Lord Kinghad several Petitions to present from different places in the County of Meath, calling upon Parliament to take the Church Property of Ireland again into its hands and from it to provide for the Clergy of every denomination in that country. In this prayer he concurred; for it was impossible that any one who looked at the signs of the times, should not come to the conclusion, that the present system of tithes could not be permitted to continue. In point of fact, the tithes had, in a great degree, been wrested from those who held them; and therefore it was necessary that the Legislature should show itself disposed to agree to some adjustment of this important question, which would give satisfaction to those who had already obtained the victory. He did not object to tithes because they were the property of the Church, but because they were a pernicious description of property. But how stood the case with regard to Church property generally, the tenure of which he was surprised to hear a noble Lord declare, to be as good and clear in the Church as was the title of their Lordships to their Own estates? So different Was his opinion, that he said broadly, that tithes belonged to the people; they were, or at least ought to constitute a fund, for providing religious instruction, and for affording charitable and religious consolation to the community.
845 These, he contended, were the true, original, legitimate objects, for which all Church property was granted. Tithes were a part of the property of the State, and of the people, and had often been dealt with accordingly. Tithe, not unfrequently, had been dealt with without looking to the tenure of the individual possessing an interest in it; for the right to tithe had been forfeited in cases where the individual had refused to adopt the religion of the State. If, at the present moment, as at the Reformation, an alteration in the established religion was to take place, the incumbent would lose his living, if he refused to conform to such alteration. In the same way, and on the same principle Oaths had been occasionally prescribed to be administered to the clergy, which, if not taken at once by the incumbent would subject him to deprivation. In various ways the State had interfered with Church property. If the State were now to endow a Catholic Church in Great Britain, could there be any doubt from whence the fund for the payment of the clergy of that establishment must come? The money for that purpose must come from the funds provided and set apart for religious instruction; and he ventured to say, that until the Catholic Church was endowed with a portion of those funds, neither peace, order, nor tranquillity would prevail in Ireland. There was no other mode of effecting that object, than by giving to the body in question their fair share of the wealth of the Church, which was, originally, set apart for instructing and affording religious consolation to the whole of the people of that country. Such a measure would he the best distribution of this vast property, and would purchase the peace of Ireland. He had heard from noble Lords on the opposite side of the House the most indecorous, extravagant, and highflying pretensions in respect of Church property. He had heard it stated, that the tenure of Church property stood on a higher footing than that of any other description of property. A more injudicious assertion could not he made. He had no wish that the tithe should belong to the landlord, who had no claim to it; but when he heard it laid down that this property could not be touched, he begged to point out to the promulgators of such an absurd doctrine the difference which existed between this and other species of property. Tithe was the property of the State, held for life by the clergy, on the consideration of performing certain services to the public.
846 Tithe was subject to the operation of capricious, arbitrary circumstances, in a way and to a degree which attached to no other species of property, and it might amount to much or little, at any period, according to circumstances. If the owner of the land cultivated corn he had to pay a full tenth; if, however, he laid his land down in grass, the tithe would be less; if he planted it, and turned it into forest, there would be no tithe at all. These were varying conditions of circumstances, which did not exist in respect of any other sort of property. Then, again, as to the origin of tithe, other property was not derived from the law, it was only protected by it, but tithe was altogether derived from the law, and never existed but as separated from or granted by the Crown. He would next draw their Lordships' attention to other instances in which this property had been interfered with. According to existing Statutes, if barren lands were brought into cultivation, they were exempted, for the first seven years, from the payment of tithe; so that here was an example, in which the property that was to yield tithe was wholly valueless to the tithe owner for a term of years. Then, again, the Irish law said, there shall be no tithe of agistment; there was also the Irish Composition Act, the operation of which, it was provided, should be voluntary. He rather thought the framers of that Statute now wished that it had been compulsory. These Statutes, however, were all direct interferences with this species of property on the part of the Legislature. The Archbishop of Canterbury had also brought in a Bill for effecting a composition of tithes in England. That most Rev. Prelate, however, was not the first person who had suggested a measure of this description, for Mr. Pitt caused a Bill to be brought into the House of Commons for effecting a composition of tithes—in the same manner that the land-tax was redeemed—and so as not to leave the amount of the tithe collected in the hands of the tithe-owner, but to entitle him, in lieu thereof, to receive a certain amount of consols. Dr. Paley, also, was a strenuous advocate for the commutation of tithe; and he could bring forward many other eminent authorities who long ago considered that tithe was a pernicious species of property, and and were anxious to get rid of it by commutation, or some other mode. Could that be said of any other species of property? It was said, that if tithes were touched, all other descriptions of property would be en- 847 dangered; and noble Lords said, "look to France." He repeated the advice—"look to France;" there was no tithe in France, it existed only in England and Ireland. He recommended them in conclusion to imitate the example of France—to provide comfortably for the clergy, but to commute at once, and for ever, tithe into a moderate land-tax. Nothing but that could save the Church both in England and Ireland from utter destruction. His Lordship concluded by presenting a petition from Kilnesson against tithes, &c.
