NATIONAL ASSEMBLY OF TILE CHURCH OF ENGLAND (POWERS) BILL. [H.L.]

HL Deb 02 July 1919 vol 35 cc91-151

Debate resumed (according to Order) upon the Amendment moved by Viscount HALDANE to the Motion "That the Bill be now read 2^a." The Amendment was as follows: To leave out all the words after "That" for the purpose of inserting the following words "this House is unwilling, especially in the absence of independent inquiry, to assent to legislation which would exclude the greater part of the people of England from effective influence in the affairs of the National Church as established by the Constitution, and which is so framed as to enable members of that Church to pass laws that may wholly change its character without adequate supervision by Parliament."

THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD BIRKENHEAD)

My Lords, the time has arrived at which it is proper that some observations should be made on this important subject by some one who speaks, in a sense which I will presently explain, on behalf of the Government. My contribution to the debate in the circumstances under which I make it will be brief in its character, but your Lordships are certainly entitled to be informed of the attitude which the Government propose to take in relation to the extremely important proposals which have been the subject of prolonged debate in this House.

The Government, after careful consideration, have decided that they are unable to support the Bill in its present shape, but they do not propose to ask the Government Whips to register your Lord ships' votes, and they do not ask any member of the Government to vote except as his own unfettered judgment on these proposals may suggest to him. Every member of the Government will, of course, vote as he thinks proper and on the merits of the arguments which have been presented to the House. It may very properly be asked, What circumstances is it that has led the Government to an attitude which may be pronounced neutral upon proposals that very greatly concern the Church of England, and, because they greatly concern the Church of England, greatly concern the State also. I should not be dealing candidly with the House if I did not say at once that just as there has been a difference of opinion among your Lordships, just as there has been a difference of opinion (illustrated even in this House) among distinguished members of the Church, so there has been a difference of opinion among the members of His Majesty's Government.

No one who has listened to this debate—certainly no member of the Government who has listened to it—can fail to have been deeply impressed by the speeches which have been made. I have been a listener of your Lordships' debates now for months, and certainly I have never listened to a debate which has been so ably conducted on all sides, and, if I may say so, in which so many remarkable and various contributions of thought have been made. I agree with what was said last night by Lord Salisbury—that, listening to this debate, no one could affect to disregard the support which the Bill has received from very different sections both within the Church of England and proceeding from those who are not members of the Church of England. We should be insensible indeed to the evidence of opinion which this debate has disclosed if we did not take careful note of the fact that so many have addressed, from many angles of thought, considered arguments to the House.

It may then be asked, if such an impression has been produced upon the Government as has been produced on my own mind, how it is that the Government is unable—to use the phrase which I carefully chose a few moments ago—to support the Bill in its present shape. Upon this point Lord Emmott made an observation in his interesting speech yesterday to which I desire to refer. He said that all the criticisms that had been made were not, properly considered, criticisms which were appropriate to the Second Reading stage of a Bill, and that almost all of them were criticisms which would more naturally have been made upon the Committee stage. No one has greater experience of Parliamentary procedure than Lord Emmott, and no one is more familiar than he with the distinction between a Second Reading point and a Committee point. The observation which I now offer is made with a due recognition of his experience on these points. I have to take a different view. I am not prepared to assent to the view that either the Government, or an individual, when driven to reach a conclusion upon the Second Reading stage of a Bill, can banish from mind, in forming that conclusion, the cumulative effect of a large number of points, each of which if considered individually may be pronounced to be more properly Committee points than Second Reading points. It may well be that nine or ten Amendments may be required to bring the Bill into conformity with the views of critics. It may well be possible to contend that each of these views, individually considered, is one which can be put on Committee stage; yet it is possible to urge the conclusion that the cumulative effect of these points of criticism—unless we are told on behalf of those who are responsible for the measure that in respect of each and all they are prepared for accommodation—can and ought to be reflected in the Second Reading stage of the debate.

I listened, as every one listened, with deep respect and unbroken attention to the speech made by the most rev. Primate, and I have read and re-read that speech, as indeed it was my duty knowing that it would be necessary for me to intervene at some stage in the debate. I do not think I do the speech of the most rev. Primate an injustice when I say that the driving force behind it was derived from the forcible complaint which the most rev. Primate made of the delay, the difficulties, and the disappointments which lay in the path of those great Shepherds of the Church who conceive that their charge required legislative attention and correction, and who came again and again to the Parliament of the Nation, and again and again went away with empty hands on matters which in their judgment brooked of no delay. Weighty indeed was the argument the most rev. Primate advanced on that point, and I am authorised to say—and I say it on behalf of a Government which, at the moment at least, represents a more varied and extensive range of political opinion than we have been accustomed to in the past—that applying our minds to the experience of the past (I will say a few words in a moment as to the future) there has been great ground of complaint and of grievance, and I shall be doing the Government less than justice if I do not make it plain that they recognise to-day that there is ground for what was the main complaint advanced in his forcible speech by the most rev. Primate.

I am bound to add that I do not think, if I may say so with respect, that the most rev. Primate and the Archbishop of York, who intervened in the course of the most powerful and interesting speech made yesterday by the Bishop of Manchester, were happily inspired in the particular illustration which they suggested. The Bishop of Manchester, in a speech to which your Lordships, whether agreeing thereto or not, listened with delight, was challenging the statement that many grave cases could be produced in which there had been intolerable delay. The case selected, I think, by the most rev. Primate and the Archbishop of York was that of the Union of Benefices Bill. The selection was, I think, unfortunate. I was asked by the right rev. Prelate who was in charge of that Bill to attempt to secure that the Bill should receive facilities in the House of Commons. I stated, in the course of debate upon that Bill, that it was a Bill in my judgment which in the interest of the Church ought to receive those facilities, and I wrote a letter to the Cabinet in which I set out a considered argument why those facilities should be given. The matter was considered by the Home Committee of the Cabinet at a meeting at which I regret I was unable to be present, but I have been informed since that a decision was taken, not many days ago, by the Home Committee of the Cabinet that a case had been made out for that Bill by the right rev. Prelate who commended it to your Lordships' attention—that the case made out by him and recommended by me had been readily assented to by the Home Committee of the Cabinet—and I was informed that the Bill was to receive all the facilities afforded to a Government measure in the House of Commons. Therefore I think I am entitled to say, of this specific illustration taken in reply to the arguments of the Bishop of Manchester, that those who took it, if I may say so with profound respect, would perhaps have acted more wisely had they ascertained what the history of that measure had been since it left this House, after the statement by me, made on behalf of the Government, of warm sympathy and an earnest desire—

THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

May I interrupt the noble and learned Lord to say that I am most grateful for what he has said, and thankful for the assistance that he has given. The precise point of my contention was in reply to the statement of the Bishop of Manchester, that in his experience no question involving legislation had been before Convocation for twelve years, and this particular matter of the Union of Benefices Bill was then mentioned. I was not aware of the facts set out by the noble and learned Lord.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

The comment which I was making is not disturbed by the explanation of the Archbishop of York, because I remember that the dialogue, if I may so call it, between the Bishop of Manchester and the Archbishop proceeded upon a further repartee made by the Bishop: Non mihi tantas componere lites; but I heard the Bishop add that at any rate that Bill had come before your Lordships twice and therefore could hardly be cited as a very convincing illustration, to which the Archbishop or the most rev. Primate replied: "Yes, but what progress has it made?" or "What has happened to it?" I have supplied the answer to that question.

Do not let me even attempt to give the impression that I am suggesting that this complaint can be disposed of by citing the case of one Bill, however important, which has been dealt with. I do not make that answer. But I say quite plainly that it is notorious that in the past it has been unduly difficult for the Church to obtain that consideration and that time from Parliament which are indispensably necessary if the Church is, under modern conditions, to carry out its great task. I go a little further. I say that it is not permanently tolerable. It has been tolerated perhaps too long that the Church, while it is described, and truly described, as a National Church, should find itself placed at a disadvantage in what is a National Assembly by the circumstances to which attention has been called: first of all that there has been in the past immense and growing Parliamentary congestion, and, secondly—and the most rev. Primate called repeated attention to this in his speech—that there are many members of the House of Commons who no longer are members of the Church of England in the strict sense, and who, in the language of a speaker in the debate, feel some kind of delicacy in intervening when purely Church matters are the subject of discussion.

I dismiss this part of the ease by saying, Let there be no misunderstanding. It is realised that there has in the past been a grievance. There is the most abundant readiness to discuss and consider that grievance with a view to its removal; but I think I ought to add an observation which has not been touched upon in the debate so far, and which in my judgment is extremely relevant to the main case that was made by the most rev. Primate. The conditions in the House of Commons have undergone profound modification in the last six years. How permanent that change will prove to be I do not know, and I am not rash enough to predict, but let no one be guilty of ignoring the profound change which, I believe with success, the conduct of business in the House of Commons has undergone.

We are all apt to generalise of the pre-war days. I am not bold enough to predict that the conditions which prevailed in the days before the war will not recur. I do not know; no one knows; but I can remind your Lordships of the nature of those conditions, and Lord Emmott will know them very well. I am not dealing now with non-controversial legislation, but with great controversial measures, which engaged the activities of the two great Parties. Everybody remembers what happened in the Committee stage debates in the House of Commons. Everybody remembers the congestion of business. Everybody remembers the absolute impossibility of finding time for the discussion of the most urgent measures. What took place then was that on every great controversial measure the combatant forces of the two Parties were deployed. Committees were appointed, consisting on one side of those who were to defend and on the other of those who were to attack the proposals of the Government. The result was that so much eloquence, ingenuity, and perseverance in debate was exhibited that no first-class Bill ever had any chance of haying more than one-third of its contents even considered in Committee. For the moment all that has happily disappeared.

I have expressly excluded myself from the supposition that I am pronouncing any considered view as to whether the change will last. But it is very necessary to notice the effect of that change and the consequence of that change if it does last. At the present moment the difficulty is not in finding Parliamentary time in order to consider the results of Committee work that is done upstairs; the difficulty at the present time, as I am informed, is to provide a sufficient number of measures to engage the activities of those Committees which are doing their work upstairs. Critics may say that the work of those Committees is well done or that it is badly done. I do not know. I should be unwilling to suppose that it was very badly done. It has not at least the temptation of publicity to waste time in discussions of undue length, and I am at any rate disposed very firmly to maintain that the work of Committees sitting upstairs to-day is much more likely to be efficiently done than the work of Committees in the full House when the whole political forces of the Government and the Opposition were deployed to what were almost openly avowed to be partisan ends.

What inference do I draw from this? I draw this inference plainly, that no generalities drawn from our knowledge of the facilities that could be obtained from the House of Commons before the war possess the slightest value in the days which lie in front of us; and I, for one, have regard to the immense volume of legislation which is on its way to this House from another place, which has not, so far as I have been able to observe up to the present, exhibited in relation to pre-war legislation any very noticeable inferiority, yet it has dealt with more complicated topics in the space of six months than under the old Party days it would have been possible to deal with in six years. As I have said, I do not claim that this review meets the whole case which was made by the most rev. Primate, but I say that he would make a very great mistake when forming anticipations of the future if he ignored the change which has taken place in the House of Commons.

But I shall be reminded—and it is true—that we are dealing here with a particular proposal. The grievance so far as it is historical is most fully conceded. I do not even—let no one say that I have exaggerated—claim that the Government is entitled to say to the Church that that grievance is removed. I do not put it so high. And if it is not certainly removed the leaders of the Church are not only entitled, but are bound, to press such matters of alleviation as may completely remove it. We have to ask ourselves what ought to be said about the particular proposal for meeting this admitted difficulty. I sum it up I think correctly if I say the proposal contained in this Bill is elaborate, is complicated, and is unprecedented. Never, I think, was old wine put in a newer bottle. I recognise at the same time that every attempt has been made to provide safeguards that may reassure those who entertain apprehension as to the result of these proposals; and I say quite plainly on behalf of the Government that though I have to make, and must make, criticisms, we realise that that body of essential thought within the Church which has devoted itself to the preparation of the Bill has made every effort which sincerity could suggest to disarm the criticism of those antagonistic to the Bill.

It must be noticed, in the first instance, that the constitution of the National Assembly, of the Legislative Committee, and of the Constitution as defined in subsection (2) of Section 1 is defined by reference. It is true, as the most rev. Primate said, that the papers have been laid before Parliament, and I do not wish to exaggerate the criticism I now make. It is only this. It is far easier to consider and to amend the terms of a Parliamentary document if contained uno instrumento et uno contextu, than if by reference—a habit which I am sorry to see the promotors of this Bill have contracted from the Government. If legislation by reference is to be adopted in private Bills our difficulty will now be aggravated. But I do not wish to push the criticism further than this, that it would be obviously far more convenient if all these details, the constituents of these important bodies, had been presented to Parliament in the same paper and available at the same moment for amendment.

