§ The following Protests were also entered against the Municipal Corporations Declaration Bill, which was read a third time without any debate.
§ "Dissentient,
§ "1. Because the declared purpose of the Bill is to relieve persons whose conscientious scruples prevent them from complying with the existing law, and it is the avowed principle of the Bill, that no class of men ought to be excluded from civil office on account of their religious opinions. Nevertheless, the operation of the Bill is confined to three classes of Dissenters alone, as if its principle did not extend equally to all.
§ "2. Because this violation of principle, and this injustice towards all who are thus excluded from the benefit of the proposed act, is not justified by a consideration of the numbers whom it will relieve, these being a very small though respectable body of persons.
§ "3. Because, even in the relief proposed to be given to those persons, there is a wide departure from the true principles of religious liberty by the declaration of religious belief which is exacted. This declaration is framed upon the assumption that the State has a right to inquire into the spiritual faith of its subjects, a position which has been the stronghold of intolerance in all ages, and may still, if maintained, be used to defend every kind of persecution.
§ "BROUGHAM, DENMAN,
§ "RADNOR, VASSALL HOLLAND."
§ "Dissentient,
§ "1st. Because a solemn and public declaration on accepting office in a Corporation, that the person so accepting it 'has conscientious scruples against subscribing the declaration required by an Act passed in the 9th year of his late Majesty George the Fourth,' and that 'he solemnly, sincerely, and truly declares 1373 and affirms, that he will not exercise any power, authority, or influence, which he may possess by virtue of the office he so accepts, to injure or weaken the Protestant Church, as it is by law established in England, nor to disturb the said Church, or the bishops and clergy of the said Church, in the possession of any right or privileges to which they may be by law entitled,' affords, in my judgment, ample security against any exercise of municipal authority injurious to the Established Church, in any legal or intelligible sense of that term. In truth, no stronger assurance and no more explicit promise can be devised, or in reason, justice, or charity exacted, from one class of our fellow subjects for the purpose of allaying the gratuitous suspicions and apprehensions of another.
§ "2ndly, Because, by the words proposed to be omitted, persons who take the benefit of the Bill are called upon to declare themselves 'Quakers,' 'Moravians,' or 'Separatists.' Yet the meaning of those terms is not explained in the Bill—and, whatever it may be, a different one from that which the framers of the Bill intended to carry may be conscientiously assigned and understood by those who take the benefit thereof. The classing of persons who feel a scruple in making the declaration prescribed by the 9th of George the Fourth, under the title of sects, real or supposed, is obviously neither necessary nor useful to give validity or credit to the assurance required to be solemnly and publicly declared and affirmed by the provisions of the Bill.
§ "The designation of sects who derive no revenues or privileges from the State, and over whose doctrines and discipline the State neither has, nor pretends to have, nor ought to have any jurisdiction whatever, must, in the nature of things, be loose, inaccurate, precarious, and uncertain. It may be invidious and offensive, and it is obviously, on this occasion, unnecessary to the two main objects of the Bill, which are, 1st, to relieve such loyal subjects as are by scruples of conscience excluded from the enjoyment of municipal offices; and,2ndly, to prevent such persons, when admitted, from exercising the powers they so attain to the injury of the Established Church.
§ "It is clear that the assurance contained in the latter part of the declaration in this Bill must, in the judgment of its framers, be quite sufficient to relieve those who scruple to make the declaration prescribed by the 9th of George the Fourth, inasmuch as, unless they were willing to give that assurance, the whole Bill would be null and of no effect.
§ "It is equally clear that the said assurance cannot, in any degree, be weakened or impaired by the person who makes it omitting to give to himself, or those with whom he concurs, names and descriptions to which no definite or legal meaning is annexed. It follows that, if the words prepared to be omitted had been struck out, the two direct purposes of the bill, namely, the relief of tender consciences 1374 and the protection of the Ecclesiastical Establishments from all hostile exercise of municipal power, would have been adequately fulfilled; and I am at a loss to discover what advantage can be derived to Church or State, or to the interests of the community, by exacting from conscientious men a designation of themselves or their brethren, which amounts to little more than a nickname for the sect to which they are supposed to belong.
§ "3rdly. Because the introduction of these denominations in the declaration may, in my apprehension, lead to vexatious litigation, and such litigation to yet more vexatious inquiries respecting the theological and speculative tenets of individuals—inquiries on principles unjustifiable, and in practice injurious to religious liberty. The right of a man to substitute the declaration proposed by this Bill for that enacted by the Act of George the Fourth, might be questioned on the score of his not being as he professed to be in the declaration, a Quaker, a Moravian, or a Separatist; and the court of law called upon to try his right under the words of the statute would thus be compelled to pronounce judgment on the character of his religious creed, a jurisdiction which no human or at least no regular tribunal has the right or the means to assume, and which is more accordant with the spirit of the inquisition of Rome than consistent with the habits and professions of a Protestant community and a free people.
§ 4thly. "Because I adhere to the reason of a dissentient to an amendment in the declaration of the 9th of George the Fourth, which was entered and signed in the Journals of this House on the 25th of April, 1828, and I cannot directly or indirectly sanction the opinion that 'any particular faith in matters of religion is necessary to the proper discharge, of duties purely political or temporal.'
§ (Signed) "VASSAL HOLLAND,
§ "And for the three first reasons.
§ "RADNOR, DENMAN."