurisdictions influenced by figures like Sir Matthew Hale and Sir Henry Vane the Elder; enforcement varied between counties such as Lancashire, Kent, and Yorkshire and was subject to political influence from patrons like Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury.
Impact on Nonconformists and society
The Act intensified pressures on Presbyterians, Baptists, Congregationalists, and other dissenting groups led by ministers such as Thomas Goodwin and lay organizers like John Bunyan. It disrupted networks anchored in market towns and corporate boroughs including Guildford, Ipswich, and Colchester, impeding itinerant preaching and altering the social composition of parishes. Consequences were felt in institutions such as the Royal Society when members sympathetic to dissent were marginalized, in academic circuits at Dartmouth College (colonial linkages) and within civic life affected by magistrates and aldermen allied with episcopal authorities like George Morley. The statute contributed to migration patterns, prompting some dissenters to emigrate to colonies like New England and Pennsylvania while others adapted by forming clandestine assemblies in rural districts such as Sussex and Devonshire.
Political and religious consequences
Politically, the Five Mile Act reinforced the alignment of Tory interests with the established church and exacerbated tensions with emergent Whig-aligned figures and dissenting allies including the East India Company’s merchant networks that sometimes sheltered Nonconformists. It fueled activism by ministers and laymen in pamphlet wars alongside writers like John Milton’s legacy and polemicists such as Roger L’Estrange and influenced subsequent legislation including the Test Act 1673. Religion in England continued to polarize around episcopal authorities represented by Gilbert Sheldon and dissenting leaders such as Richard Baxter, and the Act shaped the politics of toleration debated in the later careers of statesmen like William III of England and James II of England.
Repeal and legacy
Partial repeal and the loosening of penalties occurred through shifts including the Glorious Revolution and the passage of the Toleration Act 1689, although full relief for many Nonconformists required further legal change across the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, involving measures like the Catholic Emancipation debates and the Religious Disabilities Act movements. The Five Mile Act left a legal and cultural legacy reflected in later reforms associated with figures such as John Stuart Mill and William Gladstone, and in historiography produced by scholars at institutions like University of Cambridge and University of Oxford examining the period of the Restoration and the long-term evolution of religious toleration in Britain.