But I desire to make a criticism that goes further. In the first place I say—I avoid technical language, dealing with what I may call the lay constituency—I have a profound fear that, as defined by this Bill, this lay constituency will in practice be determined in numbers which in the long results will do great injustice to the whole of the Church of England over the laity of this country. I cannot, my Lords, even attempt—I have not the knowledge—to form an estimate of the numbers of those who will be entitled to make their influence effectively felt as laymen under that novel test; I do not say necessarily an indefensible test, because these matters are very difficult. I have not the material before me which would enable me to form a judgment as to how many will be the constituents in this new lay constituency. I heard a noble Lord last night put it as low as 100,000, though I think he must have been very wrong; but as far as I know, no one who has studied and worked out this subject has found himself in a position to give your Lordships an estimate which purports to be based upon any process of calculation that could be explained or justified. If any very great reduction is effected by the Bill in the number of those laymen who will make their influence felt, I confess that I, for one, should contemplate that reduction with the greatest anxiety. I can never forget what was said by one of the greatest theologians whom the Church of England ever produced, Hooker— There is not any man in the Church of England but the same man is also a member of the Commonwealth, or any member of the, Commonwealth who is not also of the Church of England. I heard, as your Lordships did, what was said by the Bishop of Manchester yesterday, in an eloquent and moving passage, when he described how by spontaneous impulse the members of the population went to St. Paul's Cathedral when the Armistice was proclaimed. I observe, what would indeed have been expected, that the most rev. Primate disliked as much as and perhaps more than any one in this House could have done, doing anything by legislation which would have corrected that impulse, an impulse so creditable to the people of this country and having such precious consolation to the Church of this country. I suppose that at the present moment, of the laity of this country there are millions who would account themselves qualified to take part in such rejoicings within the bosom of the Church of England.

My noble and learned friend Lord Phillimore last night, in an interesting contribution to this debate—which I am sorry was listened to by only a thin House—represented, I thought, a different angle to any that up to that point had been expressed in the course of this debate. He advanced this contention. He said, Why should any of these people"—meaning those of the laity who had not satisfied the standards laid down in ads Bill—"have anything to do with the government of the Church?" My noble friend asked a difficult question, and one which it seems to me may conceivably probe very deeply into the whole question of the establishment of the Church in this country. May I make a guarded observation on that point? I have only the right to speak as one of those who have enjoyed and deeply valued the position which the existing rules of the Church of England have made possible for those who do not technically belong to it, and it is proper, therefore, that I should speak on such a point in very guarded and very respectful language. I would say this, that while I have always been greatly affected by the difficulties of defending the establishment of the Church in a community such as Wales, where admittedly the Church was the Church of a minority, I have, on the other hand, most deeply prized and valued the maintenance of an established Church in this island in which no such question of minority arises. I may be wrong, but I thought that I detected in the speech of my noble friend Lord Phillimore, and—here again I may be wrong—in the speech of Lord Parmoor, and I am sure I saw signs of it in the writings of Canon Temple, the expression of a view which may very easily ripen into what I should think would mean alike disaster and despair. The view, I think, is being expressed in terms like these: "If no better terms are obtainable, if indeed the is the last message, we prefer Disestablishment." I think it right to say plainly that I am satisfied that those earnest men who have promoted this Bill, and the main current of support which they have derived and which has carried these proposals to their present stage, are entirely averse from any acquiescence in a proposal to disestablish the Church. I recognise that, and I rejoice to recognise it, because speaking as I have already explained, alone, I should regard the separation of the Church and State in these islands as something which was to be deeply regretted.

That view makes it more than ever necessary to scrutinise most closely the conditions of the membership of the laity who, in association with the representatives of the Church, are to discharge functions of such enormous importance. I say nothing of the Legislative Committee. I have commented on the fact that its constitution is not, at any rate directly, before your Lordships, but I come to discuss the constitution of the functions of the Ecclesiastical Committee. Here I must speak very plainly. What are the conclusions in relation to the Ecclesiastical Committee? Here again I ask leave to use untechnical language, and to describe the process as I conceive the process of the Bill to be. The Assembly has the widest possible powers. No one would justify the delegation of powers so absolutely unlimited to an Assembly unless you were able to justify and make good the safeguards that are contained in the latter part of the Bill. That is and must be elementary among all reasonable men. When the Assembly or the Legislative Committee of the Assembly has remitted a matter for consideration to the Ecclesiastical Committee what happens? There are one or two sections or sub-sections of the Bill the object of which, frankly, I only imperfectly understand. Those are the sections or subsections which deal with the relations between the Legislative and the Ecclesiastical Committee. I do not bestow much time upon them, because they seem to me to be of secondary importance. But I do not quite understand why there should be power given to the Legislative Committee to recall a matter from the Ecclesiastical Committee.

But these points are secondary, and they only lead up to the criticism I make which, in my view, is of a much more fundamental character, and is concerned with the constitution and functions of the Ecclesiastical Committee. I may say here quite plainly that I accept unreservedly the statement that has been made that the Ecclesiastical Committee was constituted in the hope of meeting some of the objections of those who desired that the safeguards afforded by this Bill should be complete. I cannot state my view upon the constitution of the functions of the Ecclesiastical Committee more plainly than by saying that from the constitutional point of view I agree entirely, without reservation, with the view laid down by my noble and learned friend last night. There are parts of my noble and learned friend's speech which did not carry, as was natural in so long and argumentative a speech, my complete assent, but as to that part of his speech which analyses and criticises the constitution and functions of the Ecclesiastical Committee, I agree entirely with his argument. I go further and say that I should be greatly surprised if any constitutional lawyer will defend the arrangement which my noble and learned friend assailed, and it was most interesting, and it may even prove to be very important, that in the course of the debate last night the noble and learned Marquess, Lord Salisbury—

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

Not learned.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

I beg the noble Marquess's pardon. I am so accustomed to dealing with so many of my noble and learned friends that one is apt to be confused. My noble friend Lord Salisbury said, in the course of the debate, that he thought it would be possible to meet the very fundamental objection taken by the noble and learned Viscount by means of Amendments, and my noble and learned friend Lord Phillimore said that he and his friends had never liked the arrangement of the Ecclesiastical Committee; and, though I have not had the opportunity of checking my recollection by reading the OFFICTAL REPORT, I think he added that he himself would have preferred that the matter should have been referred to the Secretary of State in order that he might give his certificate, which would affect the views of the Executive Government.

These admissions make a very great inroad into the Bill. How great the inroad is may be observed by looking on page 2 of the Bill. Clause 1 is a definition clause, but Clause 2, all the subsections of Clause 3 and Clause 4 postulate and depend upon the functions of the Ecclesiastical Committee, as defined in the Bill and as explained to your Lordships. If any great Amendment is to be made to the Bill affecting the functions of the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council that Amendment is one as to which I express no opinion whether it could be made consistently with maintaining the fabric of the Bill as drafted at present, but at least I say this, that those who are convinced as strongly as many of us are convinced that the functions conceded to the Ecclesiastical Committee by this Bill are not functions which could be harmonised with the working of our Constitution at all are entitled at least to say that on the Second Reading they ought, before they are asked to sanction the Second Reading, to be afforded somewhat in detail the alternative proposals which those who are willing to consider Amendments would be prepared to adopt.

If the Ecclesiastical Committee is modified, then indeed very little of the Bill as at present drafted is left. And the Ecclesiastical Committee surely must be modified. One really cannot in these days adopt a wholly new criterion of the responsibility of Ministers, and of the Crown. It was noticed in the course of the debate that my noble and learned friend Lord Haldane, usually the mildest of controversialists, developed a degree, I will not say of heat, but of earnestness and of vigour, that surprised and interested even those who differed from him. I myself believe, though I suspect that the noble and learned Viscount would not agree, that it was in no degree the odium theologicum—I do not believe that it was even that profound distrust of the prelacy which he inculcated more than once upon the House. I am persuaded that the noble and learned Viscount found himself in the position of an accomplished seaman who contemplates lubberly gear in a boat, and I am satisfied that it was only my noble and learned friend's sense of the most elementary constitutional doctrine which led him to the vigour with which he expressed his views—and indeed my noble and learned friend's speech was well founded.

What is this proposal? It is a proposal that a Committee of the Privy Council, to be set up indeed by His Majesty—although it is not so stated it must in effect be so—upon the advice of His Majesty's Ministers, shall give advice to the Sovereign. Now, observe the consequences. It is true that the advice given by this new Committee to the Sovereign is not to bear operative fruit until a resolution of Parliament or a failure of Parliament to resolve has supervened. Until there has been such a resolution, or a failure to arrive at a resolution, or to move one—until then, as a noble Lord said last night with the most perfect justice, the assent of the Sovereign is in a state of suspended animation. But that is not the gravest criticism. The gravest criticism is this, as the noble and learned Viscount said, that for the first time in our constitutional history the Monarch is to accept and to act upon advice which is given to him by a body of men who are not responsible to Parliament. Such a doctrine has only to be stated for its inadmissibility to become apparent. No, proposal so difficult to defend has ever in my recollection of constitutional practice been brought forward in this House, and, whatever other part of this Bill may survive, I cannot believe that this particular proposal will ever receive the sanction of Parliament.

I do not ignore—and I wish to be studiously fair in my expression of views on this matter—I do not ignore the fact that alternative proposals might be made carrying out the view of the promoters of this Bill which would not offend the rule of constitutional purity, and indeed of constitutional substance, which I have endeavoured to define. I think such proposals might be made. I think that my noble and learned friend Lord Phillimore last night was on the track of such a proposal, and I am not carrying the attitude of the Government further than this, that the present proposal as contained in this Bill is not one of which any responsible Government in my judgment (and I think in their judgment) could undertake the burden. I listened to what my noble and learned friend Lord Phillimore said on this point with great interest, and it well deserves the study and consideration of your Lordships. I said a few moments ago that after this stage was passed (and for the purposes of my argument I assume that it has been passed, not by the intervention of the Ecclesiastical Committee but through some other process less open to constitutional objection) the next stage is that the matter is considered, or that there is an opportunity of considering the matter by laying these Papers on the Table of the House. It is indeed elementary that if you provide a serious safeguard and protection by the process of laying these Papers on the Table of the House you do minimise—it may almost be that you destroy—the criticism which is made on this part of the Bill; but everybody will agree that unless the safeguard is really an effective safeguard, having regard to the extent of the powers committed to the Assembly, grave risks are run.

Therefore I make no excuse for very shortly examining the nature and extent of this suggested safeguard. On this point I am, I think, on somewhat strong ground. Because only a few days ago my noble friend Lord Sandhurst introduced into this House certain proposals of the Government upon the subject of health. And, as presented to your Lordships, an integral part of that proposal was that certain plans were contained in it which would become operative if they had been laid on the Table of the Houses of Parliament in the prescribed period (I think forty days) and if no action had been taken on those proposals by either House of Parliament. Such was the proposal of the Government on that occasion and it was the subject of debate before your Lordships. Lord Downham spoke in the first place, and he made this observation—I quote it from memory, but I think it is accurate—that everyone knew that it was futile to suppose that any safeguard was obtained by laying proposals upon the Table of the House of Commons on condition that they should become effective if no objection were taken; that no opportunity of debating such matters arose until 11 o'clock at night, that no sufficient means for publishing such proposals was ever regarded, and it was very doubtful indeed if anyone would ever see the proposals. The noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, speaking afterwards in the same debate and reinforcing the argument of Lord Downham, said that Lord Downham had described the process which went on in the House of Commons; Lord Downham had shown that you could not rely upon this process; and Lord Stuart of Wortley, also speaking in the course of the debate, described the safeguard as "altogether illusory."

Those noble Lords may have been right or they may have been wrong when they were dealing with a proposal made by the Government, but if they were right, then—I speak from memory—I think your Lordships supported in the Lobby the view that the noble Lords pressed upon your Lordships that the method was not satisfactory. An Amendment was proposed, and I think carried, to the effect not that those proposals should become operative if the Houses of Parliament did not dissent from them, but that those proposals should become operative if and when the Houses of Parliament assented to them. Now if that course was a proper precaution to adopt, receiving as it did the authoritative support of the noble Lords whose names I have mentioned, in dealing with the topics which relatively cannot be pronounced more important than those with which your Lordships are concerned to-day—if that view were taken by your Lordships then upon a Government proposal, I cannot help thinking that the noble Marquess (I think it was Lord Crewe) who made the suggestion yesterday was well advised when he recommended to your Lordships the alternative course of providing that if these proposals received the assent of the Houses of Parliament a very great deal of the doubt and difficulty that is felt to-day upon this part of the proposals would be resolved.

