which was defeated by a majority of 128.1 Half a century passed before another attempt was made by Mr. Beaufoy, in 1787, but, though repeated in 1789, his motion was unsuccessful. Mr. Fox was the next to take up the subject, in 1790, yet even his advocacy was impotent to overcome the determined opposition to a repeal. After the lapse of nearly forty years, Lord John Russell, more fortunate than his predecessors, obtained, in 1828, a success for which they had Repeal of vainly striven. The Civil disabilities of Dissenters were at last swept Test and Corporation away by the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts; the sacramental test previously required as a qualification for civil, military, and corporate offices, being replaced by a declaration, upon the true faith of a Christian,' against injuring or disturbing the Established Church. Acts, 1828. Roman Emancipa 1:29. The following year, 1829, witnessed the passing of the Roman Catholic Relief Act. From the date of the Union with Ireland in 1801, the injustice of maintaining the Political disabilities of the Roman Catholics in a United Kingdom of which they formed no inconsiderable a portion of the population, became more and more glaring. But George III. declared that he 'should reckon any man his personal enemy' who proposed any measure of relief; and during the life of that King the liberal concessions with which Pitt had been anxious to inaugurate the Union,—and the refusal of which was signalised by his resignation of office,-were compulsorily postponed. Under George IV. the question which was annually contested in Parliament, assumed a graver aspect. The Catholic Association,' formed by Daniel O'Connell, kept up a constant appeal to the excited passions of the Irish people, and at length the Tory Ministry of the Duke of Wellington, finding it necessary to choose between concession and civil war, introduced, and with the aid of the Whigs, carried through both Houses, the Emancipation Act of 1829.3 This measure, to which 1 Lord Mahon, Hist. of Eng. i. 480; ii. 280. 2 9 Geo. IV. c. 17. The language of the text scarcely seems to do justice to the real feelings of the Duke, which are shewn in a passage cited from Lord Ellenborough's Political Diary, i. 143. in Martin's Life of Lord Lyndhurst, p. 250, n. 1; 'Cabinet Dinner at the Duke's, and the Duke said he believed there was no one who desired the settlement of the Catholic question more than he did; but he confessed he did not see daylight. Much the same state of mind, which as Sir Theodore Martin justly says, appears to have been that of the Cabinet, is evident in Lord Lyndhurst's speech on the Bill, of which Sir Theodore says, loc. cit., 'It was obvious throughout the whole of the Chancellor's speech that he was pressed by the difficulty of depriving, upon religious grounds, the majority of the Irish population of their share in the rights and privileges of their fellow-citizens. The perplexities surrounding the whole question were stated with moderation and frankness.' On this subject, as affecting Ireland, cf. also Law Magazine and Review, No. cclxv., for Aug., 1887, Art. Niebuhr on the State of Ireland, 1829.-C.] George IV. was with difficulty induced to give a reluctant and hesitating assent, was tardy indeed, but complete. It admitted Roman Catholics, on taking the oath of allegiance with a repudiation of the doctrine that princes excommunicated by the Pope might be deposed or murdered (instead of the oath of Supremacy and declaration against Transubstantiation and the adoration of the Virgin Mary), to both Houses of Parliament, to all Corporate offices, to all Judicial offices (except in the Ecclesiastical courts), and to all civil and political offices, except those of Regent, Lord Chancellor in England and Ireland,' and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Additional restraints were, however, imposed by the Act upon the interference of Roman Catholics in Church patronage: Jesuits and monks were prohibited from coming into the realm without licence; and provisions were inserted for regulating the residence of such as were already within the Kingdom. penalties Catholic In 1832 an Act was passed providing that Roman Catholics in Repeal of respect of their schools, places of worship, and charities, and of affecting property held therewith, and of persons employed about them, should Roman be subject to the same laws as were applicable to Protestant Dis- religion and senters. A few years later the policy of according perfect Religious liberty to the Roman Catholics was consummated by the repeal of almost all the enactments against them which (though for the most part obsolete) still remained on the Statute book. education. of Civil enfranchise. Dissenters. A few supplementary measures were still required to complete the Completion Civil enfranchisement of Dissenters. In 1833, Mr. Pease, the first Quaker who had been elected to the House of Commons for one ment of hundred and forty years, was allowed to take his seat on making an affirmation instead of an oath. In the same year Quakers, Moravians, and Separatists, were enabled by statute to substitute an affirmation in all cases, for an oath." The Jews, banished from England under Edward I., had been Jewish disabilities. suffered to return by Cromwell, but were not formally authorised to 1 The Irish Chancellorship has since been thrown open to all creeds. 