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brought forward a motion for the repeal of the House and Window Tax, founded upon the present burdensome and oppressive amount of taxation, and the illusory nature of the benefits supposed to be derived from the sinking fund. This motion was comprised in three resolutions, the two first of which, setting forth the reasons for which it was expedient to repeal the tax in question, were disposed of by the previous question; and the last, declaring the tax levied on windows to be unequal, unjust, and oppressive, was negatived by a majority of 146 to 59.

Since the era of the publication of Dr Hamilton's work on the National Debt, every man competent to follow the reasonings and demonstrations contained in it must have been convinced, that the calculations of Dr Price in his

work on Reversionary Payments, concerning the accumulation of money at compound interest, and the sinking fund established by Mr Pitt on the basis of these calculations, were totally illusory; and that the only real sinking fund is an excess of income above expenditure. Proceeding upon the principles established in that celebrated treatise, Mr Hume, taking leave of minute investigations and piddling details, came forward, on the 25th of July, with a series of thirty-eight long resolutions, the object of which was to show first, how the national debt stood in January 1793, and in January 1822; 2dly, what it would have been if supplies had been raised, to the amount of between five and six millions a-year, on the average of the twenty-nine years; and, 3dly, what it would have been, if

1821.

L.4,000,000 Annual Taxes,

WAYS AND MEANS.

1,500,000 Tea-Duties,

200.000 Lottery,

165,400 Old Stores,

500,000 Surplus Pecuniary Indemnity, payable by France.

114,570 Repayment by Commissioners for issuing Exchequer Bills for Public Works,

[blocks in formation]

1822. L.3,000,000

1,500,000

200,000

151,000

110,000

L. 4,961,000

7,500,000

530,000

2,450,000

5,831,670

L.21,272,670

L. 20,000,000 16,200,000

L.36,200,000

there had been no sinking-fund operations carried on during that time.

The general results which the honourable member was anxious to establish, as deduced from the 28th and 29th resolutions, may be thus stated. The total amount required for the service of the country, beyond the amount of revenue by taxes, in twentyfour years, from 1793 to 1818, was only one hundred and thirty-eight millions, whilst six hundred and eighteen millions had actually been borrowed to pay that amount. By the system that had been pursued, the sum of L.479,814,817 had been incurred as a debt to pay that excess of expenditure, in the proportion of L. 291,229,779 for interest and charges, and L. 188,585,038 to the commissioners of the sinking fund. In the 29th resolution, the deduction he drew was, that the system of borrowing, either for excess of expenditure, or for the sinking fund, created a necessity for borrowing, progressively increasing in proportion to the sum borrowed; and that the borrowing only the sum of L. 188,585,038 for the commissioners of the sinking fund, had entailed a burden considerably exceeding the loss of the L.20,094,333, as stated in the 8th resolution to have been incurred by redeeming stock on worse terms than those on which it was created. If there had been no sinking fund, the sum re

quisite to have been borrowed, to pay the one hundred and thirty-eight millions of excess of expenditure, would have been only three hundred and sixty millions, instead of five hundred and eighty-four millions, which had been required for both.

It is impossible, in this place, to attempt even an abstract of these voluminous resolutions; but they are well deserving of attentive examination by all who take any interest in financial questions, or are desirous to become acquainted with the machinery of our funding system. That they contain numerical errors may be very possible; but the principle upon which they proceed is another matter, and cannot, we suspect, be so easily overthrown. The only wonder is, why Mr Hume should have moved these resolutions, which require the most profound attention, and were certainly calculated to provoke a great deal of discussion, only a few days before the prorogation of Parliament; unless, indeed, his only object was, to have them recorded in the Journals of the House.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, after a short reply, in which he avoided entering into the merits of the calcu

lations and conclusions of the honourable member, moved that the debate be adjourned till that day three months; and it was adjourned accordingly.

CHAPTER V.

LEGAL REFORMS.

