From One Protectorate To Another

"Moreover, after the Earl of Clarendon imprisoned numerous political prisoners offshore, Parliament responded with the Habeas Corpus Act, 1679, 31 Car. 2, c. 2 (1679 Act). The 1679 Act expressly clarified that the writ did extend overseas, including to Jersey and Guernsey where Clarendon and others (including Cromwell) had sent prisoners. Id. § XI; Administration of Justice During the Usurpation of the Government, 5 Corbett’s State Trials 935, 942 (1810) (“divers commoners of England had, by illegal warrants, been committed to prison into the islands of Jersey, and other the islands belonging to this Commonwealth”).

The 1679 Act also made it illegal to send detainees to “Parts, Garrisons, Islands or Places beyond the Seas, which are or at any time hereafter shall be within or without the Dominions of his Majesty.” 1679 Act, § XII. Parliament thus foreclosed detention in places where the writ may have been practically unenforceable, while confirming that it remained legally available in territories under the Crown’s control," - from the case LAKHDAR BOUMEDIENE, et al., Petitioners, v. GEORGE W. BUSH, et al.