§ EARL FORTESCUE, in rising to call attention to the treatment of the Salvation Army in different parts of the country, and to move for—
A Copy of any authentic report that may exist of the proceedings in the case of the Queen against the Justices of the county of Southampton in the Court of Queen's Bench,said, he regretted much the delay in bringing forward the question of which he had given Notice before the Easter Recess; but every postponement had been made at the reasonable request of some noble Lord. He had learnt that the remarkable body called the Salvation Army originated more than 12 years ago, though it had only of late attained its present daily-increasing development. It had more than 300 corps in the United Kingdom, and supported some 650 missionaries called officers and cadets. On Sunday, April 30, more than 22,000 attended its morning services at 7, and more than 50,000 marched in its processions. More than 5,000 attended its weekday services. The Army had now invaded France, and had its head-quarters at Paris; and numerous French papers had noticed, several of them with sympathy, the proceedings of 819 the Armée du Salut. One of them even warmly welcomed the Army's French paper, called En Avant. The English paper, The War Cry, quite ignoring all secular matters, already, it was said, reached a circulation of 300,000 a-week. The local contributions to it were estimated at £57,000 a-year, besides £18,000, daily increasing, secured for building a congress hall, &c., as certified by chartered accountants and solicitors in the City, who also testified that General Booth, its head, had never touched any of the Army money, except for strictly Army purposes. Till quite lately the newspapers had constantly reported disorders and outrages in different parts of the country, East, West, North, and South, in connection with the Salvation Army, in some few instances members of it being convicted of obstructing some highway by processions, or halts for singing and prayer, or of disobeying some prohibition of their proceedings by the local authorities; but never of violence, even towards their ruffianly assailants, much less towards the police. Almost invariably they were complainants of having been insulted, assaulted, and sometimes seriously injured or put in peril, without provocation. At Chester, for instance, Miss Falconbridge was stunned by a stone; near Crediton, some of the Army were attacked in their carriage, beaten, and put in great danger by having had their reins cut and one of their wheels loosened by some of the Skeleton Army, as it was called, which seemed everywhere to be composed of the worst roughs in the place. Of course, there was in the Salvation Army that mixture of good and evil, of wheat and tares, to be found in everything human; but there could be no reasonable doubt that the immense majority of the Army believed themselves to be engaged in a holy work; and when numbers of old and young of both sexes were found publicly declaring that, whereas before joining the Army they had been living moat shameful and wicked lives, but had since been enabled, for so many years, months, or weeks, to lead new and better lives, and finding a peace and comfort in so doing, previously unknown, meant to persevere, he could not but feel thankful that even if, in some cases, only for a while, so many should have been cheered, purified, and elevated, who had before been lying hopeless, foul, and helpless 820 in their degradation. Such being the Salvation Army, with nothing apparently very ephemeral in its character, its treatment by the different local authorities became important from the large numbers and vast extent of country affected by it, quite apart from the question of the individual rights of law-abiding Englishmen, justly dear to a nation long accustomed to orderly liberty, and apart from the question, also, of the bearing upon the national character of any toleration of ruffianism in connection with that Army. It was not his object to find fault with any of the authorities, Metropolitan or Provincial, much less with the Government, for their treatment of the Salvation Army. He did not know enough about it to venture to do so; but from what he had gathered from a cursory view of the cases reported in the papers, he was inclined to doubt whether, on the one hand, the authorities had always sufficiently borne in mind the legal difference between the case of a man, by some lawful action, giving an opportunity to others of committing an unlawful act, and that of a man causing another to perform some unlawful act; and, on the other hand, whether the members of the Salvation Army had borne sufficiently in mind St. Paul's declaration that all things which were lawful were not necessarily expedient; and the lesson taught by his earnest anxiety that he should not, by any liberty of his own, lead weaker brethren to stumble. In conclusion, he would, with their Lordships' permission, state from a memorandum received from one of the Army the views taken by them of their legal rights, and of their cruel wrongs. Many of these wrongs, they stated, proceeded from the spirit of ruffianism now so rife, which, whenever unchecked, had shown itself in violence done to others besides the Salvation Army, as, to take an instance out of many, in the attack upon the Bishop of Exeter's Temperance Meeting. Instances of this spirit had, he would observe, been seen quite recently in England, Wales, and Scotland, to say nothing now of Ireland, as the proceedings at Camborne, in Cornwall, and at Wrexham, in Kent, and in the Isle of Skye proved. They stated that, where the authorities had shown themselves determined to put down disorder and protect the Salvation Army, they had always suc- 821 ceeded in doing so; but that, when the authorities had shown themselves unfavourable to the Army, and had prohibited its processions, these outrages had almost always occurred. The Army was determined to carry on its proceedings resolutely, but without violence, in spite of the outrages of the lawless and the proclamations of the authorities. It hoped to receive the protection to which it had a right; but, whether that was given or refused, it would persevere in its work. Such were the views and declarations of these well-meaning and harmless, if somewhat wild and eccentric, tens of thousands of their fellow-citizens. He would now, with many thanks for their kind indulgence, conclude with the Motion standing in his name.Moved, That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty for, Copy of any authentic report that may exist of the proceedings in the case of the Queen against the Justices of the county of Southampton in the Court of Queen's Bench.—(The Earl Fortescue.)