I cannot help wondering whether another and a simpler method of dealing with this great problem might not have been possible of adoption, though I advance this suggestion in the most tentative and doubtful fashion for I know well how able are the men and how constant and sincere they have been in their exertions to supply the solution which has found expression in the terms of the present Bill; and I know it is little likely that one whose knowledge of the subject is less intimate and who has been able naturally to contribute far less time to its solution could arrive at a proper conclusion. But I cannot help feeling that instead of the elaborate attempts to define and to formulate the Constitution of the Church, instead of the attempt to define what I have ventured to call a laity constituency with all the consequent; apprehensions as to whether it would take from the service of the Church men who have always been entitled to think themselves members of the Church—whether it might not have been possible to treat the collection of Church opinion as more of a domestic business not to be defined by Act of Parliament but its value to be weighed by the laity and the leaders of the Church. And I have wondered whether those who are the natural leaders of the Church—the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Archbishop of York—might not have found themselves armed with sufficient force within the Church to come to a Secretary of State—if such provision were made by Parliament—certifying to him that the whole current of opinion in the Church demands and desires certain specified legislative changes, if such proposals were made, and provided that on such certificate being obtained and the proposals being laid before the Houses of Parliament the Houses of Parliament assent, that legislation should become immediately operative. Had such proposals been brought forward, I know that many who feel a great difficulty about these present proposals would at least have given them most anxious and careful consideration.

I have had no graceful task to discharge to-day. I would very gladly have given a different answer to those who have laboured so strenuously in the service of the Church with such devoted service; but I shall have served the Government ill if—however ill expressed that which I have attempted to say on the Bill—I have failed to give the impression that they sympathise profoundly with the object which the most rev. Primate has set before himself, and that they would not grudge, even in this busy session, giving Parliamentary time if they saw a solution which would at once command the assent of the Church and safeguard the vital interest of the nation.

THE LORD BISHOP OF LIVERPOOL

My Lords, will you bear with me for a few moments if I venture to point to the opinion of a large majority of the Church people in south-west Lancashire and also to the opinion of a number of younger Evangelical clergymen. Eighteen months ago the main provisions of this Bill were submitted to the rurideconal conferences in the diocese of Liverpool. In every case the provisions of this Bill were approved by large majorities in those twelve rurideconal conferences. When a few months later the same provisions were submitted to the Liverpool Diocesan Conference—one of the most democratic assemblies I suppose in England, consisting net only of all the clergy but of two representatives from every parish in the diocese, directly elected—these provisions were passed also by an overwhelming majority. I think that the significance of this vote is evident. Liverpool is not famed as being a stronghold of Sacerdotus; indeed, I should imagine that it is one of the most Protestant dioceses in England; and these hard-headed shrewd North-countrymen feared no outbreak or increase of Sacerdotalism in the operation of the Bill in the future.

Why did those North-country-men approve the provisions of this Bill by so large a majority? First, because in their opinion it makes for liberty. At present in the Church of England there are grave abuses, and we cannot vet, correct them. There are serious faults to be attended to, and we cannot combat them. There are considerable changes which are most desirable in the changing conditions of the twentieth century. But we are cribbed, cabined, and confined. We have to apply to Parliament, and when we apply Parliament is too congested with work to be able to consider our needs. We are tied and bound by restrictions which no doubt were desirable and useful in the sixteenth century, but which are burdensome and, I venture to think, full of danger in the twentieth. What we ask for is a reasonable and sober liberty for what I think was yesterday called a measure of Church Home Rule, by the devolution by Parliament to the Church of rights which it has, not time to exercise, a devolution to safeguard it; and in that devolution no attempt whatever is to be made to prevent Parliament having a final control over the destinies of the Church.

Secondly, I believe these North-countrymen approved the main provisions of this Bill because it makes for justice. The union of Church and State as I understand it is, in words very familiar to most of you, "for the mutual society, help, and comfort which the one ought to have of the other in prosperity and adversity." The Church is stronger for its public recognition by the State; the State, I trust, is better for its alliance with the Church. No domination—that is the object of that union. There have been times in our history when the Church has dominated the State, and they have been calamitous. There have been days also when the State has oppressed the Church, and they have been full of mischief. To-day, when changing circumstances require some measure of re-adjustment, we ask that in justice to the good work which the Church is doing that measure will not be denied.

This Bill is not, as it is said, a political manœuvre; it is not a High Church conspiracy; it is not, a disablement of half of the citizens of this country; I venture to say that it is an honest, a fair, and a well-thought-out attempt to meet a real and pressing need; and if Amendments are needed I am perfectly convinced that those Amendments will be accepted if we can be assured of justice. I speak as a member of the Archbishops' Committee from the first, as a member also of the Grand Committee appointed by the Representative Church Council. The members of those Committees were chosen with great fairness and sagacity; they represented every political opinion and all schools of thought in the Church. The discussions were long and thorough and wonderfully outspoken, and this Bill is the result. And this Bill, I feel, is not a plea for favour or for privilege, but a request for justice.

Lastly, I think our North-countrymen approved of the provisions of this Bill on the grounds of efficiency. A magnificent future lies before the Church of England, perhaps the greatest opportunity she has ever had in the whole of her great history. She is very conscious of her past shortcomings. She views them with shame and confusion of face. But she is going forward penitent and full of hope and high purpose to meet this great future which is lying before her. A new life is stirring within her, a new vision is shining before her; new forces are coming to her aid. Those who know best at present the state of her Universities and of the allied colleges assure us that they never had a finer set of material to train for Holy Order or a larger amount of such material. The men at present there are men whose characters have been moulded and whose faith has been tested by the terrible ordeal of the Great War which has passed. It is to make the work of these men effectual that we ask this House to pass this Bill, with amendment if necessary; for it is the duty of the Church of England to strengthen the soul of a great people, and to make it in the future not unworthy of its great past, and so to work that the Church will not fail to gather into it the fruits of that God-sent task which has been won for us at so great a cost, the cost of death and wounds of our bravest and our best.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

My Lords, I should first of all like to thank my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack for the extreme consideration and lucidity with which he informed your Lordships of the line taken by the Government on this measure. I hope that before I sit down I shall be able to throw some light on certain phases of this scheme which are still dark to you. He had not, of course, had time to read the literature that exists on this subject; but I hope he will allow me to say that, so far from being discouraged by his speech, I regard it as a landmark in this great movement.

I hope that the noble and learned Viscount who moved the Amendment that we are discussing will not take it amiss if I say that I think he was an odd person to move the rejection of this Bill. This Bill is brought forward by the Church of England, and it affects every single Englishman and woman. But it affects no one else. It does not affect Scotland or any Scotsman at all. Presently my noble friend Lord Balfour of Burleigh will, I hope, be bringing into this House a measure promoted by the Church of Scotland and affecting all Scotsmen and all Scotswomen. What would be said in Scotland if I were to get up and propose the rejection of that Bill? I do not see the difference between the two cases. And the noble and learned Viscount, having thought it right to play this part, has laid before your Lordships a presentation of this Bill and of the scheme on which it rests which was described by the Bishop of Ely, and accurately described by him, as an absolute travesty of the facts.

And, my Lords, I ought to know. I had no part whatever in commencing this great movement, but I had the honour of being selected by the Archbishops to preside over the first Committee which produced this scheme. And, as the Archbishop of Canterbury has reminded your Lordships, a stronger or more representative Committee has never met to consider any affair, whether connected with Church or State; and to suggest that the laymen, not to mention the ecclesiastics of that Committee would have propounded such a scheme as that sketched by the noble and learned Viscount is simply grotesque. When I remind you that Mr. Arthur Balfour was one member and the Duke of Devonshire another, you will see that to suggest that men such as these would produce a scheme for obliterating the rights of the laity and putting England under the heel of the Episcopacy surely is grotesque.

No one can really understand this Bill unless he has had time—and I know that very few of your Lordships can possibly have had the time—to read both the original Report of the Committee over which I presided and the Report of the Grand Committee of the Representative Church Council over which the Dean of Westminster presided, but no one can judge of either Report unless he reads the whole of it. The passages selected by the noble and learned Lord who moved the rejection of this Bill are taken from their context and they are valueless unless read with the whole document. It is quite true that in that document it is stated—and I am very glad it is stated—that the origin of the Church is not Parliamentary but Divine and that the final, the ultimate, allegiance of the Church is not due to Government but to God. Having laid that down, this Report—which was the work of a. body of men the great majority of whom are opposed to Disestablishment and Disendowment (and this Bill is promoted, let me say, by that great central body of the Church that is resolutely opposed to a severance of that union which has persisted now for nearly 1,500 years)—again and again acknowledged that, while that union persisted, the State had a right to lay down the lines of control under which the Church must work; and, again and again, that Report states that every single Englishman and woman, of whatever religious beliefs or disbeliefs, has rights within the Church and in connection with the Church which it is the duty of Parliament to protect and preserve. I want to say that at the commencement because no one would have guessed it from listening to the speech of the noble and learned Lord.

The best answer that I can make to the indictment of the noble and learned Viscount and of the Bishop of Manchester is to describe what the scheme laid on the Table of your Lordships' House really is, and what is the object of the Bill. It is not a "new constitution for the government of the Church" which, I think, was the term used by my noble friend Lord Crewe. It is not that. It asks three things from Parliament. Firstly, it asks Parliament to give the laity in each parish an opportunity, for the first time, of having a say in what properly concerns them in the ecclesiastical affairs of the parish, by recognising the parochial Church meeting and the parochial Church Council; secondly it asks Parliament to give the Church the opportunity of telling Parliament what changes in the law it thinks necessary to enable it to do its work properly, by recognising the measures suggested by the Church Assembly as put forward authoritatively; and, thirdly, it asks Parliament to deal with proposals for Church legislation so put forward by a different process from that from which Churchmen have learned by bitter experience that they can expect absolutely nothing. Under those three heads the whole of the request made by the Church to Parliament is covered, and let me say again, in order that there may be no misunderstanding, that there is no suggestion of any sort or kind that Parliament should abandon its present methods of dealing; with Church affairs if it chooses to use them. If this Bill became law tomorrow it would still be open to any member of the House of Commons, or to any member of your Lordships' House, or to any Government, to bring in and pass through Parliament a measure concerning the Church just as it can be done to-day.

This Bill would not confer on the Church Assembly any power of making law or changing law. It is simply an effort to get Parliament to give fair consideration to proposals put forward by the Church Assembly for changes in the law. I dwell on that because it is a very important distinction, and let me remind you now that the Church Assembly which is described in the scheme is no new body. It has been working, under the name of the Representative Church Council, for fifteen years, and its record is well known. The only change of importance in its constitution which is included in this scheme is the great extension of the lay franchise, to which I will come presently. What is the Church Assembly? It consist of three Houses, each quite distinct—the House of Bishops (that is, the members of the two Upper Houses of Convocation of Canterbury and York); the House of Clergy (the members of the two Lower Houses of Convocation of Canterbury and York); and the House of Laity. On what is the House of Laity based? How is it elected? And what is the franchise on which it ultimately reposes? The franchise on which it ultimately reposes is this—any man or woman of eighteen years of age, who has been baptised and is prepared to sign a declaration that he or she is a member of the Church of England and has not joined any other religious body with which the Church of England is not in communion, has a right to be put on the roll of electors for the parish in which he or she lives. That is an immensely wide franchise. That franchise is at least as wide as the Parliamentary franchise. The total number of voters entitled to be enrolled, if they claimed the privilege, on the parish lists would not be found to be less than the corresponding number of voters in those parishes for the House of Commons. Therefore nobody can say that the basis is not an extremely wide and democratic one.

But why are there any limitations? Why should a declaration be made that the man or woman is a member of the Church of England and has not joined any other religious body with which the Church is not in communion? My noble friend Lord Finlay objected to that limitation, and he has not been the only one. "Why have that limitation?" says Lord Finlay. I say, Why not have that limitation? Lord Emmott dealt with this point I thought with great force yesterday, and I will not repeat what he said, but I should like to put it to your Lordships in this way. This is a proposal to enable the Church of England to tell Parliament where the shoe of obsolete law pinches. Who is o tell Parliament where the shoe of obsolete law pinches except those who wear the shoe. Those who have deliberately joined some other religious body, or have held aloof from all religious observances, do not know where the shoe pinches. Why should they speak for the Church on this matter! Remember, my Lords, that there is no question here of franchise and of preserving the rights of English men or women as citizens. It is only to enable the Church to tell the nation where in practice the shoe of law pinches, and I ask how can anybody tell that unless it is those who wear the shoe.

But that is not all. Consider what possible effect within the parish might be produced if that limitation was removed. When your Lordships have time to study this scheme you will see how very real is the power proposed to be given to the laity of the Church of England in dealing with ecclesiastical affairs in their own parish, where at present they have no say at all in matters which concern them. It is provided that the roll of parish electors shall be open the whole year round up to within a fortnight of the parish meeting, and the intention of the framers of this scheme is that there shall be no inquisition into the opinions of those who claim, but that the honour of the man making the declaration should be trusted. The parish meeting is to take place at least once a year. On that occasion all kinds of questions may be asked concerning the ecclesiastical affairs of the parish. The fear of many excellent clergymen is that they should be unduly interfered with in their work by the kind of questions asked on those occasions. At that same parish meeting the parochial church council is to be elected, and it is permanently, according to our conception, to have a direct voice en behalf of the laity in the ecclesiastical affairs of the parish. Again I say that many excellent clergymen fear that such a council might trench on ground where their duty is clear and where the laity are not concerned.

