5024.
MY LORD,
No. 819.
(BAHAMAS)
LAW OFFICERS to COLONIAL OFFICE.
WE were honoured with your Lordship's commands, signified in Mr. Holland's
Temple, May 19, 1873. letter of the 14th May instant, stating that he was directed by your Lordship to request our report upon the following case.
1. By Letters Patent, passed in December 1871 (a copy of which, and of the Royal Instructions accompanying them, were annexed for our information), Mr. Pope Hennessy was appointed to be Governor of the Bahamas.
2. That Mr. Hennessy, subsequently to the passing of these Letters Patent, was sent out to temporarily administer the Government of the West Africa Settlements; that he remained on that coast until very recently, but had then sailed for the Bahamas to act as Governor under the Letters Patent of 1871.
3. That a question had, however, been raised whether, looking to the provisions of the third section of the Colonial Letters Patent Act (26 & 27 Viot. cap. 76), those Letters Patent had not become null and void, as the making of them had not been signified in the Colony by proclamation or other public notice within six months after making thereof.
66
4. That it would be observed that such Letters Patent, although not so signified within six months, are not to become null and void if "otherwise provided therein For by other lawful authority," and it was not too much to assume that those saving words were inserted to obviate the inconvenience which might arise in a case like the present, and to avoid the necessity of issuing fresh Letters Patent after the expiration of the time specified in the Act for their being signified in the Colony.
5. That in the Letters Patent in question there is, it is true, no special provision of the kind above indicated, but by the second paragraph of the Royal Instructions accompanying the Commission the Governor is directed by Her Majesty to publish the Commission upon his arrival in the Colony; and the question arises whether, as the Governor had been allowed by Her Majesty to depart with this Commission, and with instructions to publish and act under it, there had not been a sufficient provision
*
by lawful authority" within the meaning of the third section of the Act for continuing these Letters Patent and to keeping them alive in respect of the Colony.
Mr. Holland was pleased to add that he was to request that we would favour your Lordship with our opinion whether, in the circumstances above stated, the Letters Patent of 1871 have become null and void in respect of the Colony.
In obedience to your Lordship's commands we have the honour to
Report
That we are of opinion that the Letters Patent of 1871 have become null and void in respect of the Colony.
The Right Hon. the Earl Kimberley,
to.
&c.
&c.
We have, &c. (Signed)
J. D. COLERIDGE, G. JESSEL.
0 14978-885.
95.—5/46.
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
ITILL CO. 885
11 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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