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the House might be taken after it was seen what the friends of the measure proposed . He must be allowed to give a brief history of the machinery of the Bill . The first method proposed was to omit part of the liturgy ; this was the most simple plan , and was sanctioned by Lord Liverpool . But the Archbishop of Canterbury opposed it ,
and his arguments convinced him ( Lord Holland ) that the plan was not desirable nor reasonable to expect j but the Archbishop then conceded the principle of relief . Then came a bill proceeding on the principle of the law of Irelaud , air lowing the Dissenting ministers to marry , To this it was objected , Where are these marriages to be registered ? There were
also other difficulties raised , and considerable pathos was shewn in lamentations that the clergy would lose their fees . Well , the framers of the Bill , having no wish to degrade or injure the clergy , wishing only to learn the objections in order to try to remove them , -devised another plan , that of legalizing their own marriages , and carrying a
certificate to the Church to be registered . Then again the same objectors ( who , after all , are in reality opposers of the measure in totq ) cry out , ' * Oh I this is making the Church the handmaid of Dissent . ' * Well , then it is suggested to these Dissenters that they should make the marriage a civil act before a magistrate , and that the clergyman cannot
then have any difficulty in registering the magistrate ' s acts . What is the consequence ? Why , the very persons who set them upou this , make it the ground of a new opposition . Really he could not conceive how this Bill , or the plan of it , was after all of the consequence that was attached to it . But he
Was so desirous of yielding to the conscientious scruples of such a body of men as these , and of ceasing thus to trifle with them , that he hardly cared how it was done . He must say he very much preferred the former plan , but he gave way to the objections raised to it ; and it was too much now for men who
were , in their hearts , against the thing altogether , to make this very yielding to their objections the ground of a new opposition . The measure was analogous to the law of Ireland and Scotland , to the ancient law of England , and to the present law regarding Jews and
Quakers . It was a convenient course ( if . not strictly a formal one ) to amend the Bill according to the views of its friends , that all parties may know what is proposed . The Rev . Prelate had kindly offered to do this without the House being called on to pledge itself to
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the measure which it might afterwards reject , ft became them to take some such course after thus defeating the parties three or four times on these cavils about details . If four plans were all rejected , let a fifth be brought forward ; but justice to an honoured and respected branch of their fellow-subjects required that they should not thus go on trifling with them by acknowledging the principle , and yet perpetually turning them round on minor points .
Lord Eldon concurred that it would be better , as the House had for that Session sanctioned the principle , to leave the friends of the measure fo add their amendments , —print the Bill , and come to the consideration of it next Session ; no one being to be considered as committed by it . He solemnly in the face of the country declared , that he would no longer continue a magistrate in a country where he should be required to do the acts imposed by this Bill .
Lord Malmesburv observed , that if the clergy were justified in objecting to act in this matter as magistrates , he saw no reasou why he as a magistrate was not to be allowed the same scruple against doing the clergyman ' s duty in marrying people .
Lord Lansdowne . The necessity of regulations on marriages was a matter purely civil , ft was undoubtedly further desirable to give the marriage tie the sanction of a religious ceremony . The parties had themselves asked to be allowed to do so , and it had been objected to .
Lord Ellenborough mentioned the great difficulties which the general Committee on the law of marriage had found in devising any plan for giving relief to Dissenters . He was rather disposed , if they could , to unite the principle of the former Bill with this , by requiring a previous religious ceremony before going to the justice .
The Bishop of Chester . The intervention of two parties in that way would only occasion great iuconrenience , and he could not help suspecting that the object of so many objections was to throw difficulties in the way of the measure altogether . What was the use of passing a law to compel Dissenters to adopt a religious ceremony ? The
petitioners , whose petition ( a very improper one he thought it ) the Noble and Learned Lord read on Tuesday , made it the ground of their objection that marriage was made a religious ceremony at all . It . seemed quite ridiculous to pass a law to compel them to make it a religious rite . If they wished it to be so , there was nothing in this Bill to prevent their
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Intelligence . — Unitarian Marriage Bill . 697
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VOL . I . 2 Z
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1827, page 697, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1800/page/65/
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