§ LORD COLERIDGEsaid, that he was not aware what line his noble Friend would take on the subject before their Lordships, or of the particular instances which he would bring forward. He (Lord Coleridge) spoke in that House under considerable restraint, because it might be his duty to sit elsewhere in judgment upon a case connected with the Salvation Army, and he should be sorry to say a word which might prejudice a case which might come before him. He had only heard one side of the case now before the Queen's Bench—namely, that on behalf of the Salvation Army. Only one of the magistrates in that case had made a statement with regard to it. He had known that gentleman from his youth, and he knew that he was a man of the highest character, who was absolutely incapable of doing anything intentionally unjust. If, therefore, he and his colleagues had erred, he (Lord Coleridge) felt sure that it was the result simply of a mistake in their judgment. The two conflicting rights which magistrates had to consider must be regarded. He took it that every Englishman had an absolute and unqualified right to go about his business and perform legal acts with the protection of the law; and he apprehended that walking through the streets in order and in procession, even if accompanied by music and the singing of hymns, was 822 an absolutely lawful act, an act in the doing of which every subject had a right to be protected. On the other hand, there was hardly any act which could not be so done as to become a nuisance to the public peace; and the circumstances were such at times as to compel the local authorities to determine that such acts, though lawful in themselves, should not be done, because the public peace was thereby endangered. In such a case, the duty of the magistrates was equally clear. Their first duty was to preserve the peace, and to take care that there was no disturbance of any kind. Those conflicting rights might give rise to extremely delicate questions; but he felt sure that where the magistrates insisted on law and authority being respected there was little danger of the peace being disturbed. Their Lordships would understand his reason for abstaining from giving an opinion on the case to which the noble Earl had referred; but he might say that the "hard labour" did seem to him to be an unfortunate part of the sentence, very different to account for or to justify. As to the question whether or not the procession ought to have been stopped in that particular case, of course he was unable then to give an answer.
§ LORD MOUNT TEMPLEsaid, that, looking to the disposition abroad to lawlessness and violence, the impunity of outrage on the Salvation Army might establish an evil precedent for other cases more generally approved. The peculiarity in this case was that the struggle was between physical force and moral force; between arbitrary, violent tyranny and patient endurance. The object of this "Army" was simple, honest, and praiseworthy. They persuaded working classes to give up intemperance and vice, and to lead self-denying, religious lives. To gain attention they marched in procession, and sang hymns in thoroughfares. They required from their members a pledge of abstinence from beer, spirits, and tobacco. This had been injurious to the business of the licensed victuallers, and their adherents mobbed them, hurled stones, and struck blows; and met with passive perseverance, without even irritating words. In some places this cruel violence was easily stopped; in others the authorities would not afford protection. The influence of the publicans' interest was already powerful, If they acquired a new 823 power of putting down by violence any moral demonstration against the liquor traffic, what security had we that they would use their power with moderation? Those who worked by appeals to conscience to raise men out of vice ought to receive protection from the savage violence of rioters.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURYfelt that he ought not to allow this subject to pass without remark. His noble Friend (Earl Fortescue) had mentioned that the Lower House of Convocation had addressed the Upper House on this subject, and had asked that it should be considered. Accordingly the Bishops had appointed a Committee of their own Body for that purpose. Some difficulty had doubtless arisen in reference to this subject, in consequence of the members of the Salvation Army acting in a way which was not customary among religious bodies, and many good people were shocked by what they regarded as a want of reverence on the part of the "Army." But it had been well remarked that, perhaps, their peculiar mode of proceeding was such as might have considerable influence over uncultivated minds; and, looking to the fact that there was in this country a vast mass of persons who were not at present reached by the more regular ministrations of the Church, it was not unlikely that much good might eventually result from the more irregular action of the Salvationists. He had been informed that the leaders of the movement were persons of unimpeachable character, and that they were most desirous of checking the extravagances of many of their followers, and that there had been much misrepresentation spread abroad with regard to them. He trusted, therefore, that any movement of this kind, provided it were carried on with decency and propriety, would be encouraged, and that it would be able usefully to supplement the efforts of the regular clergy in affording spiritual aid to the great mass of the population.
§ LORD WAVENEYsaid, that, speaking from his own personal experience, he could testify that the action of the Salvation Army was not such as to call for the interference of the authorities, as had been recently shown at Ballymena, County Antrim, Ireland. He believed if proper protection were afforded to these persons there would be no breach 824 of the law arising out of their proceedings.
THE EARL OF ROSEBERYsaid, their Lordships would quite understand the difficulty which a Member of the Government found himself in, in having to take part in such a discussion as this. The noble Earl (Earl Fortescue) had given their Lordships a full description of the Salvation Army. Even if he had any personal views on the subject, it would not be right for him to state them upon that occasion; and, on the part of the Government, he could only deal with the Motion as it stood upon the Paper. The noble Earl had moved for a Return of certain Papers which were at present in the Crown Office. He could assure the noble Earl, in the first place, that the Secretary of State had no information with regard to what had taken place before the Lord Chief Justice than what was to be derived from the newspapers, and no official documents whatever were in existence in connection with that case other than the affidavits which had been filed, and the rule requiring the Justices to state a case for the consideration of the Court. It was not customary for such documents to be laid upon the Table of the House, and he could not consent to produce them at the present stage. The object of the noble Earl, however, had doubtless been fully satisfied by the very interesting discussion to which his Motion had given rise. As to the views of the Home Secretary, they had been stated by the Home Secretary in a letter which was in the hands of their Lordships, and which was addressed, on the 1st April, 1881, to the magistrates of Basingstoke. That letter had been so often printed that he did not think it necessary to repeat it now. The matter was still sub judice, and he did not know whether, when the decision was given, it would be necessary for the Secretary of State to add anything to the letter which he had referred to; but it was clear that he could make no further statement on that subject now.
§ Motion (by leave of the House) withdrawn.