I quite admit that the provisions both for the parish church meeting and the parish church council must be carefully safeguarded, but I am prepared on my part to run some risks in order to give the laity for the first time a real voice in the concerns of their own parish. That being so, is it not only fair to the Church in the parish and to the incumbent that he should not rim the risk of being dealt with by people who feel no obligation or responsibility as Church people at all, who never have attended church, never mean to attend church, and who take advantage of a declaration in which there is no limitation to come in and control him, and possibly override the views of those who do use the Church, and who are really practising members of the Church. I do not suggest that that would happen often, but I do suggest that it is a real danger. The occasion might arise in a somewhat rather exciting moment in the history of the parish, and I say it is a greater danger than the danger of excluding such an individual as my honourable and learned friend described yesterday from the list of Church voters. Whatever rule is made there are sure to be hard cases, and nobody knows better than my noble and learned friend that hard cases do not make good law. That is the real case for limitation such as is suggested in this scheme; that the purpose for which the franchise is to be used is in respect of the Church Assembly informing Parliament where the shoe of law pinches, and where in the case of the parish the matter in question is one which only really concerns those who have used the Church, who mean to use the Church, and who acknowledge their responsibility as Church people.

The election of the parochial church council is not the only function of the electors in the matter of elections at the annual parochial church meeting. It is also proposed that on the same occasion they should elect the representatives of the parish to the diocesan conference. There are some cases where the diocese is so big that it is not possible every parish should have direct representation, but I hope one of the very first measures laid before Parliament by the Church Assembly, under this Bill, if it comes into operation, will be for the division of these dioceses which are now so unwieldy and unmanageable in size. Therefore, the scheme is that each parish should have direct lay representation on the diocesan conference, and the diocesan conferences elect the members of the House of Laity: and they elect them by proportional representation. I want to draw your Lordships' attention particularly to the provision of proportional representation, because under it it is quite impossible for any party in the Church to "collar" the House of Laity. It is quite impossible for the High Church Party, the Low Church Party, or the Broad Church Party to get hold of the whole of the representation. The system of proportional representation will make it quite certain that each party gets its fair share of representation.

The question is asked, and I think it is in the mind of the Lord. Chancellor, Why should election to the House of Laity be indirect instead of direct? There is nothing that the framers of the scheme would so much desire, if they saw their way to do it, than to have the House of Laity elected by direct representation. If any of your Lordships can suggest a method by which it can be done nobody would be more delighted than the framers of the scheme. But think what it means. It means cutting up the whole of England into constituencies, having machinery for keeping Rolls in artificial areas, and it means all the paraphernalia of a General Election, with great expenditure to the candidates going round to the constituencies. Such a machinery is, I am afraid, quite beyond the means of any body in existence except the State. The proof of that is to be found in the fact that the great General Assembly of Scotland is elected by indirect election, and the Great Assemblies of the branches of the Anglican Church in the United States and the Dominions without exception are all elected by a system of indirect election—and no doubt always for the same reason. Then one point more which I wish to make about the parochial Church Councils, the Diocesan Conferences, and the House of Laity, because I want you to understand every part of this scheme.

THE MARQUESS OF CREWE

May I be excused for a moment for interrupting my noble friend? He was giving us a most interesting, clear, and full description of the provisions laid down in the White Paper before us with regard to the constitution of the Church Assembly. When I was speaking I ventured to criticise certain of those provisions, but I criticised them on the understanding that your Lordships would be able to consider them with a view to asking whether the promoters of the Bill would agree to their forming part of the Bill as it is before us. Now my noble friend describes them, but as the Bill stands we are in no position to deal with them or to alter an iota of their terms. The question I desire to put to my noble friend and the promoters of the Bill is whether they are willing that these provisions should form part of the Bill, or whether my noble friend is merely defending them in order to get a Second Reading for the Bill. It appears to me that the distinction is of the first importance, and I cannot help thinking that the vote on the Amendment of my noble and learned friend (Viscount Haldane) to be given by many of your Lordships must greatly depend upon the answer which my noble friend or the promoters of the Bill are able to give.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

My noble friend is quite entitled to put that question, but I was already going to answer it. I think that, altogether apart from the answer given to that question, it is very necessary that your Lordships and the whole public should understand what the scheme is. It was, however, my full intention to give, and I shall be giving in a very few seconds, the answer to that question of the noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition. I was going to say that the members of these Councils must be communicants. That is in strict accord with all precedents. It is true also of all the corresponding Assemblies in the Church of Scotland, and the corresponding Assemblies in the Churches in the United States and the Dominions.

The noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition, Viscount Haldane, and Viscount Finlay, all asked the question which has been asked again: Ought not this scheme to be put as a schedule to the Bill? But ought it? In the first place, I offer to you a very practical objection. If the scheme is put into the Bill as a schedule you would have a Bill of enormous length, which would not have the slightest chance of getting through the House of Commons. That is a real practical objection. But, further, I ask you to remember what the proposal is. The proposal is for a body which will have the opportunity of informing Parliament what reforms the Church desires, but gives the Church no power to enact those reforms itself. Is it, or is it not, reasonable that the Church itself should say how that body is to be composed? Would it not be a mere mockery to pretend to give the Church such a body and then form it in a way unacceptable to the Church. I suggest to you, my Lords, that considering the wholly limited purpose for which this body is put forward this is a perfectly reasonable view, especially as I remind von that this is no new body but one which has been working in the public eye now for more than fifteen years.

It has been said that the powers given to this body in the Bill are too wide. Is that really the case? If Parliament once admits the justice of the scheme, and such a body is established, why confine its activities only to matters of comparatively small moment. Is it not wholly in the public interest, and according to the wishes of Parliament, that on the most important questions Parliament should also be informed of what is the mind of the Church. The whole question depends, as my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack so justly observed, upon whether the guarantees of control by Parliament are sufficient. Granted that the guarantees of control are wholly sufficient, then I contend that there is no ground for limiting the questions concerning the Church about Which the Church may put forward proposals to Parliament.

Now I come to the Bill, and those parts of the Bill which have so troubled my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack and the noble and learned Viscount who moved the rejection of the Bill; that is, the Legislative Committee of the Church Assembly and the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council. The Legislative Committee of the Church Assembly is nothing but a conduit pipe between that Assembly and the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council, and those clauses which my noble and learned friend did not wholly understand are of the most innocent type possible. The whole purport of those clauses is this: if the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council find there are objections to a measure proposed which have never occurred to the framers of that measure, or if that committee is able to point out that the effects of the measure go far beyond anything contemplated by the framers, then it is surely reasonable that the Church Assembly should, through the Legislative Committee, have the power of withdrawing the measure. Surely it is quite clear that such a body as the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council will throw much light even on a measure that has been carefully considered by the Church Assembly. That light may only be in the shape of a small Amendment. That small Amendment may be inserted by the Church Assembly, and then the measure can go back to the Legislative Committee, and from that Committee to the Ecclesiastical Committee, and then go forward with the Report of the Committee to Parliament. Or the criticism may be of such a serious kind that the Church Assembly at once might withdraw the proposal with the intention of bringing it forward in a new form in a new session. But there is no suggestion of secrecy. All the criticism of the Ecclesiastical Committee will be laid before the Church Assembly by the Legislative Committee of that body and will pass into public-knowledge. I hope that explanation is clear to my noble and learned friend, because I assure him that there is nothing hidden in those proposals at all, and that their sole purpose is to enable the Church Assembly to make an Amendment if necessary in a measure before it goes before Parliament, or, in the event of the criticism being a very serious one, of withdrawing the measure altogether.

Now I come to the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council, and I can assure my noble and learned friend that the very last thing the framers of this scheme intended was any treason to the Constitution. Also may I inform them that the words to which they take so much exception were suggested and passed as the proper constitutional words by legal luminaries no less than themselves. This is a question of a difference between great lawyers. We were advised by one set of great lawyers that this was the right formula; we are told by another set of great lawyers that these words are a treason to the Constitution. I assure you that we laymen are wholly innocent in the matter. What was the intention of the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council? Whether the scheme is good or whether the scheme is bad, it had no idea behind it whatever except this, that no measure proposed by the Church Assembly should go before Parliament without the keenest possible examination by the best intellects that could be found in the country, and that that examination should be conducted exclusively from the point of view of the State and the rights of the English man and the English woman as a citizen.

To put it in another way, this Committee was not supposed to have any responsibility to the Church at all, but only to the State. Its function would be in a Report to state quite clearly and fully what the effect of the measure proposed is—how it affected existing law; what changes in the law it entailed; and how, if at all, it affected the rights of the State or the rights of the citizen. It was intended, in fact, that when a measure proposed by the Church Assembly came before Parliament it should come accompanied by an authoritative Report of this Committee of the Privy Council, which would give Parliament, the Cabinet, the Press, and the public more information about that measure and more knowledge of it than of any other kind of Bill ever coming before Parliament. That was the sole intention of those who framed this scheme.

Now I come to the words. The words, we were advised by most competent lawyers, were the right constitutional formula. The Report is a Report to Parliament, to the Cabinet, to the Press, and to the public of England; and we were informed by these legal advisers that the right formula of an Act of Parliament was advice to the King. If that is wrong, by all means alter it. If the right words are that the Report and advice should be to the Cabinet, or to the Prime Minister, or to Parliament, by all means change the words; they are not mine, they are the words of lawyers; and I altogether dispute that it would be fair to condemn this Bill because one set of lawyers think that another set of lawyers have made a great mistake in the drafting. It never occurred to me for one single moment that anybody could doubt that the final action taken by the King could only be taken on the advice of his Ministers. It never occurred to us that anybody should doubt that, or think otherwise; and if change is required in the draft of the Bill to put that right, I certainly would be the first to vote for it. But the fault, if fault there is, is the fault of lawyers.

Having, I hope, fully explained this matter of the Privy Council, I will now deal with the procedure before Parliament. The words in Clause 4 are these— When the Ecclesiastical Committee shall have reported to His Majesty on any measure presented by the Legislative Committee, the report, together with the text of such measure, shall be laid before both Houses of Parliament within fourteen days, if Parliament be then sitting, or, if not, then within fourteen days after the next meeting of Parliament, and thereupon— (1) If the Ecclesiastical Committee shall have advised His Majesty to give His Royal Assent to the measure, then, unless within forty days either House of Parliament shall direct to the contrary— That is, pass a Resolution adverse to the measure— such measure shall be presented to His Majesty, and shall have the force and effect of an Act of Parliament on the Royal Assent being signified thereto. (2) If the Ecclesiastical Committee shall have advised His Majesty that the measure ought not to receive the Royal Assent, no further proceedings shall be taken thereon: Provided that if both Houses of Parliament within forty days so direct— Either House of Parliament can stop a measure recommended by the Privy Council, but it requires both Houses of Parliament to give authority to His Majesty to give his assent in the case of a measure adversely criticised by the Privy Council— such measure shall be presented to His Majesty, and on the Royal Assent being signified thereto shall have the force and effect of an Act of Parliament I want to make two observations about that before I pass on to consider it. In the first place there was no intention, as imagined by my noble friend, that the Church Assembly or the Legislative Committee thereof would have any influence on the Report of the Privy Council to Parliament. These private conferences were exclusively from the point of view of enabling the Church Assembly to correct a mistake, as I have already pointed out; and, of course, the Privy Council alone would be responsible for its Report to Parliament. When the words are used "advise His Majesty to assent or not to assent," I take it what it means is this—that if the Committee of the Privy Council was of opinion that the measure proposed was in any degree contrary to the interests of the State, or if it in any degree whatever impinged on or infringed the rights of the citizen, that would be an adverse Report. If, on the other hand, the Committee could give a testimonial to the effect that the rights of the State and of the citizen were not in any degree adversely affected, then I imagine that would be a favourable Report.

As the Standing Orders in the House of Commons are now, what would happen under this procedure? I think the words I am going to read are an exact and accurate description— The consideration of a Resolution relating to a measure laid on the Table of the House of Commons under the provisions of the Enabling Bill would be governed by the rule prescribing the interruption of business at eleven o'clock, and the adjournment of the House of Commons at 11.30 (Standing Order No. 1). By that rule, certain business is exempted from the operation of the rule. This business is called exempted business. Exempted business may be entered upon after eleven o'clock, and the House remains sitting until it is disposed of unless a Motion for Adjournment be carried. The consideration of measures under the Enabling Bill will be exempted business. For the rule is that when by an Act of Parliament a particular effect has been given to an expression of disapproval by the House of any rules or orders laid before it, then the consideration of the Address or Resolution expressing that disapproval is exempted business. (See "Manual of Procedure," edition 1904, page 31, paragraph 36, Note.). There are two members of this House who have had very great experience of the working of this method of procedure—Lord Emmott and Lord Stuart of Wortley. My recollection of what Lord Stuart of Wortley said is quite different from the recollection of the Lord Chancellor.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

My noble friend will, perhaps, allow me to say that examined it only a quarter of an hour before I came to the House, and any recollection is fresh.