Marriage Act Amendment Bill passed by the Commons.-Strenuous opposition to it in the House of Lords.-Original Bill almost totally changed, in which state it was passed.-Proposed Bill for relieving Unitarian Dissenters from certain conditions imposed by the Marriage Act.-Roman Catholic Peers' Bill.-Debates on the Measure in the House of Commons.-Carried by a majority of five.-Discussions in the House of Lords.-The Bill opposed by Lord Colchester and the Lord Chancellor, and supported by Lords Erskine, Grey, Holland, and Grenville.-Thrown out on the second reading.-New System of Navigation Laws.-Colonial Trade Bills.-Mr Scarlett's Bill for regulating the removal and settlement of Paupers, thrown out on the second reading.-Sir James Mackintosh's Resolution concerning the Criminal Low carried in a modified form.-Bills for inflicting heavier penalties on accessories before the fact in certain felonies, and in aggravated cases of manslaughter.-Mr Martin's Act against Cruelty to Animals.-Improvements in the Bankrupt Laws.--Mr M. A. Taylor's motion on the Vice-Chancellor's Court.

Or the reforms proposed or effected, during the present session of Parliament, in the different branches of English jurisprudence, the first in order was the bill introduced into the House of Commons, on the 27th of March, by Dr Phillimore, for amending the provisions of the 26th Geo. II. c. 33, commonly called the Marriage Act, and for remedying the great and intolerable evils of which that measure had been found to be productive. The history of this act is well known. It originated in the House of Lords. Many of their Lordships having been extremely scandalized at several clandestine and informal marriages which had been brought under their cognisance, and probably influenced by that ancient aversion of patricians to intermarriage with plebeians, directions

The

were given to the twelve Judges to pre-
pare a bill to remedy the evils complain-
ed of. In conformity with these de-
rections, a bill was framed, but it was
found so objectionable in its provisions
that it was speedily abandoned.
task was then undertaken by Lord
Chancellor Hardwicke, who brought in
the bill in question, which passed the
House of Lords with little opposition.
In the House of Commons, however,
it encountered the most violent opposi-
tion that is recorded of any measure,
with the exception perhaps of the Jews'
naturalization bill, and was finally sent
back to the House of Lords, so modi-
fied and changed in its provisions, as
scarcely to be recognised by its parents
as their own offspring. Lord Hard-
wicke, nevertheless, strongly urged the

expediency of passing the bill in its altered state, as an alternative preferable to risking the loss of the measure; distinctly stating, however, that opportunities might be taken hereafter for amending the exceptionable clauses which had been introduced into the act in its progress through the Lower House of Parliament *.

By the operation of the act thus passed, marriages became null and void in two cases; first, when solemnized, under the age of twenty-one years, without the previous consent of the parent or guardian; secondly, when solemnized in a parish-church or public chapel where banns had not been usually published, that is, before the 25th of March 1754 +. By a singular anomaly, the penalty was almost never allowed to attach in the latter case; whereas, in the former, no obstacle was ever interposed to the full and unrestricted operation of the law. By this enactment of nullity, marriages took place which had never any legal commencement, while no recognition, no acknowledgment, no cohabitation of the parties after they had attained their majority, no lapse of time, in short, could give effect to marriages thus contracted; tractu temporis non convalescunt. Hence it happened in practice,

that a man who obtained a licence upon a false statement of his own age, or of that of the person with whom he was about to intermarry, might, at any subsequent period of his life, avail himself of his own erroneous statement, and, in defiance of the oath he made when he obtained the licence, prove the minority of either of the parties at the time of the marriage, and the absence of the previous consent required by the statute in which case, he became entitled, as a matter of course, to a sentence declaring this marriage to have been null and void ab initio. Applications for a sentence of nullity were in consequence frequently made to the ecclesiastical court after a cohabitation of seven, eight, nine, or ten, and in some instances twenty years. Penalties like these operated against the innocent, while the guilty were safe; an encouragement was held out to the worst species of fraud and perjury, for it was on the issue of these ill-fated marriages that the severest punishment fell; the children, the grand-children, the remote posterity, the very nati natorum, might at any time be amerced of their estates and possessions, on proof made of the want of lawful consent. Under the operation of such a law, leaving its immoral tendency ‡ entirely out of the

• The reader will find, in the sequel, that the history of this act was, in every respect, the reverse of that now introduced for the purpose of amending it, which encountered the most formidable opposition in the House of Lords, at the head of which was the Lord Chancellor.

