proceeding from the joint authority of the Sovereign, the Lords, and Commons, and the Church another set of laws, put forth and executed by the authority of ecclesiastics, must necessarily occasion great confusion, national dishonour, and individual wrongs. Courts of scattered over Eng. land and There are nearly four hundred of these courts scattered over Nearly 400 England and Wales. Some pertain to archbishops, bishops, Inquisition and archdeacons. Others are attached to cathedrals, deans, rectors, vicars, and other orders of ecclesiastics; and, strange as it may appear, portions of them belong to lords and ladies of manors. The whole system will be best understood by a brief description of their constitution-their powers-their abusesand the reasons for their extinction. THEIR CONSTITUTION. Wales. Inquisition, siastical None but avowed members of the Church of England can Constituobtain admission. The bishop appoints the judges, advocates, tion of the and proctors; and at his pleasure he can remove them. At the alias Eccletime of being admitted they swear they believe the Thirty-nine Courts. Articles of the Church of England, " and will yield obedience to the lawful commands of their diocesan." And it is a fact, that, Popish if after being admitted, any judge, advocate, or proctor, were to alter his religious opinions or conduct, the bishop could, on this account alone, suspend him, or altogether dismiss him from the court. He has equally arbitrary powers as to admission. Any gentleman after payment of a large premium, and serving seven years as an articled clerk, may be rejected by the bishop, and denied the right of becoming a practitioner. bishops and as avowed judges act Protes tants. In the name of common right, we protest against this monopoly of justice by clerical persons. Did it extend no further than to members of the Church of England, it might be left to judges, advocates, and proctors, to emancipate themselves from trammels imposed by diocesan authority and guarded by constant supervision. But seeing that the powers of these courts lay hold of, and adjudicate upon, civil matters which affect the whole community, we repeat it, that the continuance of such a monopoly of judicial power, with such restraints upon practitioners, is to them a degradation, to national jurisprudence a Inquisition dishonour, and to the people at large a moral wrong. As a of the dioconsequence of this exclusiveness, the principal courts are filled Exeter, up by only a very few practitioners. The diocese of Exeter, comprehending within its jurisdiction above two millions of wich. ceses of Gloucester persons, has only eight proctors, with ninety-two causes every That of Gloucester, with its 117 causes sition a monopoly of English bishops! bishops deem juries unneces sary in their courts of year brought before it. in one year, has five proctors. That of Norwich, with seventy causes, is conducted by six proctors. These are only specimens The inqui- of one great system of judicial monopoly. An outery would be justly raised against such a state of things, if it obtained in either the civil or criminal courts. Yet causes both of a Righteous! criminal and highly important civil character constantly occur in the provincial courts of bishops, and still they are closed against all other persons than such as they permit to practise. As might be expected, trial by jury is unknown in these inquisition. courts. Had any twelve men been selected periodically to try the causes conducted in them, they would from time to time have spread such information as should not only have exposed them to merited contempt, but led long ago to their abolition. Would it, for instance, have been allowed that witnesses should never be examined in open court, but in private by written interrogatories? or that one examiner should generally be employed by the proctors for both parties? or that he might so guard an insincere witness from discrepancy or contradiction as would render it impracticable to establish against him a charge of perjury? or that even a cross-examination should entirely fail to elicit those distinct and expressive peculiarities of a case, upon an acquaintance with which its main strength may depend? The examiner not being at liberty to change a question, a witness may negative that which is true in fact, although it is not true in form. More than this, if a witness live beyond the limits of the jurisdiction (though it be but the next street) of the court in which a suit may be carried on, he cannot be compelled to attend and give evidence in that court, without the sanction of the other bishop in whose diocese he resides, simply because a contrary custom would "be attended with the inconvenience affecting the fees of different officers." the Bishop It ought not to be forgotten, too, that the Bishop of London of London. must approve of every examiner of his court before he can exercise his functions. Power of come un of their un holy courts. Bishops be- There is another singular feature in the constitution of these holy judges courts. It is that many of them (at least 160) are at different periods inhibited or closed; sometimes at the primary, at other times at the triennial, visitation of the Bishop, during three, four, or six months. At these periods, no business is transacted in them, as it is then conducted either personally before the Registrar Courts. bishop, or in the court next in the ascending order of authority. However serious the inconveniences which result from this practice, they are, however, fraught with advantage to different officers. Thus the registrar of the Consistorial Court of Fees of the Salisbury states his fees, in 1827, to have been £485 0s. 8d. of the But in 1829, "being the year of the triennial inhibition of the Bishops' Archdeacon of Berks, Sarum, Wilts, and Subdean of Sarum," they rose to £927 16s. 8d. So also the Registrar of Norwich Episcopal Court states his income in 1829 to have been £1,259 Os. 1d.; but two years before, when the Registry Offices were closed for three months, it amounted to £2,224 12s. 6d. The evils occasioned by these courts will become increasingly evident by a reference thereto. THEIR POWERS. They have usurped testamentary jurisdiction. tics claimed by canon law to be when men present made their wills. At one time ecclesiastics claimed by canon law the right to Ecclesiasbe present whenever any man made his will. Such an invasion of civil rights was not, however, more odious than the present practices of these courts in testamentary matters prove injurious. For instance: the Bishop grants probate of wills disposing of personal estate, but has no power over a testator when bequeathing real property; the consequence is, the validity of a will has often to be tried in two courts-in that of common law, so far as relates to the real estate, and in the Spiritual Court as to the personality. In one court the testator has been