2 10 Geo. IV. c. 7. 3 2 & 3 Will. IV. c. 115. 7 & 8 Vict. c. 102, 9 & 10 Vict. c. 59. 5 3 & 4 Will. IV. cc. 49, 82; and see 1 & 2 Vict. c. 77. 6 It cannot be doubted that, although their residence here may not have been legally recognised until the Restoration, Jews were practically settled in England long before the time of Cromwell. The fact of the banishment, which has been lately a subject of discussion in Notes and Queries, 7th Ser. vii. 215, may be here stated in the words of the author of a Short English Chronicle, in Three Fifteenth Century Chronicles, Camd. Soc. 1880, ed. by Gairdner, p. 39, inserted in his text before the record for 20 Edw. I., ' This yere the kynge ordeyned that all the Jewes settle in England until after the Restoration.' An Act of James I.3 passed in 1610, and directed against the Roman Catholics, had the collateral effect of debarring the Jews from the benefits of Naturalisation, by making the reception of the sacrament a necessary preliminary to Naturalisation in all cases. In the interest of trade and colonisation this requirement was partially relaxed by two subsequent statutes, which (1663) dispensed with the sacramental test in favour of all foreigners who had been engaged in the hemp and flax manufacture, and (1739) of all Jews and Protestant foreigners who had resided seven years continuously in the American plantations. Notwithstanding the political disabilities attaching to them in England, the number of foreign Jewish settlers continued to increase with the expansion of English commerce; and at length, in 1753, an attempt was made to extend to all Jews applying for Parliamentary Naturalisation the exemption from the sacramental test, already conceded to those who had resided in the colonies, or been engaged in the manufacture of hemp or flax. But the celebrated Jew Bill, by which this very moderate measure of toleration was effected, proved to be in advance of the opinion of the age. 'No Jews! No Jews! No Wooden Shoes!' became the popular cry; and although the Bill, after a fierce opposition in the House of Commons, obtained a fleeting place upon the Statute-book, it raised such a storm of opposition throughout the country, as to necessitate its repeal in the following session." Jews were occasionally admitted to municipal offices, together with Protestant Nonconformists, under cover of the annual Indemnity Acts; but the declaration 'on the true faith of a Christian,' imposed by the Act 9 Geo. IV. c. 17, while relieving Dissenters from the requirements of the Test and Corporation Acts, had forged new fetters for the Jew. These were removed, so far as regards Corporations, in 1845 ; and after a lengthened struggle, the only legal obstacle to the admission of Jews to Parliament was also removed, in Parliament, 1858, by an Act which empowered either House of Parliament, by Admission of Jews to 1853. that were dwellinge in this londe shulde be exiled for evir.' Evidence of the value to the Exchequer of Jews in England before the banishment . Edw. I. is given by Mr. Jacobs, Arch. Rev., ii. 1888-9, pp. 396-410.-C.] [Cf. supra, p. 113, and note 1.-ED.] 1 Blunt, Hist. of the Jews in England, p. 72. 2 Supra, P. 554, #. I. 3 15 Car. II. and 13 Geo. II. c. 7; Cobbett's Parl. Hist. xiv. 1373; Lecky, Hist. of Eng. i. 262. Resolution, to omit the words 'upon the true faith of a Christian,'1 from the oath of Abjuration. tration of births, mar Marriage In 1836 a Civil Registration of births, marriages, and deaths was Civil Regis established; and by another Act, Dissenters were permitted to solemnise marriages in their own chapels, registered for that purpose.3 riages, and deaths, The grievance complained of by Dissenters with regard to burials 1836. (though destined, doubtless, soon to disappear) still continues in the Dissenters' country districts of England, mitigated, however, by the practice of Bill, 1836. some incumbents who allow Dissenting ministers to perform their own burial service in the parish churchyard; and in populous towns the Dissenters have generally provided themselves with separate burying grounds and unconsecrated parts of cemeteries. Lastly, in 1871, one Universities of the few remaining disabilities of Dissenters was redressed by the Tests Act, Universities Tests Act, which opened all lay academical degrees and all lay academical and collegiate offices in the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, and Durham to persons of any religious belief. V. Liberty of the Press. 