THE EARL OF SELBOBNE

Lord Stuart of Wortley said, according to the noble and learned Lord, that he thought this procedure did not give proper security. I certainly understood kiln to say that he thought it did give full security, and Lord Stuart of Wortley nods his assent. I am correct then that Lord Stuart of Wortley and Lord Emmott both, from their great experience in the House of Commons, said they thought this procedure did give full security for adequate discussion. Why did we adopt that procedure? Because at this time it was the only alternative procedure open to us to adopt. The procedure to which the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack has called attention, and to which Lord Finlay and Lord Crewe called attention, was not in existence when this scheme was framed. I think it has only come into existence during this session of Parliament. Therefore I think we may be pardoned for adopting in our scheme the only alternative procedure of which we then had cognisance as admitted in either House of Parliament. But we have now, as pointed out by noble Lords, an alternative scheme, and that may very properly be the one which your Lordships and the House of Commons may wish to adopt.

This brings me to a statement that I think will be rather a surprise to many of your Lordships who heard Lord Haldane's speech, or the speech of the Bishop of Manchester. There was the suggestion that there was an attempt in this scheme to smuggle measures of the greatest importance and of far-reaching effect through Parliament without adequate discussion. Not one single critic either in this House or in the correspondence in The Times has drawn your Lordships' attention to the passage in the report of the Grand Committee of the Representative Church Council which I shall read to your Lordships. We ourselves, who are responsible for bringing this Bill before Parliament, have in the clearest manner possible directed Parliament s attention to this point, and asked Parliament to devise measures for making the control of Parliament over this kind of legislation effective. Why have our critics never mentioned that fact? I am the first to admit that the kind of measure which may be brought to the notice of Parliament under this scheme falls into two classes. There is what I may call the ordinary measure of routine—a measure, say, for the formation of a new bishopric. I do not think there is one of your Lordships, nor the noble and learned Lord who moved the rejection of this Bill, who would not agree that the existing procedure after eleven o'clock would be quite adequate to deal with a case like that, but as I have strongly urged to your Lordships that the Church Assembly should not be precluded from bringing forward proposals of much greater importance, so I am the first to admit, and we who are responsible for bringing this scheme are the first to admit, that in those cases this might not be a sufficient method of maintaining Parliamentary control.

Will your Lordships listen to this passage from the Report of the Committee of the Representative Church Council, dated the 3rd of October last, which is public property— It has been brought to our notice that the method of passing legislation through Parliament as proposed by this Bill is regarded with apprehension in some quarters, on the ground that measures of importance might be passed without any opportunity for adequate discussion. We do not believe this apprehension to be justified. We are confident that important measures, exciting widespread public interest, would be sure of proper attention from the Houses of Parliament, and from the Government, which controls the time of the blouse of Commons. The apprehension, however, is entitled to attention; and the remedy, we believe, must be sought, as regards the House of Commons, from the House itself. It might be possible for the House to provide by Standing Order that Motions relating to measures decided by the Speaker to be of special importaoc—or claimed to be such by a certain number of Members—should be assured a special and convenient time for consideration. In any case there would be no difficulty in bringing this matter prominently before the House when the Enabling Bill is under discussion, and pressing for such a settlement as would allay the fears that are now entertained. We are accused of trying to foist upon Parliament a scheme to smuggle through legislation of great importance. I think that passage by itself disposes altogether of that unworthy suggestion.

VISCOUNT HALDANE

As the noble Earl has referred to something that I said, I would ask him why, if that passage is to be taken seriously, they did not in the Bill ask for an affirmative Resolution of the House of Commons instead of leaving things to go through sub silenlio. It is no use to say it is new. This procedure has been in the Military Manœuvres Act for years.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

Well, I did not know it. If the noble Viscount tells me that that procedure has been in the Military Manœuvres Act for years, that is the only Act he can quote; and although I have heard almost every day of my Parliamentary life of the other procedure, I only can say that I never heard of the positive form of procedure until this session. I suggest, after what I have been able to tell your Lordships, that nothing remains of the case that this is an attempt to deprive the laity of their rights, and to hand over the whole government of the Church to the Bishops, and of the suggestion that we wish to smuggle through Parliament measures without adequate discussion, I think the most remarkable feature of this debate has been that the urgent need for adjusting the machinery of the Church to the changed and changing conditions of the time has been denied by no one in this debate. Nor has any speaker denied that Parliament cannot deal with the case under its present rules.

I have only one other assertion to controvert, and that is this—that the difficulty of getting Parliament to deal with Church questions arises from divisions in the Church itself. That is not true. There are divisions in the Church, and great divisions, and so there always will be in any body, secular or religious, in which, as is the case in the Church of England, there is free speech and free thought. But now to-day the men of extreme view on one side or another are heard by the public but the great central body of common sense Church opinion is silent, because they have no organ through which they can express their opinion. If once you give the Church the opportunity of deciding all these questions you will see that that great, silent, central body, absolutely imbued with the common sense of the nation, will come to Parliament without any hesitation with a decision on all these questions.

When every institution in the State is being reconstructed, is the Church alone to be refused the power of telling Parliament what changes it thinks necessary? The Bishop of Manchester said yesterday, "Why should not the Nonconformists have the same privilege as Churchmen are asking for themselves? "Why not? In the Report of the original Committee and of the later one in most respectful terms the hope is expressed that if any change is made by Parliament in this matter for the benefit of the Church the benefit may be extended to Nonconformists, if they wish it. And the technical difficulty, which the right rev. Prelate suggested, of the number of different denominations is no difficulty in this case, because there is a body well known and greatly respected, the Free Church Council, and the Free Church Council could in such a matter in all that concerned the Nonconformist take the place of the Church Assembly.

I have been asked how this question affects disestablishment. That is much too large a question to argue to-night. But I do say without the slightest hesitation that the great majority of those who are favouring this Bill are opposed to disestablishment and disendowment. I think the only real danger that could arise in this country of disestablishment and disendowment of the Church of England would be if the young men and young women of the Church who are burning with zeal and wish to see the machinery of the Church adapted to the needs of the time found that reform under the Establishment was impossible. If they found that Parliament refused every demand, or request, or petition of theirs for the opportunity of adjusting the machinery of the Church to the requirements of the age then I believe that thousands of these young men and women would turn as their only resource to the alternative of disestablishment. And one of my strongest reasons for pleading so passionately to Parliament to give the Church the opportunity of reforming itself is this. I am one of those to whom the severance of this 1,500 years old connection would be a pang almost past expression. That may be unintelligible to many of my Nonconformist brethren. I know it is. But it is a view which many of us hold.

But there is another aspect of this case which I feel even more strongly than on the subject of disestablishment, and that is the question of reunion. I am not alluding now to the reunion of the sundered fragments of the West, nor to the reunion of the East and West; I am thinking of reunion between the members of the Church of England and those whose fathers were once members, but who left the Church and became Nonconformists There is far greater chance of reunion to-day than there was twenty years ago. I do not believe that that reunion can ever be brought about by the sacrifice of fundamental principles on either the one side or the other, but what I do believe is this, that my Nonconformist fellow-countrymen will feel far more attraction to a Church, and to union with a Church, which has made every possible effort to reform itself of abuses and to make itself more fit for its divine mission, than they feel towards the Church to-day.

THE LORD BISHOP OF NORWICH

My Lords, I venture to begin my few remarks to you upon this important subject by tendering hearty thanks to the noble Earl who has just sat down. I cannot say that I am in agreement with him in all that he has said. But I am aware of this, that to no one do we owe so much in the discussion of this all-important problem as we do to the noble Earl, unless it be to his distinguished son.

I think that all of us who have listened to the debate so far must have felt two things—first, the difficulty that has attended Church legislation in the part, and, secondly, the importance of improving the approach between the Church and Parliament. We have welcomed very heartily what we heard earlier in the afternoon, from the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack, who explained to us that the new system of Parliamentary debate which has been initiated in the last few months might tend to the advantage of the Church as much as to the advantage of other bodies. For the Church by no means stands alone in the difficulty of gaining attention to its requirements. And we may add that these ideas of devolution which are in the air to-day may also help the Church, as they may help other bodies, if means are devised by which Parliament shall be saved from having to spend its attention upon small and local and sectional matters, and therefore have the more time to give to the larger and more important questions.

The noble Earl has referred to the question whether it is the divisions in the Church which have militated against attention in another place. There, I confess, I do not quite agree with him; and once more I was rejoiced to hear the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack say that the important Union of Benefices Bill—in which I have the honour to interest myself—is to receive the support of the Government. That measure came to the Government with a recommendation that the united voice of the Church was in its favour. We have been glad to hear all that has been urged on behalf of the laity in regard to this Bill and every one is anxious that the laity should be put into such a position that they may exercise an official and a useful voice in the councils of the Church. If the Bill before us accomplished the two very desirable advantages of improving the approach of the Church to Parliament and of giving the laity such a position as we wish them to hold, I think it would have met with approval from all sections of this House. These advantages are very real, very great, and very obvious, and I confess that at first sight they seemed to me to cover the whole ground; but I do not deny that protracted and more careful consideration of the whole question has revealed to me other points which I do not think we must allow to pass from our consideration.

First of all, I doubt whether this new Church Assembly will give us the unity which the noble Earl indicated; it will no doubt give us a semblance of unity, but I doubt whether the unity will be so real as to carry full weight with it. The other day I read in another connection in The Times that the evils of an existing system are enumerated and then exchanged for so many benefits under the new; the merits of the first and the drawbacks of the second are ignored. I am afraid that in our considerations we may fall under that criticism of those who were dealing with another question. The more I consider the drawbacks of this Bill the more vivid I think they become. As I have already said, the advantages are clear and plain to the eye from the beginning, and they grow no bigger on consideration. It is said that if this Bill is passed the old methods will remain as they are. I cannot think that this is a very wise remark; because the whole point of this Bill is to induce people not to use the old methods but to employ the new ones. I do not think we can have it both ways—that this Bill does not disturb old arrangements and, therefore, is harmless, and that it introduces new arrangements which ought to make us enthusiastic about it.

I ask leave to take a point which does not lie at all outside a Second Reading debate to be reserved for the Committee stage, for it vitally touches the character of the Bill and the important issue of the new powers to be given to the laity. These powers are urged—I myself am ready to urge them—in favour of the Bill. But I do not deny that when in Convocation I voted for this Bill I did so under the impression that it was much more capable of amendment as it stands than I now believe. I have elsewhere before now very closely questioned—as I question this afternoon—the wisdom of incorporating into the Bill actual executive details if the Bill is to be, as is urged, merely one for erecting new machinery. In that case one might have supposed that it would limit itself to the process of erecting new machinery. But if your Lordships look in the Appendix, Section III (10), (4) and (5), you will find that the Bill goes into such a detail as defining the powers of a Church Council as against those of an incumbent I in a way that has nothing to do with the primary object of the Bill—namely, erecting a new approach to Parliament from the Church. If you have read the Bill carefully you will find that, with very small exceptions, it is the parochial Church meeting which deals with the elections and not the parochial Church Council at all. I very much doubt whether the supporters of the Bill have accurately seen this very important distinction between the parochial Church meeting and the parochial Church council which is set out in the Appendix, and about which the noble Marquess Lord Crewe asked a question.

It does not satisfy me to say that if people have not grasped these nice distinctions it is their own fault, and they ought to have taken the trouble to do so. I think it would be really disastrous to pass a Bill which would be a potential cause of friction in every parish in the kingdom. One is glad, of course, to know that in most parishes the clergyman and his flock are on very happy and blessed terms together. But one never knows when a change may come in a parish. I feel sure that this arrangement attributing definite duties to the parochial Church council should have been left over to a later stage when the Assembly is in working; then I think it may very well have been discussed upon both sides. But why this executive detail, of what I cannot help calling in some directions a provocative character, should be placed in a Bill which sets out merely to erect a piece of machinery, I cannot follow. In a vague way many of the clergy, and others too, would be in favour of the Church Council which now exists in some cases, but without at all realising the new powers to be put into the new style of Statutory Council. I believe there are some people who would say, "This is an excellent Bill because it will enable us to keep our parson in order." But I question whether that style of somewhat personal argument is one that ought to be used in advocating the Second Reading of such a grave measure as this is.

I go on now to speak of the kind of man to whom the noble Earl alluded, but somehow I seem to take rather a different view of his hopes than did the noble Earl. I speak as no Party man, but I have in my mind the silent, quiet laymen who have no sectional organisation and no Party newspapers to help them, and I am afraid that such men as these are likely to fare not well but ill in the new Assembly. Even if it is their own fault for not pushing, and if need be not fighting, it would be a disaster for the Church to lose the good will of such men, and that they should feel that in some respects the direction—perhaps the officious direction—of the Church was in the hands of an expert body which did not care very much about them.