pronounced sane, in the other insane, when he executed the same deed. Such conflicts of judgments led to most serious results, property is not secure; executors know not how to act; legatees Property may be despoiled; and in one instance, a residuary legatee so Executors circumstanced is now imprisoned, and has been incarcerated in the Queen's Bench nearly twenty-five years. Nor is this all. It is constantly occurring that persons interested in the faithful administration of a will, are first obliged to go to these courts for an inventory of effects from executors or administrators; but as these courts have no power in such civil matters to enforce their own decrees, suitors must afterwards have recourse to a Chancery suit in order to compel payment. Two expensive suits are thus required instead of one; the costs of either of which may more than absorb the sum claimed. Without this twofold process, justice is altogether withheld, or, what may be worse, a greater injury may be, and often is, inflicted than the relief obtained can not secure. know not Residuary legatee im how to act. prisoned for 25 years by a Bishop. of the bury. Registrar of the Ecclesiasti. cal Court at Norwich. compensate. Great as are these inconveniences and injuries, they are not of equal magnitude with those which constantly arise out of another part of the present system. We allude to Prerogativo the prerogative of the Archbishop of Canterbury. If any person Archbishop die, leaving five pounds in two dioceses, or within two pecuof Canter- liars; or if he die in one diocese leaving no effects; but leaving effects to the value in another diocese; probate or administration must be taken in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, because of the power pertaining to his Grace as Primate of all England. Many persons are ignorant at the time of taking probate or administration, that the deceased left property in different districts. "Cases often occur," says Mr. Kitson, the Registrar of the Ecclesiastical Court at Norwich, "in which after Wills have been proved, they are required to be sent to the Prerogative Office, on the ground of bona notabilia having been discovered." All the expenses of probate or administration must delay neces- be re-incurred: every act of the executors under the first probate was void, whatever amount of money had been received and paid. Titles or leases so granted would be invalid: even the consent of a guardian to the marriage by license of a minor, son or daughter of the deceased, if given under the first probate, would be also void, and would render the marriage itself voidable. Other practical inconveniences frequently arise from this prerogative. Scotchmen, Irishmen, colonists or foreigners, who had neither resided nor died in England, but who had shares in an English railway or canal which passed through two dioceses; or who had effected a life assurance with a company, having its principal office in London; would be obliged, through their representatives, to contribute to this method of keeping up the authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury, which extends over all "the dominions" of the crown. Vexatious sary for the Inquisition to fleece its victims. Practical incon veniences in the Bishops' Prerogative Courts. Insecurity of public wills under the Arch bishop of Canterbury. Another matter of great public importance connected with the testamentary powers of these courts is the condition of the the care of registries in which wills are deposited. Next to the documents in the Bank of England, there are no records of greater importance. Yet the places where they are kept are unsafe, inconvenient, and, in many instances, a reproach to the ecclesiastical authorities. And, although it is almost incredible, it is a fact, that when at Lady-day, 1857, the present lease of the premises used as the Prerogative Office of the Archbishop of Canterbury expires, THE WILLS OF THAT PROVINCE WILL COME INTO THE POSSESSION OF THE EXECUTORS AND ASSIGNEES OF THE mentary REGISTRARS." These date from 1484 down to the present time. They affect property and titles to estates to an enormous extent. But why should these civil interests of the nation be thus placed in the hands of the Church? All testamentary papers through- Testa out the kingdom ought surely to be surrendered into the custody papers at of the crown. At present they are the property of bishops present the and their respective officers; nor can they be produced in any Bishops. common law court except by their permission and the payment of such fees as they may choose to demand. property of The Inquiables vicious sition en women to Their Matrimonial Powers-The limits of this address allow Matrimonial not a minute detail of the many injuries inflicted in consequence powers of this jurisdiction. "In the whole practice of the law," says in the Bishops' an officer in one of the Ecclesiastical Courts, who had had Courts. twenty years' experience, "greater evil is not to be found than the power vested in the hands of a vicious woman, whose guilt is manifest, to drag her husband through various courts of appeal; subjecting him to the expenses of proceedings on both sides; extorting money" (and that by order of the court) "as extort alimony all the while; the very lapse of time giving occasion money. &c. for fresh recriminatory pleas on either hand-fresh examination of witnesses-intolerable expense, and almost endless delay.". (Appendix to Report, p. 256.) Can anything be more truly odious, or destructive of domestic honour? All this evil is occasioned by courts, one ostensible purpose of which is that they should act as conservators of public morals. unrepealed 37 Henry Acts of VIII. cap. 17. 1 Eliz. cap. 1. Other and extraordinary powers they possess and exercise. Thus, by various unrepealed statute laws, every archbishop, bishop, archdeacon, or other person exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction, is authorized "to correct, punish, and repress all manner of heresies and errors, vices, sins, abuses, idolatries, Dangerous hypocrisies, and superstitions."-(37 Henry VIII. cap. 17, s. 3, and 1st of Elizabeth, cap. 1, s. 12.) They can fine and imprison for life "any person whatsoever who shall declare or speak anything in derogation, depraving, or despising, of the Book of Common Prayer, or anything therein contained, or any part thereof"-(2nd and 3rd of Edward VI. cap. 1); and by s. 12 the jurisdiction of peculiars is expressly included. Of these peculiars, deans, rectors, and vicars, are judges by virtue of their institution to the benefice. In the diocese of Winchester Diocese of Winchester alone there are no less than forty-five rectorial and vicarial contains peculiars, in either of which "any person whatever" may be forty-five cited for expressing an opinion at variance with the statements and vicarial 2 & 3 Edw. VI. cap. 1, in power of Bishops. rectorial Peculiars. |