Defence of the Realm Act

On 8 August 1914, four days after Britain declared war on Germany, the Defence of the Realm Act received royal assent. Parliament passed it in two days, practically without debate. The short Act gave the government the right to issue regulations for the whole of the war, and over time these reached deep into the everyday life of the British. From the initial letters of its name it was known simply as DORA.

An Act in two days

The Home Secretary, Reginald McKenna, introduced the bill in the House of Commons on 7 August. Its first clause empowered the King in Council to issue regulations during the war on the powers and duties of the Admiralty and the Army Council, “for securing the public safety and the defence of the Realm”. The regulations could provide that people who communicated with the enemy or endangered communications, railways, docks and harbours would be tried and punished by courts martial as if they were subject to military law. McKenna gave an assurance that the penalties would not include death. He explained that for offences such as tapping telegraph wires or trying to blow up a bridge a court that could sit at once was needed. An MP, William Chapple, asked whether the Act would be retrospective. The minister replied that it would cover acts committed from the day it was passed, and the regulations would remain in force until the end of the war. The Commons passed the bill the same day in all three readings, without amendment.

On 8 August the bill went to the House of Lords. The Lords suspended a standing order so that all the readings could be held at one sitting, dispensed with the committee stage and passed the Act. The same day the Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons announced to MPs that it had received royal assent. The text of the Act appeared on 11 August in a supplement to the official London Gazette, and further supplements carried the regulations issued under it.

What DORA banned

The Act itself ran to a few sentences, but over the course of the war the regulations covered almost every area of life. The government could take over buildings and land needed for the war and create new offences without a vote in Parliament. It was forbidden to talk about naval and military matters in public places or to spread rumours about them, to buy binoculars, to trespass on railway lines and bridges, to fly kites, light bonfires or set off fireworks, and to use invisible ink in letters sent abroad. No one could spread, by word of mouth or in writing, reports likely to cause disaffection or alarm. The press could not write about troop movements and numbers, and letters from the front were read by censors.

What came next

During the war the Act was amended and extended several times. As early as 28 August 1914 Parliament passed a second Defence of the Realm Act, and on 27 November a consolidation act replaced both earlier ones. Further amendments in 1915 reached into the pubs: their opening hours were limited to noon to 3 p.m. and 6.30 to 9.30 p.m., buying rounds for others was banned, and beer was watered down. The afternoon break in English pubs survived until 1988. Opponents of the war were imprisoned under DORA, among them the Scottish socialist John Maclean and the philosopher Bertrand Russell. Later the government also used it in matters of food, and even banned feeding bread to horses and chickens.