10 Laws Written for Exactly One Person

Most laws are supposed to apply broadly, to citizens, companies, or at least some recognizable category of people. But every now and then, a government has skipped that step entirely and written legislation with one particular person already in mind.

These are not hypothetical examples or strange local ordinances that technically affect only one resident. They are real acts of parliaments, legislatures, and governments that singled out an individual by name, or so precisely that there was never much doubt about who was being targeted. Some were designed to take away property. Some stripped people of power or rights. Some ended with an execution. One, rather more pleasantly, ended with a pension.

There is even a name for the nastier version of this practice: a bill of attainder, in which a legislature effectively punishes a person without the usual process of a judicial trial. The U.S. Constitution eventually banned the practice at both the federal and state levels, partly because history had already demonstrated exactly what could happen when a legislature decided it was also a courtroom.

The following laws show what happens when governments stop writing rules for everyone and start writing them for that one person they really, really have something to say to.

Related: 10 Unbelievable Times Laws Had Unintended Consequences

10 Athens Fines a Playwright for Making the Audience Cry

In 494 BC, the Persian army captured Miletus after crushing the Ionian Revolt. The city had been an ally of Athens, which had helped support the rebellion, so the catastrophe was still painfully fresh when the playwright Phrynichus decided to turn it into a tragedy.

Soon afterward, he staged The Capture of Miletus. According to Herodotus, the audience was reduced to tears. Normally, making an entire theater cry would be considered a pretty successful night for a tragedian.

The Athenians saw things differently.

They fined Phrynichus 1,000 drachmas for reminding them of their own misfortunes and ordered that his play never be performed again. The punishment targeted one playwright and one particular production. Athens had effectively decided that Phrynichus had committed the unforgivable crime of making people think about something they desperately wanted to forget.

It is one of antiquity’s strangest examples of a government singling out an artist and his work for punishment. Apparently, even the birthplace of democracy had its limits, especially when the audience left the theater crying.^[1]

9 Rome Passes a Law to Exile Cicero by Name

Publius Clodius Pulcher had a problem with Cicero and, being a Roman politician, found a perfectly normal solution: pass a law designed to ruin him.

The trouble went back to the Catiline conspiracy of 63 BC. Cicero, then consul, had five Roman citizens executed without formal trials for their alleged roles in the plot. His supporters called him the savior of the Republic. His enemies spent the next few years looking for a way to make him regret it.

In 58 BC, Clodius, now tribune of the plebs, introduced a law imposing exile on anyone responsible for executing a Roman citizen without trial. Cicero was not named, but nobody was particularly confused about the intended target. He fled Rome before the measure passed.

Clodius then dropped the subtlety. A second measure named Cicero directly, formally confirmed his exile, confiscated his property, and barred anyone within hundreds of miles of Rome from sheltering him. Cicero’s house on the Palatine was demolished, and Clodius dedicated a shrine to Liberty on the site.

The political winds changed the following year. Another law recalled Cicero, who returned to Rome in September 57 BC after about 18 months away and received an enormous public welcome.

Rome had managed to exile one of its most famous politicians by passing a law essentially devoted to the question of how miserable Cicero’s life should become.^[2]

8 England Executes a Minister It Couldn’t Convict

Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford, was King Charles I’s most powerful adviser and one of the most hated men in England. Eventually, Parliament decided that merely disliking him was no longer enough. It wanted him dead.

In 1641, Parliament tried to impeach Strafford for high treason, accusing him of attempting to establish arbitrary government and use military force against the King’s subjects. The problem was that Strafford defended himself effectively enough that proving treason through the normal proceedings looked increasingly uncertain.

So Parliament changed tactics.

It introduced “An Act for the Attainder of Thomas Earl of Strafford for High Treason.” Instead of asking a court to convict Strafford, Parliament would simply pass a law declaring that this one particular man was a traitor and should die.

Both Houses approved the attainder. Charles I resisted because he had personally promised Strafford protection, but mounting political pressure eventually broke him. Strafford himself reportedly advised the King to assent rather than place the monarchy in further danger.

Charles gave his approval on May 10, 1641. Two days later, Strafford was beheaded on Tower Hill.