Again, the existing franchise is, in my humble opinion, both wide and wise; but it is common knowledge that, though on the Representative Church Council the majority in its favour was decisive, yet if a comparatively small proportion of those who voted for that franchise changed their minds at a later date and voted for a narrower franchise, a very serious change would be made. And I am not speaking with unfounded fears with regard to this narrower franchise, because the vigorous words which were spoken at the end of the meeting of the Representative Church Council showed how much feeling there is still upon this point; and we are aware that a leading Bishop took it as the occasion for his resignation of his See. And I entertain no doubt either that if the narrower franchise had been carried, this Bill would still have been introduced into your Lordships' House, though it would have encountered a larger amount of opposition. I cannot feel that this generous franchise, this wise franchise, is by any means secure from subsequent alteration when the Church Assembly has been erected. I know it is said here, "Trust the future"; and many distinguished men are prepared to trust the future. But the future is very apt to develop inherent tendencies, and, looking ahead, I cannot see that any list of names, however distinguished, is a real guarantee that the franchise will be kept open so as to prevent the Assembly from degenerating into en organ of denomination, and becoming unworthy of the name National.

If an attempt were made to narrow the franchise, I cannot see that we shall derive very much from the review of the Parliamentary Committee of the Privy Council. I may be confused in my mind, but I seem to understand the noble Earl to say that these internal points dealing with the polity of the Church would be decided by the Church Assembly, and it would not be for the Parliamentary Committee of the Privy Council to intervene unless the rights of citizens were to be in some way invaded. My right rev. brother the Bishop of Ely spoke yesterday of the Privy Council Committee being a grand jury. I am not certain in what sense he used the words "grand jury"; the only grand jury I have been acquainted with was when, as a young man, I used to swear in a jury when I was a Judge's marshal. And those grand juries had the habit of very expeditiously performing their duties, and, unless there was very grave reason to the contrary, quickly passed on the trial to the next stage. The whole scheme, to my mind, resembles the work of experts rather detached from common life. I do not, of course, discredit it as the work of experts, but I believe that the work of experts all over the world must, if it is to be effective, have a strong public opinion behind it.

About this public opinion we hear rather different representations from the various dioceses. My brother the Bishop of Liverpool just now explained to us the enthusiasm which was felt in his Diocesan Conference. Yesterday the Bishop of Ely spoke of the enthusiasm which was felt in East Anglia. I suppose that enthusiasm was expressed in Diocesan Conference, and I never can be quite sure that the Diocesan Conference really represents very well the laity of a district. At least I do not yet find there is much pushing to get a place upon it, and I do not find a seat upon it as yet coveted very dearly. My own experience is rather different. I do not lay stress upon it, because I think it is im- possible to say what is the view taken in this part of England and in that. But last Monday I completed my septennial visitation of the diocese of Norwich, and there I was interested to discover that only in forty out of our 600 parishes had any interest been taken or exhibited in this Bill. And it may be wiser, I believe, after all, for the varying views of the Church and the disagreements within its borders to be set in neutral surroundings.

In view of the national work of the Church, I think we cannot ignore the nation, or suppose that we are dealing with a wholly ecclesiastical problem. The Church of England is much too near the nation for it to be possible for such an attitude to be taken up. If ever a nation as a whole needed Christian guidance from its own Church, which has, in its simplicity of unsystematised and informal intercourse and the spirit of imparted comradeship been bound up with its life and heart and deliberations from the very day when it could speak of itself as the English nation, it needs it now; and I believe it would be a calamity if, with the view to simplicity of organisation or from any pedantic appeal of logic, there were erected some new Church government that would in the least tend to endow the Church with some sectional coherence or adherence.

May I go on to remark—and here the noble Earl anticipated me—that we cannot say, "Never mind Disestablishment" in this connection. Others have told us that it has nothing to do with the subject, but the noble Earl has taken a different view, for obviously it does come into view as a disastrous alternative. Whether the passing of this Bill should lead the enemies of the Church to cry out for Disestablishment, or the failure of the Bill should lead those who have propounded it to urge Disestablishment from within in the way that the noble Earl suggested is possible—a threat which I think I have heard definitely expressed outside—I believe that the very worse thing which could happen to the nation is disestablishment of the Church, and that the Church would thereby eventually lose its marvellous parochial system, by which there is one man set down to every parish to whom every member of his flock may turn, and on the other hand, a man who may have a right of entry into every house within his town or village parish.

My Lords, I speak as one who could have hoped that the scheme would work and who could have wished it to work, and I grieve to think what labour the failure to carry it would involve, for I, too, have toiled away at it. But I think that the course of our debate has opened up a vista of clear hope. The noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack spoke very encouragingly of his readiness to help to provide a workable scheme. The noble Marquess, Lord Crewe, has said something of the same kind, and I certainly think that this debate has made clearer than ever the unfortunate disabilities which, from the point of view of legislation, our Church at present suffers from. I am not, offhand, prepared to suggest a better scheme. I never think it fair to say to a man "If you do not like this, propose something better." That would be the end in all action and literature in the whole range of life of the work of the critic. And I think in these busy impatient days our country is likely to suffer when it says, as it often does, "Take this or nothing." I would far sooner wait and discover whether the supporters of this scheme as it now stands and those who oppose it cannot lay their heads together to bring out a scheme which would work and which would be acceptable.

Now there is no better way that I can see to produce that happy result than to give this Bill as it stands a Second Reading It seems to me that to leave such a suggestion as I have made as a pious aspiration to some one who will take it up is by no means hopeful, and if the Bill receives a Second Reading, though I imagine its contents will be considerably altered, yet the Bill would give us a ground upon which to set to work. Whether it would be wise to refer it to a Select Committee or to refer it to a Committee of both Houses it is not for me to say, but I feel that if no Second Reading were given all these labours would be lost and no one would take up the cause again. Personally, if the Bill remained as it was without Amendment, I should feel that I was embarking on a perilous voyage into a newly-discovered and unexplored borderland between Church and State and I should be loth to take that voyage. If the Bill, having been read a second time, came to be so modified by the concurrent suggestions of those who, from different quarters of the House, have expressed their good will, it would be, I believe, quite a different matter I may be allowed perhaps to say a personal word in conclusion. I could not possibly vote against the Second Reading, even if I wished to do so, because I owe such a sincere deference to the splendid personality of our Primate to whom, in all these matters, we are under an enormous debt of gratitude.

THE EARL OF CAVAN

My Lords, it is with the very greatest diffidence that I venture to say a few words in favour of the Bill before your Lordships, but I do so for one special reason, which is that discussions on Church matters, and what the Church was doing or was not doing, were very much more frequent during the long years of the late war, both in trenches and in messes, than perhaps your Lordships would imagine. The general tenour of those conversations, so far as I was able to judge, was that the Church was undeniably losing its grip and hold on the people and that, unless something was done, there was a real danger of a deadly indifference settling down upon the country—an indifference which, in my Opinion, would be a calamity. Therefore, I for one welcome this Bill as a perfectly honest effort to do that "something" which so many of the soldiers thought was necessary.

Speaking as one who has no strong leanings either to the High Church or to the Low Church I look upon it as unspeakably sad that the introduction of a Bill of this sort should at once become a bone of contention between the extremists in the Church. I do not believe that the promoters of this Bill had, or have, the very slightest wish for anything revolutionary. I have had very little experience of reading Bills. In fact, I frankly own that this is the first Bill I have ever read through. But it appears to me eminently reasonable and very well safeguarded. Lastly, I welcome the opportunity given to laymen to take an active part in the Church's business. This power must, at any rate, awaken general interest in Church matters in every town and village in the country, and this fact must postpone, anyhow, that deadly indifference on Church matters and that general apathy which I myself so much dread.

THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

My Lords, I think your Lordships will feel that the time is approaching when we ought to endeavour to come to some decision upon the Second Reading of this Bill. In its passage, both in the Press and in some respects in your Lordships' House, it has encountered many dusty clouds of suspicions, fears and irrelevant issues, and it has been difficult always to observe very clearly the actual purpose and provisions of the Bill. I think that I must endeavour very shortly to lay some of that dust and to enable the Bill to be seen in its true proportions. If, in doing so, I have to repeat some of the points which have b en better made by previous speakers, I hope your Lordships will forgive me, as it has not been possible for all of you to be present during the whole course of the debate.

First of all let us dismiss from our mind the idea that this Bill seeks in any sort of way to change the fundamental status and character of the national Church. This is neither the hour nor the place in which to attempt a disquisition upon the meaning of a national Church. For our purpose the national Church means at least these two things—that the Church which ventures to claim so august a title is one which has, in a very peculiar degree, a responsibility for the whole people of this country; and, secondly, that Parliament owes it to the Church which, by virtue of its national position, it very largely controls, to see that this control helps and does not hinder the Church in the fulfillment of its mission to the nation. A point, has now been reached in the long relations between the Church and the State when, owing to the immense increase of the work of the Church—due inevitably both to the enlargement of the population and. I trust, still more to the enlargement of the horizon of the Church's own vision of what it owes to the nation—and owing to the equally immense increase in the work and the scope of Parliament, the old and existing methods of procedure in regard to legislation affecting the Church have been proved to be outworn and no longer consistent either with the responsibility of the Church to the nation or of the responsibility of Parliament to the Church.

The principles of Church and State have agitated mankind for centuries and are responsible for some of the most memorable, some of the most regrettable, and also some of the most inspiring episodes in the history of this country; but this is not an occasion when those fundamental principles of Church and State are at issue. What we are concerned with in this Bill is the effort, in view of existing conditions, to enable Church and State the better to fulfil the great functions with which they are charged, and, therefore, we can dismiss from our minds at once the idea that, either in design or in effect, this Bill has Disestablishment in view. I venture to mention this, even after all that has been said upon the subject, because in private conversation not only with some of your Lordships but also with laymen in different parts of the country who are not present, I find there is still a lurking suspicion that somehow or other the words which were used by the noble Viscount who leads the opposition to the Bill, to the effect that Disestablishment was somehow or other involved in these proposals, still exists. It certainly is not there in design. No one could suppose for a moment that the Archbishop of Canterbury, or the noble Earl, Lord Selborne, who has just spoken with so much weight, could possibly design Disestablishment in any measure which they put before this House.

It is equally true that if there is no look towards Disestablishment in design, there is neither any look towards Disestablishment in effect. How can it be said that this Bill in any way involves, even indirectly, the disestablishment of the Church, or the alteration of the rights which every citizen has with regard to the Church? The noble and learned Viscount answers, in his Amendment, by saying that the Bill proposes to exclude the greater part of the people of England from effective influence in the affairs of the Church. How do the people of England exercise influence upon the affairs of the National Church? It is first of all through their position as citizens in the parish to which they belong. This Bill in no way whatever affects the rights of any English laymen as regards the National Church. It is worth while to emphasise that point, because we hear even in speeches in this House implications that somehow or other the existing laity, whether they be regarded as citizens or as members of the Church, are to be deprived of some of the rights which they possess.

I know of no right belonging now to any man or woman in this country with regard to the National Church which is affected by this Bill. They will still have their vestry; still elect their churchwardens; still have their rights in the parish church to which they are attached, and I for my part would never sanction any proposal which derogated from the effective representation of the affection which all parishioners feel for, even if they do not always attend, the parish church which is the centre of so ninny sacred associations in their parish. They will still have the right to the ministrations of religion which are provided by the parson of the parish. Therefore, my Lords, when we hear from the noble and learned Viscount in the course of his speech these words— In the parishes the clergyman ministers to every one who is not an evil-liver, who claims his ministrations. He baptises them, he marries them, and he buries them; they have the right to go to the church to the services and to be in the vestry. All these things will cease to be certainty if this Bill passes; there is not one of these rights which it does not threaten"; I feel that the noble Viscount and myself are really living in different worlds, because there is nothing in this Bill, or in the intention of any of its framers, affecting in the slightest degree the existing right of any layman in the Church or citizen in the country.

Then again, the effective influence of the people of England is also exercised by their representation in Parliament. Here again it may be worth while to repeat that there is nothing in this Bill which affects the position of Parliament as the ultimate source of the sanction which must be given to any changes affecting the Church of England in regard to its constitution, or its relation with the Statute Law of the country. As has been pointed out in this debate, Parliament still retains its own right of initiating and carrying through ecclesiastical legislation, and the only change that is made is a change of procedure in regard to a certain class of measure coming before Parliament. In its intentions, as in its very title, this Bill recognises and desires to uphold the ultimate control of His Majesty and of the two Houses of Parliament.

We are told that the Bill in some way affects, if not these legal rights of citizens or of the lay members of the Church, the comprehensive character of the Church. Eloquent words have been spoken during this debate about the need of retaining the allegiance to religion of the greatest possible number of the people of this country; of the grave danger of doing anything that would repel any one from feeling at home in the National Church. There is no one in this House who shares more fully than I do the desires that have been thus eloquently expressed. There is no proposal in this Bill even affecting the religious or spiritual status of any one in this country. It is not by putting his name upon the electoral roll that a man becomes a member of the Church of England, and it is not by his refraining from claiming his place on the electoral roll that he can cease to be a member of the Church of England. Whatever his fights or his desires about membership in the National Church may be, they are not in the least affected by whether or not he desires, through participating in this representative system, to take an active part in the internal affairs of the National Church.

