Repeal

Lore & Background

A repeal is the removal or reversal of a law, derived from the Old French *rapel*. In the United Kingdom and Ireland, the removal of secondary legislation is specifically termed revocation. Repeals can be partial, where only a specified provision of an act is removed while other parts remain in force, or full, where an entire act is abolished. A repeal may occur with a re-enactment, replacing the old law with an updated or amended version—common in consolidation bills or when modernizing legislation, such as the replacement of the Poor Laws in England with modern social welfare. Alternatively, a repeal without replacement is enacted when a law becomes ineffective or produces worse consequences than intended, often reflecting major societal shifts, as seen with the repeal of Jim Crow laws, the Corn Laws in England, or the repeal of Prohibition in the United States. Repeals can be express, using explicit language in a new statute—as is standard in the United States, where Congress must pass a new law deleting the codified text from the U.S. Code—or implied, where a later statute is inconsistent with an earlier one, thereby repealing it *pro tanto*. Repeals may also include savings provisions, which preserve the effect of the repealed law for limited purposes, such as maintaining rights granted under it. Under English common law, a repealed statute was once considered obliterated from parliamentary records, though this is now subject to savings under the Interpretation Act 1978. In parliamentary procedure, a motion to rescind or annul is used to cancel a previously adopted action.

Reader's Guide

Repeal is a fundamental mechanism in legal systems for updating or removing laws. It can be express, where explicit words in a statute repeal an earlier one, or implied, where two statutes are mutually inconsistent and the later statute repeals the earlier one pro tanto. In the United States, all repeals of parts of the U.S. Code are express, requiring Congress to pass a new law containing repeal language. Repeals can be with or without savings; a repeal without savings eliminates the repealed statute completely, while a repeal with savings preserves its effect for limited purposes. In parliamentary procedure, the motion to rescind, repeal, or annul requires a two-thirds vote, a majority vote with previous notice, or a vote of a majority of the entire membership under Robert's Rules of Order, while The Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure requires only the same vote and notice as the original action.

Did You Know?

• The repeal of a statute under common law of England and Wales was said to 'obliterate it completely from the records of Parliament as though it had never been passed.'
• The Twenty-first Amendment to the U.S. Constitution repealed the Eighteenth Amendment, making it the only constitutional amendment ever repealed in the United States.
• A repeal without replacement is generally done when a law is no longer effective or has far more negative consequences than originally envisioned.

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