Parliament had found a remarkably efficient solution to its legal problem: if you cannot convict a man under the existing law, simply make passing a new law the conviction.^[3]

7 Parliament Changes the Rules to Execute Sir John Fenwick

In 1696, the English government believed it had caught a dangerous Jacobite conspirator. Sir John Fenwick had been implicated in plotting to help restore the deposed James II, and two witnesses were prepared to testify against him.

That mattered because English treason law required two witnesses.

Then one of them disappeared.

Cardell Goodman, one of the men expected to testify, vanished before Fenwick could be brought to trial. Suddenly, prosecutors had only one usable witness and a serious problem. Under normal criminal procedure, they might no longer be able to convict him.

Parliament decided it did not need the normal rules.

The government introduced a bill specifically titled “An Act to Attaint Sir John Fenwick Baronet of High Treason.” A bill of attainder did not require Parliament to satisfy the same evidentiary rules as a treason trial. After bitter debate, the Commons and Lords approved it, and Fenwick was legally declared guilty.

He was beheaded on Tower Hill on January 28, 1697.

Fenwick may have escaped a conventional conviction because the law required two witnesses. Parliament responded by passing a law that required exactly zero trials.^[4]

6 Britain Passes a Law to Keep Napoleon Imprisoned

After Napoleon escaped from Elba in 1815, returned to France, reclaimed his throne, and launched the campaign that ended at Waterloo, Britain was understandably reluctant to try the small-island retirement plan again.

This time, Napoleon was sent considerably farther away, to the remote British island of St. Helena in the South Atlantic. But once the war ended, an awkward legal question emerged: on what authority could Britain continue holding him indefinitely?

Parliament’s answer was remarkably specific.

In 1816, the government introduced a bill whose purpose was stated directly in its title: “An Act for the more effectually detaining in Custody Napoleon Buonaparté.” During debate, ministers made clear that Napoleon himself was the object of the measure and that they did not intend it to authorize the detention of the companions who had followed him to St. Helena.

The law gave legal backing to Napoleon’s continued imprisonment. It allowed the Crown to determine the conditions necessary to keep him securely detained. Unlike the Treaty of Fontainebleau, which had given Napoleon sovereignty over Elba, this arrangement contained no miniature empire and no second chance at retirement.

Napoleon remained on St. Helena until his death in 1821.

After one spectacular escape, Britain apparently decided that ordinary legal principles were not enough. If Europe’s most troublesome former emperor needed his own law to keep him on an island, Parliament was happy to write one.^[5]

5 Parliament Convicts a Duke Before He Is Even Caught

In June 1685, James Scott, Duke of Monmouth, landed in southwestern England and launched a rebellion against King James II. Monmouth was the illegitimate but popular son of Charles II, and his supporters hoped to put the Protestant duke on the throne in place of his Catholic uncle.

Usually, a rebel had to be captured before the government could convict him of treason. Parliament decided that sounded unnecessarily time-consuming.

While Monmouth was still in open rebellion, it passed the Attainder, Duke of Monmouth Act 1685. The statute named him personally and declared that he “stand and be convicted and attainted of High-Treason,” suffer death, and forfeit his property.

In other words, Parliament convicted Monmouth before anyone had caught him.

The Act received royal assent on June 16. Monmouth’s rebellion was crushed at the Battle of Sedgemoor on July 6, and he was captured two days later while hiding in a ditch. Since Parliament had already handled the conviction and death sentence, there was no need for a treason trial.

Monmouth was beheaded on Tower Hill on July 15.

Most wanted men have to worry about what will happen if they are captured. Monmouth had the unusual experience of knowing Parliament had already passed a law announcing the answer.^[6]

4 Henry VIII Condemns Thomas Cromwell by Act of Parliament

Thomas Cromwell spent years helping Henry VIII transform England. As the king’s chief minister, he played a central role in the break with Rome, the dissolution of the monasteries, and the enormous expansion of royal power. Unfortunately for Cromwell, service to Henry VIII did not come with retirement benefits.

By 1540, Cromwell’s enemies at court had gained the king’s ear. He was arrested during a Privy Council meeting in June and sent to the Tower of London, accused of treason and heresy.