I think that this mistake and misunderstanding revealed itself in the speech of the noble Viscount. He mentioned the name of one who will always be remembered with admiration and gratitude in this House, the distinguished author of "The Diary of a Churchgoer"—Lord Courtney of Penwith, and said— Lord Courtney was one of those men who, as I shall show in a moment, if this Bill had passed could not have felt it legitimate to remain within walls which had been narrowed and which imposed a view of things which he could nut conscientiously hold. Lord Courtney would have been perfectly able, so far as I know, to enter his name upon the electoral roll of this representative system, but if for any reason he declined to do so it would not in the least affect his position, or his right, or his allegiance to, or his welcome within, the National Church. So it is, I submit to your Lordships, a thing which we can dismiss from our minds, that in any sort of way, if I may use some words that have been used on this matter—that in any way this Bill was non-churching by exclusion from the Establishment every man or woman who does not, claim a place upon the electoral roll. I rather emphasise this point, because I think it is most important that it should be understood that it is upon quite other grounds, and by quite other means, that a man realises his membership in the National Church, than by associating himself with its actual affairs by applying to have his name inscribed upon the electoral roll.

Of course, my Lords, the noble and learned Viscount sees the danger of this narrowing of the comprehensive character of the Church of England, because in his view this Bill sets up a denomination, with episcopacy as the dominant factor. In his view the danger of the Bill is that it gives further power to a dangerous prelacy. It is singular that perhaps the most active criticism of the Bill comes from another quarter, which asserts that the object and certainly the result of this Bill would be a fatal blow to the Episcopacy, as the divinely-appointed governors and rulers of the Church. Of two contradictory propositions one certainly must be false, and I suggest that the truth is not wholly in the statement of the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Haldane. I think I might describe the noble and learned. Viscount's attitude towards the Bishops in the words that were used by a very brilliant scholar and thinker of Cambridge, Mr. Henry Sidgwick, and those who knew him will know that whatever he said was enhanced by the effective stammer with which lie said it. He said that Bishops individually were among the most agreeable of his acquaintances, but Bishops collectively represented everything that he most detested. I hope the noble and learned Viscount will partially agree with the first part of that statement. The second I know he wholly agrees with.

Although that may be true, and although it may colour the noble and learned Viscount's attitude towards this Bill, it is really, as I think has been abundantly pointed out, irrelevant, to the discussion, because your Lordships will recognise that a measure which more than ever gives a very considerable place to the laity in regard to all that concerns the Church of England, and very considerably limits the power of the Episcopacy, cannot possibly justify the words of the noble and learned Viscount, to which I think attention was called in the admirable speech of my brother the Bishop of Ely. I may remind your Lordships of them, in order that you may see that not all the criticisms of the noble and learned Viscount are very damaging to this Bill. He said that if this Bill were passed the Church would pass from a democratic to an aristocratic basis, only the aristocracy would be an episcopal aristocracy. I do not think, if I may borrow the title of a work to which I owe very much in my own reading, that there is much of a "Pathway to Reality" in these words. I think they must be described as really rhetoric—high sounding words which have no relation to facts.

But there are still some who say: "In spite of all this we suspect the men under whose auspices this Bill has been very specially commended to public opinion. We suspect that they represent an element in Church life which, however much you may disguise it, is narrowing in its tendencies and disposed to be sacerdotal in its views." After this debate, that can be no longer pretended, for we have had as one of the most emphatic sponsors of the Bill the Bishop of Liverpool, whom no one would suppose to be of narrowing or sacerdotal tendencies, and we know that Sir Edward Clarke is one of its foremost champions, and he would be very much surprised if he were regarded as the protagonist of a narrow and sacerdotal section.

I dismiss that point at once. As a matter of fact in all my experience of ecclesiastical matters I have never known one which commanded so surprising a unanimity of assent among men who otherwise and on other points are often sharply divided. When I think of the way in which the main proposals of this Bill have been discussed in Assembly after Assembly of the Church of England, and when I have watched with admiration the growing concentration of assent and desire which it has received, I think I am justified in saying that one of its chief titles to consideration at your Lordships' hands is the singular unanimity which it has evoked among the members of the Church of England. My Lords, when we spoke of these Assemblies we heard a reminder of the limited value attaching to the opinion of the ecclesiastically-minded layman. I am very familiar with the ecclesiastically-minded layman, and I am not, I think, more disposed to favour him than any of your Lordships, if we understand aright what it means. We all knew the person to whom the affairs of the Church, in his common conversation, occupy almost the place of King Charles' head in the conversation of Mr. Dick, and we do not think much of that type of man; but that is not in the least the type of man who, in my experience, has been concerned with either the shaping or the carrying through of this Bill to the stage which it has so far reached in the Assemblies of the Church.

When I think of my own diocese, or of others with which I am acquainted, and ask myself who have been prominent in this business, almost without exception they are men who are taking a leading part in the business of the county councils, magistrates on the Bench, able and well- known business men, and in some cases representatives of the wage-earners of the country. If by the ecclesiastically-minded is meant the layman who happens to give a large part of his time and attention to the affairs of the Church to which he belongs I have yet to learn that a man's judgment loses value in proportion as it is based upon interest and knowledge.

When one hears this kind of thing which I was rather sorry to hear partially reflected in the speech of my brother the Bishop of Norwich, one wonders whether this would not be a fair analogy. It would be as if members of your Lordships' House who are not frequent in attendance in the debates, and who do not take a very active part in the political affairs of the country, were to find that their judgment was enhanced and regarded as of the greatest possible value in comparison with the judgment of those members of this House who are continually here transacting its business, but who might therefore be described as politically-minded. The fact is that here you have just the thing which has been so often desired, just the very thing that I think the noble Marquess opposite (Lord Crewe) mentioned in regard to ecclesiastical legislation—a united voice; the Church coming forward and saying, "Here is something about which we have thought, which we have discussed, and for which we care; and it is with such a united voice that we present it to Parliament." The Bishop of Norwich, who has just spoken—and I cannot but say that I think his speech would have been more helpful had it been delivered in the Assemblies of the Church before it was delivered here—is not so sure about the evidence of much unity or enthusiasm among the parishes of Norfolk about this Bill. Well, my Lords, if it has taken the Bishop of Norwich so long to make tip his own mind, I do not think he can be surprised that his clergy and laity have found it a little difficult to make up theirs. I can certainly say, and I think no one will seriously dispute it, that judged by whatever ways are possible by which you can gather and collect the united desires of the great hulk of the clergy and the laity of the Church of England, these desires are for and not against the principles of this Bill. Perhaps I may allude to this again before I close. Therefore, my Lords, you will remember, I doubt not, in deciding your vote, that this is precisely one of those occasions on which—and it is not very frequent— something like a united Church asks for the help of Parliament to fulfil its work.

I pass to the Bill itself. What has been most remarkable in this debate is the unanimity with which it has been acknowledged that the present state of things as regards ecclesiastical legislation cannot go on. There is no one who has hitherto spoken who has for one moment questioned the truth of that proposition. It was acknowledged by the noble and learned Viscount; it was handsomely acknowledged by the noble Marquess who leads the Opposition; and it was most fully acknowledged by the speech delivered by the noble and learned Lord upon the Woolsack. It has been universally acknowledged. That fact alone would make it worth while to have brought forward this Bill before Parliament. Whatever chances or even mischances this Bill may have either in this House now or in Committee or in another place, it will have been well worth while to have had it once and for al clearly laid down, in the very responsible and full manner in which the noble and learned Lord laid it down, that steps must be taken to ensure that reforms and measures which are ardently desired by the great majority of active Churchmen shall have some better chance of passing through Parliament than they have hitherto enjoyed; and I would like, on behalf of those who have been framing this Bill, to express our gratitude to the noble and learned Lord for the words he used and for the assurance which he gave.

I think it is unnecessary at this stage of the discussion to press the points which, at an earlier stage, were so fully made by the Archbishop of Canterbury. But let me put it in a very plain and, if you will, homely way. Like others of my brethren I am continually dealing with the ordinary layman who feels puzzled and irritated about the way in which things are going in his parish. He comes to me and points out, let us say, that some incumbent who though not technically within any existing legislation is obviously wholly unfitted to the sacred work which has been entrusted to him. He asks me, "Why cannot this man be got rid of?" Or he comes to me and points to some one who, though morally quite respectable, is yet incurably idle or incapable of making any kind of impression upon his people, and who yet, because of the fixity of his freehold tenure, is entitled to remain there until his church is emptied of every single parishioner. The layman says to me, "What is to be done?" My Lords, it is no use for me to turn to that layman and ask him to make use of that measure of effective control over the affairs of the National Church which the noble and learned Viscount thinks that he now possesses. It would be mockery. I have to tell him, "I am sorry but that requires legislation, and legislation is the one thing that the Church cannot get." The layman very naturally replies and. says, "Well, why cannot it be altered?" It is precisely to find an answer to that question that this I Bill is brought before your Lordships.

Or, again, may I take an illustration which is borrowed from my own personal experience? It fell to me to endeavour to procure the passing of the Sheffield Bishopric Bill. I am not likely to forget the experiences which attended that enterprise. Here was a Bill which was desired by the whole of the great population of Sheffield, by Nonconformists (as far as their expressions can show) as eagerly as by Churchmen. The money was there—there was no difficulty, except that in its progress in the House of Commons the Bill was obstructed by one or two individuals and no progress could be made; and the final result by which the desire of these great masses of Church people, Nonconformists and others, in Sheffield was carried out was obtained by a method of Parliamentary manœuvre which certainly I think reflected very little credit either upon the Parliament which made it necessary or upon the Church which had to accept it.

The point does not really want labouring. It is common ground; and I think it is equally true that Parliament itself would welcome legislation of this kind quite as eagerly as the Church. It is quite plain that owing to limitations, want of time, and owing to, as Lord Emmott last night very forcibly pointed out, the very natural and generous dislike and distaste of Members of Parliament who are not members of the Church of England to show themselves active in its concerns, legislation affecting the Church has not had a chance. I take the point which the noble and learned Lord upon the Woolsack made, that things are not now as they were before the war, that there is different procedure. But even if the procedure was expedited so that the worst evils of obstruction were removed, there would still, I think, be the great advantage to Parliament in regard to these matters to have before it a measure which, because it is brought forward after full discussion and thought by representatives of the Church, enables Parliament to deal with it with fall knowledge and in a really derisive and responsible way. Therefore I think upon that ground there is no sort of disagreement, but there is argent and indeed imperative need for a change in the legislative procedure by which Church and State are to work together in this country.

The question really is, Does the Bill reasonably and adequately meet this admitted need? Its nature has been quite fully put before your Lordships in the weighty speech of the noble Earl. The proposal is that the Church, with its representative assemblies, should consider and frame measures which it desires to become law, and should then submit them to the scrutiny of whatever body of experts on the part of the State be most competent to deal with them, and they should then be put before Parliament and become law, subject to the assent of Parliament after discussion being given or withheld.

Let me, though I do not wish to be long, say a word or two upon each of these features of the Bill, and first of all upon this National Assembly of the Church of England. I desire here to deal as frankly and as honestly as I can with a difficulty which has been expressed by the noble Marquess opposite and others. It is a criticism of the form in which the suggestion of this Assembly conies before this House. I think there has been some misunderstanding on this matter which I will try if I can to remove. I think the criticisms of the noble Marquess and others—the force of them I acknowledge—would be most reasonable if the Bill were asking Parliament to create new representative bodies for the Church, or to endow those bodies with powers of legislation. But, as the noble Earl has pointed out—and I think it is worth while to repeat it so that there can be no doubt about it—in the first place this National Assembly of the Church of England is not a new thing which your Lordships are asked to call into being. It exists in all its essential elements. It is principally composed of the Convocations of the two Provinces into which the Church is divided—the Provinces of Canterbury and York—bodies, as I need scarcely remind your Lordships, which have a constitution independent of Parliament, and a history which goes back beyond Parliament itself. To these bodies, already part of the constitution of this Realm, the Houses of Laymen have been added, elected upon a representative basis. That is the National Assembly of the Church of England. This Bill incorporates or alludes to a system by which tine existing system has been improved precisely in order to make it more worthy of the limited powers which it is desired that Parliament should give it—namely the powers of initiating legislation. For that purpose it has widened its franchise, and in some way improved its procedure.

In the second place—and this I would venture to emphasise—the Church of England needs for its own sake and for its own interest a representative assembly. Your Lordships can readily understand that what was possible in the life of the Church during the eighteenth or the earlier part of the nineteenth century, is no longer possible now. The Church of England cannot be any longer merely parochial or merely diocesan in its scope. It has a work to fulfil in regard to the whole nation, and beyond the, nation to other nations overseas, and indeed to the whole world; and in order that it may express its mind upon matters which concern the public life of this country, in order that it may set forth its work here in England, it is necessary that it should have representative Assemblies of a wider scope than the two Convocations sitting separately, and with the fuller recognition than can be given merely to the Convocations meeting with representative laymen. If you consider—to mention it only in a word—what has yet to be done in the way of enabling the Church through its financial system to cope with the growing poverty of the Clergy, and the immense needs of our great populations, if you consider all that is involved in what will be universally admitted to be the need of providing a proper pension system for the Clergy, you will see that the Church of England now must have a representative Assembly of its own, through which its common mind can be ascertained and its common work set forth.

