Act in Restraint of Appeals

Appeals, Act in Restraint of (1533). The Act (24 Hen. VIII c. 12), largely the work of Thomas Cromwell, was a crucial step in Henry VIII's assertion of royal supremacy. He had already moved against the clergy with accusations of praemunire and in 1532 forbade the payment of annates or first fruits to Rome. The Act, passed in the first week of April, forbade appeals to Rome and had two objectives—to allow Cranmer to give a ruling on Henry's marriage to Catherine of Aragon which could not be appealed, and to intimidate the pope generally.