1971. of the Press Of the Political privileges of the people acquired or enlarged since (V.) Liberty the Revolution, we have still to consider the liberty of the Press, 'the guardian and guide of all other liberties,' -and the last to be recognised by the State. 6 We have seen how freedom of opinion in Religious matters was early restrained by the action of the Church against the Lollard teachers and writers; and soon after the invention of printing in the fifteenth century the Press was placed under a rigorous censorship, The Censornot only in England but throughout Europe. After the Reformation ship. 1 [It may not be without interest to note that Lord Lyndhurst, in 1853, argued in favour of admitting Jews to Parliament, that these words, which were closely connected with the immediately preceding words without mental reservation,' were not directed against the Jews at all, but were originally inserted to prevent Roman Catholics from taking the oath under certain mental reserves, which, according to some of their teachers, would save them from being bound by it.' Life, by Martin, p. 452.-C.] 21 & 22 Vict. c. 49: 23 & 24 Vict. c. 63. By the 29 & 30 Vict. c. 19, all distinctions between Jewish and other members were removed by the enactment of a new form of oath from which the words 'on the true faith of a Christian' were omitted. 3 6 & 7 Will. IV. cc. 85, 86. [The Local Government Act, 1894, 56 & 57 Vict. cap. 73, known as the Parish and District Councils Act, confers by sec. 7, upon the parish meeting the right of adopting among others the Burial Acts, 1852-1885; and the practical secularising of the parish churchyard seems now to be only a question of time. Cf. post, note at end of chapter. -ED.] Earl Russell, Eng. Con. p. 339. Supra, pp. 340, 342. The Press under Charl s 1. in England, the censorship of the Press passed with the Ecclesiastical supremacy to the Crown. It became a part of the Royal prerogative to appoint a Licenser, without whose imprimatur no writings could be lawfully published; and the printing of unlicensed works was visited with the severest punishments. Printing was further restrained by patents and monopolies. The privilege was confined, in the first instance, under regulations established by the Star Chamber in Queen Mary's reign, to Members of the Stationers Company, and the number of presses, and of men to be employed on them, was strictly limited. Under Elizabeth, the censorship was enforced by more rigorous penalties. All printing was interdicted elsewhere than in London, Oxford, and Cambridge; and nothing whatever was allowed to be published until it had first been seen, perused, and allowed' by the Archbishop of Canterbury or the Bishop of London, except only publications by the Queen's printers, to be appointed for some special service, or by Law-printers, for whom the licence of the Chief Justices was sufficient. Mutilation or death was the penalty of those who dared to print anything which the Judges might choose to construe as seditious or slanderous of the government in Church or State. Under James I. and Charles I., political and religious discussion James I. and was repressed by the Star Chamber with the greatest severity. By an ordinance of the Star Chamber, issued in July, 1637, the number of master printers was limited to twenty, who were to give sureties for good behaviour, and were to have not more than two presses and two apprentices each (unless they were present or past Masters of the Stationers Company, when they were allowed three presses and three apprentices) and the number of letter-founders was limited to four. The penalty for practising the arts of printing, book-binding, letterfounding, or making any part of a press, or other printing materials, by persons disqualified, or not apprenticed thereto, was whipping, the pillory, and imprisonment. Even books which had been once examined and allowed were not to be reprinted without a fresh licence; and books brought from abroad were to be landed in London only, and carefully examined by licensers appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London, who were empowered to seize and destroy all such as were 'seditious, schismatical, or offensive.' Periodical searches, both of booksellers' shops and private 1 Ordinances of the Star Chamber for the regulation of the Press in 1585, supra, p. 389. 2 St. 23 Eliz. c. 2. See the cases of Stubbe, Udal, Barrow, Greenwood, and Penry, supra, p. 380, n. 1, and p. 383. * Supra, pp. 465-467. |