He never received a conventional criminal trial.

Instead, Parliament passed a private act devoted specifically to him: “An act for the attainder of Thomas lord Cromwell.” The legislation declared Cromwell a traitor and heretic, stripped him of his property and offices, and authorized the king to determine the manner of his death.

It was a particularly grim end for a man who had spent years helping Henry use Parliament to accomplish royal policy. Cromwell was executed on July 28, 1540—the same day Henry married his fifth wife, Catherine Howard.

Henry had promoted Cromwell from relatively humble origins to one of the most powerful men in England. When he wanted him gone, Parliament produced a law for that too.^[7]

3 Parliament Legislates Edward VIII Off the Throne

In December 1936, Britain faced a constitutional problem no ordinary statute book had anticipated. King Edward VIII wanted to marry Wallis Simpson, an American divorcée whose second divorce was still being finalized. His government strongly opposed the match, and Edward decided he would rather surrender the throne than give her up.

On December 10, Edward signed an Instrument of Abdication declaring his irrevocable decision to renounce the throne.

But a king could not simply resign by writing a letter and walking away.

Parliament therefore passed His Majesty’s Declaration of Abdication Act 1936 specifically to give legal effect to Edward’s decision. The law was extraordinarily direct: the moment royal assent was given, Edward would cease to be king, the Crown would pass to the next person in line, and Edward and any future descendants would lose their rights in the succession.

The Act became law on December 11. Edward VIII immediately stopped being king, and his younger brother became George VI.

Most laws regulate what ordinary people can and cannot do. This one existed because exactly one man needed Parliament’s help quitting one of the hardest jobs in the world to resign from.^[8]

2 Congress Seizes Richard Nixon’s Presidential Records

When Richard Nixon resigned the presidency on August 9, 1974, he did not leave Watergate entirely behind. He also left behind thousands of hours of secretly recorded White House conversations and mountains of presidential documents that may have contained evidence of abuses of government power.

At the time, presidential papers were generally treated as the former president’s personal property. Nixon reached an agreement with the General Services Administration that allowed him to retain considerable control over his materials—and even provided for the destruction of the tapes after a set period or upon his death.

Congress had other ideas.

In December 1974, it passed the Presidential Recordings and Materials Preservation Act. Unlike the later Presidential Records Act, which created rules for future administrations, the 1974 law applied only to Richard Nixon’s presidential materials.

The federal government took custody of Nixon’s tapes and records, preserved material related to Watergate and abuses of governmental power, and created procedures for eventual public access. Purely private materials were to be separated and returned.

Nixon challenged the statute, arguing in part that Congress had improperly singled him out. In 1977, however, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the law.

Congress later created a general system governing presidential records. But first, it passed a law for one particular former president because it feared he might destroy the evidence everyone wanted to hear.^[9]

1 Pennsylvania Gives Molly McKolly Her Own Pension Law

Not every law written for one person was designed to exile, imprison, dispossess, or execute someone.

In 1822, Pennsylvania’s legislature considered a bill for an elderly Revolutionary War woman named Molly McKolly, now commonly identified with Mary Hays McCauley and the legend of “Molly Pitcher.”

The original bill described her simply as the widow of a Revolutionary War soldier. But when it reached the Pennsylvania House, lawmakers made a remarkable change. They removed the words “widow of a soldier.” They replaced them with language recognizing her own services during the Revolutionary War.

The final measure was titled “An Act for the relief of Molly M’Kolly, for her services during the Revolutionary War.” Governor Joseph Hiester signed it on February 21, 1822, granting her an annuity of $40 a year.

Exactly what McKolly did during the Revolution remains uncertain. Later tradition famously portrayed Molly Pitcher carrying water at the Battle of Monmouth and taking over a cannon when her husband could no longer serve it. Still, historians have not found documentation proving all parts of that familiar story.

What is documented is unusually significant: Pennsylvania’s legislature deliberately changed the wording so the money honored Molly’s service, not merely her husband’s.

After nine entries filled with governments using individualized laws to punish troublesome people, it seems only fair to end with a legislature writing one specifically to say thank you.^[10]