Harman’s Outrage: Day 2

Harriet Harman’s proposal for legislation designed to target a single person – Sir Fred Goodwin – who, whatever his other failings, has not yet been charged wth any crime, seem even more extraordinary today than they did yesterday. Daniel Hannan puts the matter into some historical context:

Harriet Harman is proposing that a law be introduced aimed at a specific individual, retrospectively to criminalise something that was legal at the time. Such laws were known mediaevally as Acts of Attainder: they declared someone guilty after the event, and with no trial. Attainder Bills were introduced very rarely, usually following a gross abuse of ministerial power or an open insurrection. The last Act of Attainder was passed against Lord Edward Fitzgerald after the failure if the United Irishmen rising of 1798. Since then, Britain has been governed more or less according to constitutional rule.