If that be so, I think it is reasonable to say that two things follow, the one that the same body which expresses the mind and sets forward the work of the Church in its own internal affairs should be the body through which proposals requiring legislation should reach Parliament; and if so, secondly, that this body should be constituted in accordance with the views and the experience and the need not of Parliament but of the Church itself; and that Parliament should be asked not to decide upon the constitution of this body but whether or not the body is sufficiently representative of the Church of England to justify Parliament in entrusting it with this limited power of initiating legislation. I think this is a point the more reasonable because the Bill, your Lordships will observe, does not ask that powers of legislation should be entrusted to this body, but only that powers to initiate legislation should be given to it. And that is a very important point. There is no kind of desire to question the fairness or limit the authority of Parliament in the simple request that the Church should be allowed to arrange according to its sense of its own needs and its own work what is the assembly that meets these needs best, and we ask Parliament to use that Assembly and not to create another as an organ through which the wishes of the Church may reach Parliament in regard to legislation. That is the real explanation of the form in which the constitution of the proposed National Assembly comes before your Lordships.

I do not propose, in reference to this National Assembly, to deal with the speech, eloquent and impressive as it was, delivered by my brother, a Suffragan in my Province, the Bishop of Manchester. The Bishop thinks that the Assembly will be so dangerous that Parliament ought not even to confer these limited powers upon it. I am sorry that the Bishop is not present, but he will not mind if I allude to his speech, because it may have impressed some of your Lordships by its vigour and eloquence. By long experience I know that my brother the Bishop of Manchester is a very expert wizard in raising bogeys, and when he puts them before us—as the Bishop of Ely, I think, using another metaphor said in his admirable speech—I confess that our flesh creeps, and we seem to be seeing a vista of untold disaster impending if we do not follow the Bishop's advice. But, as with other bogeys, so these fade when the light of day or of reality is turned upon them. It is quite unthinkable that any such representative Assembly as is here contemplated would suggest measures imposing taxes upon the people of this country, or abolishing the Royal supremacy, or things of that kind. Surely the Bishop's own experience of the procedure of ecclesiastical Assemblies would not suggest that they were capable of such revolutionary spasms as this.

And when your Lordships remember that any decision, to be a decision of the Assembly, must be a decision of each of the three Houses, in order to justify these terrible pictures which the Bishop laid before us yesterday, we have to suppose that, first, the Bishops, and then the clergy, and then all the representative laity for a moment lose their senses. The Bishop's argument proceeds on the assumption that this ecclesiastical legislature may go mad. But I submit that the reasonable thing to do is to assume in legislation that on the whole, even in ecclesiastical assemblies, the dominant mood, if not wisdon, is at least sanity. And, moreover, to go further, these measures, even if, incredible as it may seem, they passed the National Assembly of the Church of England, would have no chance of getting the assent of Parliament unless by an impossible combination of circumstances both Houses of Parliament went mad as well. And therefore I do not dwell further upon the speech of the Bishop.

The real question is whether Parliament can recognise this body as sufficiently representative. And here I think it is important to observe that what the Church wants and, I think, with deference, Parliament wants, is the same thing. In this regard what Parliament wants is precisely not the opinion of the ordinary adherent of the Church of England who retains his own civil and ecclesiastical rights. What Parliament expressly wants to obtain is the knowledge of what those who are really associated with the life and work of the Church desire. I would submit that in regard to this Constitution it represents really both what the Church and Parliament desire, and therefore that it is not, I think, unreasonable to suggest that Parliament should be willing simply to say, "Does this body, so constituted in accordance with the needs of the Church, represent, sufficiently the mind and view of the Church to make it possible for us to give it these limited powers?"

I do not propose, after the speech of the noble Earl, to which most of you, I think, listened, to deal with the other two parts of the scheme, the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council, and the procedure of Parliament. With regard to the first I would only say this as one who has been much interested in this measure, that I entirely endorse what was said by the noble Earl, that in this matter we were guided by what we thought was expert opinion, and that if the main design of this provision, namely that Parliament should not only have before it the considered desire and request of the Church but also an independent scrutiny and examination by some competent body representing the interests of the State and of the nation—if the provisions embodying that proposal can be made clearer, I am quite certain that those who promote this Bill would be most willing to accept these suggestions.

Speaking for myself, at any rate, I think that one might go further and say that it is quite conceivable that in Committee some actually better proposal of effecting this desire might be proposed and, if so, I am acre equally it would be most frankly and fully considered. Your Lordships will understand that it would be foolish to say about this or that point here and now that it would be accepted in Committee, because obviously we should wish to see it tabled and to hear it discussed; but I believe I can speak for the noble Earl and others and for the Archbishop of Canterbury when I say that if any Amendment is proposed to carry out the purposes of this part of the Bill more effectively it will be most carefully and sympathetically considered.

There remains the Parliamentary procedure, and of that I can only say that, so far as the Archbishops and Bishops are concerned, we are largely in the hands of those who have fuller experience of Parliamentary procedure. Certainly our desire is to make the ultimate assent of Parliament not in any way a form but a reality. And here again, if any amendment can be introduced which will more effectively stamp upon the Bill itself the honest and sincere desire of those who promote it that Parliament shall have a full and effective discussion, and therefore a full and effective voice, in deciding whether or not the measure should pass, we are most anxious in every way that that should be done.

This Bill, which, as I have explained, comes forward in a very remarkable manner at the request of the constituted authorities of the Church, is (if I may recall the words with which this debate opened in the speech of the Archbishop of Canterbury) an appeal to Parliament to help the Church (A England to do its work properly. In speaking as I have done I am conscious of no other desire than that. I do not think that your Lordships will withhold a Second Reading from a Bill so presented, and with such an object. It may be amended; in some respects I hope it will be; but in its fundamental character I think it deserves this reception at your Lordships' hands.

If so be that your Lordships see fit to refuse even a Second Reading, I think it right to say that it would cause great bitterness of disappointment among many of those to whom for the future welfare of the Church and partly of the nation we shall have to look—the younger men and women of this generation. I think it not impossible that their thoughts might be directed towards the way of disestablishment. That is not, I think, a desire which would move the majority of your Lordships' House. But, on the other hand, if you will pass this Bill through the Second Reading and afterwards, if so be, amend it and it becomes law, then you will strengthen and give a new hopefulness and fruitfulness to the ancient alliance between Church and State in this country. Why should there be this suspicion between the Church and Parliament, if it exists? We are both partners, with the same duties to fulfil—the promotion of the truest welfare of the people of this country. It is a partnership, as you have been reminded, whose origin lies far back in the ultimate roots of the life of this ancient people. It has been responsible I will dare to say for some of the most valued elements of strength, stability and reverence in the national life. Never was that partnership more needed than it is at this unspeakably momentous period of history to which we have come.

Recall for one moment the circumstances in which we meet—on the very threshold of this new age with its incomparable responsibilities. This is, perhaps, the first effort of the national Church to adapt its life and machinery to the needs of the new time which we have reached; and these needs and demands are very great. There never was a time when more depended upon the power of moral and spiritual ideals in the life of this nation. At a time when inevitably men are seeking to grasp and to hold the things that are seen and temporal, their efforts can only be redeemed from selfishness and sordidness by a more effective reminder of the things that are unseen and eternal. That reminder cannot be given by the Church of England alone; but your Lordships will understand the desire of the Church which claims to have the title of national that it shall at least have a foremost place in that great endeavour.

An eloquent reference was made by the Bishop of Manchester, and alluded to by the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack, to the great crowds of people who poured into our cathedrals, not only at St. Paul's but in the Minster at York, upon Armistice Day. I venture to say with all my heart that so far from forgetting those crowds it is the remembrance of them, the silent appeal of those crowds, that is the mainspring of the motives of those who promote and support this Bill. For one of our great hindrances in endeavouring to influence these multitudes and to attract them to their national Church—as I can tell from experience in East London and among the working people of the North—is precisely this, that the Church which claims

to be national seems to have no power to remedy the abuses and the anachronisms which have attended it in its long history and to adapt itself to the needs and aspirations of living men.

Give the Church a fuller chance thus to bring its system of life and work into touch with the needs of the hour and you will give it a better chance of being more truly national not only in title but in fact. It is because we believe that this measure will enable the Church better to fulfil its responsibility to the nation and Parliament better to fulfil its responsibility to the Church, that we ask your Lordships to give it now a Second Reading.

On Question, whether the words proposed to be left out shall stand part of the Motion?

Their Lordships divided: Contents, 130; Not-Contents, 33.

CONTENTS
Canterbury, L. Abp.	Hambleden, V.	Farrer, L.
York, L. Abp.	Hampden, V.	Forester, L.
Curzon of Kedleston, E. (L. President.)	Hood, V.	Glenarthur, L.
	Knutsford, V.	Grenfell, L.
	Peel, V.	Hare, L. (E. Listowel.)
Argyll, D.
Bedford, D.		Harlech, L.
Northumberland, D.	Bangor, L. Bp.	Harris, L.
Richmond and Gordon, D.	Coventry, L. Bp.	Hatherton, L.
Somerset, D.	Ely, L. Bp.	Hylton, L.
	Gloucester, L. Bp.	Joicey, L.
Aberdeen and Temair, M.	Liverpool, L. Bp.	Kinnaird, L.
Bath, M.	Llandaff, L. Bp.	Kintore, L. (E. Kintore.)
Bristol, M.	London, L. Bp.	Lawrence, L.
Cambridge, M.	Norwich, L. Bp.	Leigh, L.
Camden, M.	Rochester, L. Bp.	Mendip, L. (V. Clifden.)
Linlithgow, M.	St. Albans, L. Bp.	Methuen, L.
Salisbury, M.	St. David's, L. Bp.	Montagu of Beaulieu, L.
Zetland, M.	Salisbury, L. Bp.	Monteagle, L. (M. Sligo.)
	Southwell, L. Bp.	Monteagle of Brandon, L.
Ancaster, E.
Bathurst, E.	Wakefield, L. Bp.	Newton, L.
Bradford, E.	Winchester, L. Bp.	Northbourne, L.
Brassey, E.		O'Hagan, L.
	Aberdare, L.	Oranmore and Browne, L.
Caithness, E.	Aldenham, L.	Parmoor, L.
Cavan, E.	Annesley, L.	Phillimore, L.
Chichester, E.	Anslow, L.	Queenborough, L.
Clarendon, E.	Avebury, L.	Rathcreedan, L.
Dartmouth, E.	Balfour, L.	Rathmore, L.
Eldon, E.	Barrymore, L.	Redesdale, L.
Ferrers, E.	Beresford of Metemmeh, L.	Ritchie of Dundee, L.
Grey, E. [Teller.]
Halsbury, E.	Brodrick, L. (V. Midleton.)	Rotherham, L.
	Burgh, L.	Roundway, L.
Howe, E.
	Carnock, L.	St. Levan, L.
Lindsey, E.	Cheylesmore, L.	Sandys, L.
Lucon, E.	Clinton, L.	Sempill, L.
Mount Edgcumbe, E.	Cochrane of Cults, L.	Somerleyton, L.
Onslow, E.	Cottesloe, L.	Stuart of Wortley, L.
Powis, E.	Crawshaw, L.	Sudeley, L.
Selborne, E.	Dewar, L.	Sydenham, L.
Shaftesbury, E.	Dinevor, L.	Thurlow, L.
Waldegrave, E.	Downham, L.	Vivian, L.
Yarborough, E.
	Emmott, L. [Teller.]	Waleran, L.
Bryce, V.	Erskine, L.	Wenlock, L.
Esher, V.	Faber, L.	Wigan, L. (E. Crawford.)
Goschen, V.	Fairfax of Cameron, L.	Wyfold, L.
NOT-CONTENTS.
Birkenhead, L. (L. Chancellor.)	Sandhurst, V. (L. Chamberlain.)	Marchamley, L.
	Devonport, V.	Monckton, L. (V. Galway.)
Crewe, M.	Haldane, V. [Teller.]	Muir Mackenzie, L. [Teller.]
Lincolnshire, M.	Knollys, V.	Pontypridd, L.
	Ampthill, L.	Rowallan, L.
Chesterfield, E.	Askwith, L.	Saltoun, L.
Dartrey, E.	Atkinson, L.	Southwark, L.
Jersey, E.	Charnwood, L.	Stanley of Alderley, L. (L. Sheffield.)
Manvers, E.	Clwyd, L.
Portsmouth, E.	Denman, L.	Terrington, L.
Russell, E.	Gisborough, L.	Weardale, L.
Stanhope, E.		Wittenham, L.
	Hollenden, L.

Resolved in the affirmative; Bill read 2^a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.