+ In consequence of the construction applied to the words "usually published," which were held to describe only the places where banns had been published anterior to the passing of the act, the Court of King's Bench was obliged to declare a marriage void which had been solemnized in a chapel erected in 1765. But, as there were many marriages equally defective, an act of Parliament (21st Geo. III. c. 53.) was immediately passed, legalizing all the marriages celebrated in such churches or chapels since the passing of the Marriage Act, and indemnifying the clergymen from the penalties they had incurred.

"I am confident in maintaining, that the Marriage Act, by its actual operation and effect, as far as any municipal law can license that which is a malum in se, does license adultery. If two persons of mature intellect, and perfectly competent to understand the nature of the contract in which they engage, are united together in a de facto marriage, deficient in no circumstance enjoined by the religious institutions of the State; if they cohabit together as man and wife, and acknowledge each other as such for many years after they have attained

VOL. XIV. PART 1.

K

question, no man was secure in the possession of entailed property, or in the enjoyment of any dignity which had descended to him in virtue of any marriage contracted since the 25th of March 1754, for he could have no security that that marriage was not entered into in violation of the act in question.

It was with a view to remedy these dreadful defects, which thus went to unsettle the tenure of property, and to destroy the honour and happiness of families, that the present bill was introduced into Parliament. The operation of the bill was to be twofold, prospective and retrospective. With regard to the prospective part, it repealed entire ly the nullity clause in the marriage act; and instead of a marriage in which the consent required by the statute had not been given being null and void to all intents and purposes in law whatsoever, it was enacted that the power of annulling it should be by a suit to be instituted in the ecclesiastical court of competent jurisdiction for that purpose. In order to obviate a possible inconvenience which might arise from parties clandestinely married without the consent of their parents or guardians withdrawing beyond sea, or without the jurisdiction of the English ecclesiastical courts, and remaining abroad till they might attain their majority, and being enabled, by such conduct, to baffle the intent, and elude the operation of the law, there was introduced a clause, borrowed in substance from an act which passed in the Irish Legislature in 1749, authorising parents and guardians, on the occurrence of such a case

as that now stated, to file a libel in the ecclesiastical court of the diocese within which the minor was resident at the time of the marriage, and empowering the ecclesiastical court to proceed to hear and determine the cause in the same manner as if the party proceeded against was resident within the diocese, if it should be shown by affidavit that such party had been served with the process of the court, and consequently had received due notice of the pending proceedings.

With regard, on the other hand, to the retrospective part of the bill, it was enacted, that in all cases of marriages solemnized anterior to the passing of the act, without the necessary previous consent, where both the parties had attained the age of twenty-one, and continued to live together as husband and wife, such marriages should be hereafter deemed good and valid, unless either of the parties to such marriage should institute a suit in a cause of nullity within six months after the passing of the act. This retrospective clause, was founded upon and justified by the most conclusive precedents. In 1781, Lord Beauchamp (now Marquis of Hertford) brought in a bill (21. Geo. III. c. 53. already alluded to) to legalize all marriages solemnized in churches and chapels in which banns bad not been published antecedently to the passing of the Marriage Act; and in 1805 Bishop Horsley brought in another bill to the same effect with that formerly introduced by Lord Beauchamp. Both received the unanimous sanction of the Legislature; and when passed into laws

the age of twenty-one years, and then, advanced to middle age, separate, on the ground of the want of parental consent to their original union, and severally intermarry with other persons: will any one deny that persons so conducting themselves, though they may not be amenable to punishment according to the strict letter of the municipal law, are not, in the eye of God and man, guilty of the crime of adultery? Or can it be contended that the municipal law, which sanctions such conduct, does not, in point of fact, and according to the rule of that law which is engraven in our hearts, authorise the commission of adultery ?"—Dr Phillimore's Speech on introducing the bill.

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