[BILL 117.] CONSIDERATION. (Hansard, 12 June 1868)

§ MR. VANCE
said, that the Bill was one paving the way for the confiscation of the property both of the English and Irish branches of the Established Church. It was a violation of the rights of property, of the Act of Union, and of the Oath of the Sovereign. Upon the present occasion he did not intend to oppose the Bill itself, but wished to draw attention to a clause which had been hastily and inadvertently introduced the other evening. The clause professed to deal in a tender manner with private rights, but seemed to treat corporate rights in a rough way. The misfortune of 1530 the intended measure of the right hon. Gentleman was that it was a Bill of confiscation, without having any object of public utility. It proposed to confiscate three-fifths of the property of the Irish Church, without providing any equivalent fund for the support of that Church. It was a great defect in many of our Acts of Parliament that they showed too great a respect fur private rights, and too great a disregard for corporate rights. One of the greatest anomalies in the Irish Church was caused by certain clauses which had crept into an Act of Parliament. There would have been but little complaint of the want of provision for religious purposes in certain parishes in Ireland had it not been for the enactments which had crept into the Church Temporalities Act. The misfortune was that whilst that Act enacted that, where there was no church in any parish or where service had not been performed in a parish for a certain length of time, the revenues of such parish should be forfeited to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners; but it contained a saving clause, which enacted that where a benefice in such parish was in the gift of a private individual there was to be no sequestration, and thus such parish frequently remained without any religious supervision while its revenues were received by an absentee clergyman. The tight hon. Gentleman carried that tenderness for private rights through the whole of the measure he shadowed forth—while confiscating, according to his own admission, three-fifths of the property of the Irish Church, without offering any counterbalancing public advantage. The clause in the Bill to which he wished on the present occasion to draw special attention was one which appeared to have crept into it, through haste and inadvertence. It provided that— Every person who shall be appointed to any office in the College of Maynooth after the passing of this Act shall hold the said office subject to the pleasure of Parliament, and likewise every Presbyterian minister hereafter to be appointed to receive any shave of the Reguim Donum." The first, part of that clause was an absolute injustice, while the last part of it was an absolute absurdity. The Bill proposed to enact that the presentation to all benefices in the Irish Church which should become vacant should be immediately suspended, and it was understood that the presentation to the offices in the College of Maynooth were to be suspended also. So far from that being done by this clause, however, it permitted all vacancies which 1531 might occur in that institution to be filled up, merely directing that the whole grant should be subject to the pleasure of Parliament. But what was the effect of that provision? Had not the grant to Maynooth always been subject to the pleasure of Parliament, which had at any time power to abolish it either in part or altogether. The part of the clause which referred to the Regium Donum was very vague. The Regium Donum was commonly understood to be a provision for the Presbyterian and Nonconformist clergy in Ireland; but, in fact, technically, it might be a Royal giant for any other purposes. There was no public recognition by any Act of Parliament of the Regium Donum. It was mere surplusage to say that that grant was to be at the disposal of Parliament, when it was voted in the Estimates year by year, and might at any time be abolished, either wholly or in part. The clause if agreed to would be utterly inoperative, and therefore he begged to move that that part of it which referred to the Regium Donum should be omitted.

MR. GLADSTONE
said, he thought the hon. Member had been rather severe upon this clause, and it was a great pity that he had not been present when it was agreed to in Committee. All he could say was that he was in no way responsible for the clause, which had been introduced in order to meet the views of those who sympathized with the hon. Member with respect to this measure, and which was not necessary either to carry out the objects of the authors of the Bill, or to meet the views of the Government as expressed by the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary. The hon. Member said that the first part of the clause—that which related to Maynooth—was unjust, and that the second part of it—that which related to the Regium Donum—was absurd. He appeared, however, to be more scandalized by the absurdity than by the injustice, for he proposed to omit the absurd part of the clause and to retain the unjust part of it. The course that the House should take upon the subject was quite plain. 1532 These private rights were recognized in the 4th Resolution. In his opinion there could be no doubt that with respect to this clause they had gone beyond all usage; and if the matter were viewed in a strict and fastidious sense, possibly beyond propriety, in taking notice in a statute of rights which depended entirely on the pleasure of Parliament. But if the grant to Maynooth were to be referred to in the statute, it was only just that the Regium Donum should be placed upon the same footing, and that the legislation with regard to both grants should be equal, which would be the case if the clause were passed. The fact was that the provision with respect to the Regium Donum grew out of the 4th Resolution which had been adopted by the House. That Resolution distinctly recognized the existence of a personal interest on the part of those who received the Regium Donum. It was not a legal interest, but it was an interest of a kind with which the House had always shown its readiness to deal generously; and if they were to make any distinction between the College of Maynooth and the Regium Donum they would be committing a manifest practical injustice. The hon. Gentleman appeared to forget that the Bill contained provisions for the discharge of the duties of the minister during the continuance of the Act, and that the only object was to prevent the creation of freeholds until Parliament could deal with the whole subject of the Irish Church.

§ MR. NEWDEGATE
said, he must reiterate his objection to the Bill; and he presumed his arguments had some weight, because the Roman Catholic Members were so desirous to refute them. He had voted with the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy (Mr. Aytoun) on the ground that it was unjust to pass au Act designed to injure the Anglican clergy, while the professors of Maynooth were allowed to be free from its operations. The right hon. Member for South Lancashire (Mr. Gladstone) apparently thought such a course just, and had voted the other way; but now, by sanctioning the clause, he had endeavoured to cover an injustice by an absurdity. The position of those who derive benefit from the Regium Donum was totally different from the professors at Maynooth, because the latter were appointed under an Act of Parliament. It was perfectly true that the Regium Donum in the aggregate was sanctioned under the Appropriation Act, but the appoint- 1533 ments were not specified in any Act of Parliament. On the other hand there was a clause in the Maynooth Act specifying the appointments. The position of persons receiving a share of the Regium Donum was therefore totally different from that of persons appointed under the Maynooth Act of 1845.