985,
No. 3.
(CANADA)
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
C.O.
Reference :-
· 885
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH—NOT TO
MY LORD DUKE,
QUEEN'S ADVOCATE to COLONIAL OFFICE.
Doctors' Commons, January 28, 1860.
I AM honoured with your Grace's commands, signified in Mr. Elliot's letter of the 29th November last, stating that adverting to the letter which I, conjointly with Her Majesty's Attorney General and Solicitor General, addressed to your Grace on the 4th November last, relative to the mode of appointing a metropolitan bishop for the province of Canada, he was directed to request that I would prepare and transmit, for your Grace's consideration, a draft of an instrument for the appointment of such metropolitan.
Mr. Elliot was also pleased to enclose three petitions of the bishops, clergy, and laity of the respective dioceses of Quebec, Montreal, and Toronto, explaining the objects with a view to which the appointment of a metropolitan is desired, together with the Provincial Act of the 19th and 20th of the Queen, cap. 141, entitled "An Act to enable "the members of the United Church of England and Ireland in Canada to meet in synod," and also the draft Letters Patent for appointing the metropolitans of Sydney and Cape Town.
But
Mr. Elliot was also pleased to add that your Grace would wish that the bishop who is to become the metropolitan should be carefully designated; and that the Archbishop of Canterbury has suggested that the metropolitan should be the senior bishop of the province for the time being, according to the date of his appointment to the see. as that designation might seem hereafter to include the Bishop of Huron, it would be expedient that I should communicate with the Archbishop on that, and on any other point connected with the proposed appointment, upon which I may wish to have the benefit of his Grace's opinion and advice.
In obedience to your Grace's commands I have taken this subject into consideration, and have the honour to
Report
That I have accordingly prepared (and herewith transmit) draft letters patent for the appointment of a metropolitan of Canada, in which I have followed the precedents of Cape Town (1853) and Sydney (1854), with the additions which the circumstances of the case appear to require. These additions will be observed at pages 19 and 34 of the draft.
I have, agreeably to your Grace's instructions, conferred with his Grace the Arch. bishop of Canterbury upon this subject.
His Grace was pleased to express his opinion that the Bishop of Quebec for the time being should always be the metropolitan, agreeably to the ancient and regular ecclesias- tical usage in this respect.
His Grace was also pleased to desire that I would call your Grace's attention to certain grave questions of imperial and ecclesiastical policy connected with this subject, which might possibly affect your Grace's opinion of the expediency of appointing a metropolitan of Canada.
The "Canada Church Synod Act" is so framed as to confer the most extensive powers on the General Assembly. These powers, for instance, are such as to extend to the most serious interference with the jurisdiction and functions of the metropolitan, and even to his removal or exclusion.
The metropolitan designate, or any of his successors, may, notwithstanding Her Majesty's Letters Patent, be by the general assembly prevented from presiding over, or even from attending, the assembly, or performing any other metropolitan function or duty.
The address of the synod of Toronto (with these papers) expressly prays Her Majesty that sufficient authority shall be vested in him "until provision shall be otherwise made by the General Assembly;" under these circumstances it is, in his Grace's opinion, open to serious question whether the creation of a metropolitan of Canada by Royal Letters Patent is necessary or desirable.
I pointed out to his Grace, and he desired that I would state, that if (as may possibly be the case) all that is practically requisite or desired by the Canadian synods is that Her Majesty should formally authorise one of the Canadian bishops to convoke the first
o 16978.-
15.—3/86.
General Assembly under the “ without appointing a metropolitan.
Canada Church Synod Aot," this might be done
With reference to the Canada Church Synod Aot," I would beg to refer to the reports of the Law Officers to Lord John Russell of the 21st August 1855, and to the Right Honourable H. Labouchere, August 5, 1856.
I have, &c. (Signed) J. D. HARDING.
To the Right Hop. the Duke of Newcastle.