§ Order for Second Reading read.
§ MR. BERESFORD HOPE, in rising to move that the Bill be now read a second time, said, he should not detain the House very long in asking Parliament to read this Bill a second time. In 1840 a very beneficial Act was passed for the relief of conscientious persons, among whom were the members of the Society of Friends, one of whom might, for a few shillings of church rates, after having been served with all the necessary orders in the cause, fall under the penalties of the law. A member of that Society having so acted, the result was he was put in prison, where he remained some time the subject of much sympathy and commiseration for his conscientious action. Accordingly, the Minister of the day—Lord John Russell—brought in a Bill which became, after 807 the name of the sufferer, Thorogood's Act, of which the main feature was that when a person had been sent to gaol, it should be lawful for the Judicial Committee of Her Majesty's most honourable Privy Council, or the Judge of the Ecclesiastical Court, to let the man out on this condition—that the party proceeding against such man should have consented to it, provided always that no such order should be made by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council or the Judge without the consent of the other party or parties, with this further proviso, that he should not have this remedy applied to this case till he had smarted for his conscientious procedure, and had been kept in prison for six months.
§ Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members not being present,
§ House adjourned at a quarter after Ten o'clock.