The Bishop of London considered it extremely inconvenient and irregular for the noble Baron, day after day, on presenting petitions for the abolition of the present tithe system in Ireland, to enter into such explanations, and make such vehement declarations as those which he had this night ventured upon to their Lordships, against the property of the Established Church, and debating other matters in which its interests were involved, without giving previous notice of his intention. Such a notice would not only be regular but was really requisite, in order that those who considered it desirable to defend the interests of religion, might attend for the purpose of answering and refuting such imputations and statements. It was not his intention to enter into the discussion of the general question; but when the Irish Tithe Bill should come before their Lordships, he would endeavour to show that the tithe possessed by the clergy of the Church of England had been most faithfully applied to the uses of religion, and, therefore, were a sacred property. Till then, he deprecated the attacks of the noble Lord—attacks, indeed, which derived their whole efficacy from the frequency with which they were made. "Gutta cavat lapidem—non vi, sed sœpe cadendo." The noble Baron, in order to shew that Church property belonged to the public, had laboured to prove that it was held under a condition for the performance of certain duties, and he inferred, that if those duties were not performed, the right to such property no longer remained in the Church. In reply to this, he begged to ask the noble Baron whether there did not exist many feudal tenures in this country, under which large properties were held, by the performance of certain specific duties—which duties, however, from the alterations of times and circumstances, and the constitution of society, had fallen into disuse. The Church held its property upon 848 the same species of tenure as many Corporations; and he, therefore, asked whether their Lordships were prepared to call upon the Church to give up that property, on the ground that her revenues were no longer appropriated to the specific uses to which they were destined in former times in this kingdom; while nothing was said in respect of these Corporations which held similar estates, and derived from them such vast emoluments? He did not put this invidiously; but he should be prepared to shew, when the proper time arrived, that several Corporations and private individuals held their property with mere nominal duties to perform, as the consideration. Whether the Church was to be considered a Corporation or not, it would be a great hardship to deprive 1,000 individuals of their incomes, who did not now perform those duties, for doing which those incomes were granted. The statements made by the noble Baron hardly deserved a serious answer; but it was desirable that they should not go abroad, at this period of excitement, uncontradicted. The great evil resulting from such observations was, that his statements were so mixed up with truth and fallacy, that indifferent persons did not take the trouble of separating the one from the other; and, from want of proper investigation, truth gave colour to falsehood. That an evil existed under the present tithe system, with respect to the bringing of new lands into cultivation, he admitted, and the object of the Bill which had been brought in, by the most reverend Prelate, was, if possible, to remedy that evil. He allowed, too, that while the law remained as at present, a new incumbent might, in some cases, raise his tithes, and exact a rate of payment which must operate on the landholder or on the agriculturist, as a great check to improvement. This was, no doubt, a serious evil, and a remedy for it would, he trusted, be found. With respect to the general operation and principle of tithes, and to the theory as to whether the tithe fall on the consumer, or on the landlord, he would not presume to determine; but he thought the observations of Mr. Peyronnet Thompson were worthy of attention. He must premise, however, that this author was by no means friendly to tithes; but he gave his opinion as an honest man; this Gentleman, he believed, was also held in high estimation by the noble Lord. Mr. Thompson, in his Theory of Rent, said:—
In opposition to all these arguments, the conclusion is, that tithes fall on the landlords, 849 but have also a certain effect in preventing the cultivation of poor soils, and diminishing the outlay upon others; which, in return, must cause a small re-action upon price, but one far short of throwing the tax on the consumers. And it becomes of importance to ascertain the magnitude of this last effect, and to compare it with what would have been the result, if the support of the clergy had been raised by a tax on the produce of manufactures, instead of agriculture? The rents in England are supposed to be, in the aggregate, a third of the produce. Hence the case so often assumed as an example—with corn at 55s.