Settlement, Act of definition of Settlement, Act of in the Free Online Encyclopedia.

Settlement, Act of, 1701, passed by the English Parliament, to provide that if William III and Princess Anne (later Queen Anne) should die without heirs, the succession to the throne should pass to Sophia Sophia (sōfī`ə, Ger. zōfē`ä), 1630–1714, electress of Hanover, consort of Elector Ernest Augustus.
..... Click the link for more information. , electress of Hanover, granddaughter of James I, and to her heirs, if they were Protestants. The house of Hanover Hanover, house of, ruling dynasty of Hanover (see Hanover , province), which was descended from the Guelphs and which in 1714 acceded to the British throne in the person of George I .
..... Click the link for more information. , which ruled Great Britain from 1714, owed its claim to this act. Among additional provisions, similar to those in the Bill of Rights Bill of Rights, 1689, in British history, one of the fundamental instruments of constitutional law. It registered in statutory form the outcome of the long 17th-century struggle between the Stuart kings and the English Parliament.
..... Click the link for more information. , were requirements that the king must join in communion with the Church of England, that he might not leave England without parliamentary consent, and that English armies might not be used in defense of foreign territory without parliamentary consent. The act also prohibited royal pardons for officials impeached by Parliament. A clause providing that no appointee or pensioner of the king should sit in the House of Commons was repealed (1705) before the act became effective. The unpopularity of William's pro-Dutch policy, the lack of an heir to William or Anne, and fear of the Jacobites Jacobites (jăk`əbīts')
..... Click the link for more information. prompted the act.