REPORT. (Hansard, 17 June 1870)

THE BISHOP OF WINCHESTER

said, he was indebted to the noble and learned Lord (Lord Cairns) for some Amendments necessary to make the Bill harmonize with the Bankruptcy Law, and these he proposed to adopt. Other 321 Amendments suggested by his noble and learned Friend he could not adopt. Although, no doubt, they would remove some anomalies, they would not promote the object which he, and he believed their Lordships also, had in view—namely, the removal of the scandal occasioned by sequestrations, and the assertion of the principle that the endowment was primarily for the benefit of the parishioners, and only secondarily for that of the clergyman. These Amendments he could not therefore accept, and if they were adopted he should be obliged to throw up the Bill.

§ LORD CAIRNS

said, he could not allow the Bill to pass this stage without protesting against some of its principles, which he thought went much too far. The Bill would remedy the great defect of the existing law by allowing the Bishop to appropriate an unlimited portion of the income of the sequestered benefice to the spiritual necessities of the parish; but he objected to the clauses which made bankruptcy compulsory in the event of a clergyman being involved in difficulties, even though the creditors might be willing to accede to a compromise. This, he feared, would create a greater scandal than it removed, for bankruptcy would be a greater scandal than sequestration. He must also protest against the clauses which enabled Bishops and Archbishops, in cases where a beneficed clerk has been adjudged bankrupt, and shall fail to obtain his discharge within two years of adjudication, without any legal proceedings, summarily and without further process to declare that the bankrupt has forfeited his benefice. If a clergyman charged with drunkenness or immorality was tried before the proper tribunal, from whose decision either party could appeal, the penalty was two to five years' suspension; now, the misfortune or offence of bankruptcy was surely a more venial one, and it was not just, therefore, to empower the Bishop, or on appeal, the Archbishop, acting at his pleasure, without any judicial process, to visit it with forfeiture of the benefice. He could not allow the Bill to proceed without protesting against the introduction of a system of discipline which the country would be loth—to say the least—to see established.