—is not very far from an average case. And in it, the diminution of produce consequent on the reduced outlay, arising from a tax of one-tenth or a tithe, would be less than the three-hundredth part. Adding, therefore, this effect to the other, the whole diminution of produce effected by tithes in England—supposing them to be universal—may be estimated at less than the hundred-and-twelfth part. The value of the whole annual produce of agriculture in Great Britain, compared with that of manufactures, has been estimated as being as one to three. If, then, the support of the clergy were to be raised by a tax on the produce of manufactures, instead of agriculture, the tax must be a third of a tithe, or three-and-a-half per cent; and the consequence of this would be, in addition to the tax being paid by the consumers, to cause a gratuitous loss, or prevention of production, which, if ten per cent may be assumed as the average rate of manufacturing profits, would be equal to ten-elevenths, or three-and-a-half per cent, on the whole amount of goods manufactured.Mr. Thompson then went into some arithmetical calculations, with which he would not trouble their Lordships; and afterwards proceeded to state:—Hence the real state of the charge against tithes is, first, that the tax, with the exception of a trifling reduction, is paid by the landlords, instead of being paid by the consumers, as would have been the case if it had been levied on manufactures; and, secondly, that there is a saving of more than nine-tenths of the loss or prevention of production which would have taken place by the other mode. When tithes are asserted to be a peculiarly pernicious and impolitic mode of taxation, these facts are always kept out sight. The proof of the assertion falls to the ground upon examination, like the proof of many other popular outcries. As the woodpecker, the rook, and the goatsucker, have been persecuted, time out of mind, for imaginary injuries, so the ecclesiastical rook has been charged with collecting his subsistence in a manner peculiarly injurious to the public, through clear ignorance or concealment of the nature of the process. Some species of commutation might possibly be better still. But it is plain that the extended outcry has 850 been made either through ignorance or a desire to direct the hostility of the community to a particular quarter by misrepresentation.Such were the opinions of Mr. Thompson, and he had no doubt that they would be considered a good authority by the noble Lord on this subject.
The Earl of Radnorsaid, he had more than once heard his noble friend, who was in the habit of presenting petitions of this description, censured for expressing his opinions; but that censure he had always thought, was unjust. His noble friend had argument and common sense on his side, and instead of provoking the censure of the right reverend Prelate, for the conduct he pursued ought to receive some acknowledgment. He would take upon himself to state, that the opinions of his noble friend, on this matter, were in unison with the sentiments of nine out of ten of the intelligent and enlightened people of this country. Their Lordships ought to be made acquainted with such opinions, because they were those of the people. The right reverend Prelate censured his noble friend, because he did not give notice of his intention to present these petitions. It appeared, however, that the right reverend Prelate, himself, was not unprepared for this discussion; for he had come down with what he considered a complete answer to the observations of his noble friend. Whether his noble friend was right or not in his statement of this question, he would not take upon himself to decide; but he would affirm, that the feelings of the agricultural portion of the people were in unison with his noble friend's remarks. The people, he begged to tell the right reverend Prelate, would not be satisfied with the principle of composition. There was a Bill of that character last year before their Lordships, and he had reason to know that it was looked upon with dissatisfaction. With respect to the principle of the Church being a Corporate body, or rather that it consisted of 10,000 Corporate bodies, who were supposed to hold for life, under the condition of performing certain duties, he begged to ask, how that principle operated in Ireland, where the mass of the population were Catholics, and, therefore, could not receive those advantages which such a revenue, if applied in another way, might purchase? He thought it hard that his noble friend was censured for the explanations which he considered it necessary to give on presenting petitions, for these explanations and statements were in his (Lord Radnor's) judg- 851 merit pregnant with important consequences, and, as such deserved their Lordships' best consideration.
Lord Teynhamsaid, that it was the general opinion of the agricultural part of the community that tithes operated prejudicially to their interests. He was sure that such was the prevalent feeling in the county of Kent, where the cultivators of the soil bitterly complained of them.
Lord Kingsaid, that his observations upon the tithe system had been confined to its operation in Ireland. In reference to the extract which the right reverend Prelate had read, he knew that there was a difference of opinion between Messrs. Thompson and Ricardo, the former maintaining that tithe was a deduction from rent, and the latter that it was a tax upon the produce of land. He believed that Mr. Ricardo in this instance was wrong, therefore, he (Lord King) did not object to tithe as a tax upon the produce of the land, but as an impediment to its cultivation, and consequently to the employment of labour.
Petition laid on the Table with several others of the same nature, presented also by Lord King, from various parts of Ireland.