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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
C.O.885
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ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
3 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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In obedience to your Grace's commands we have taken this matter into our consideration, and have the honour to report—
1. That the proposed course of proceeding will, if the details are properly arranged, be in our opinion 'unobjectionable and sufficient in point of law.
2. That the matter will be sufficiently brought under the considera- tion of the Ecclesiastical Authorities of Canada by a statement substan- tially similar to that which is now submitted to us.
3. Considering the peculiar circumstances of the case, it does not appear to us that in bringing the proposed course of proceeding to the notice of the Canadian Ecclesiastical Authorities in the first instance, any modifications are requisite on the part of your Grace.
It will be for them, under competent legal advice in the Colony, to suggest such modifications (if any) as the Colonial laws and Constitution (whether Civil or Ecclesiastical) may appear to them to require in order to ensure the practical success of the plan thus proposed.
We have, &c. (Signed) J. D. HARDING.
WM. ATHERTON. ROUNDELL PALMER.
His Grace the Duke of Newcastle,
&c.
&c.
&c.
No. 14.
The Duke of NEWCASTLE to Governor Wodehouse.
(No. 485. Cape of Good Hope.) SIR,
Downing Street, June 5, 1862.
1 HAVE had under my consideration your despatch No. 49 of the 21st of March, inclosing the copy of a correspondence between yourself and the Bishop of Cape Town, relating chiefly to the exercise of the patronage of the Crown.
In order to place you in possession of my general views upon this subject, I inclose copies of despatches which I have addressed to the Governors of New South Wales and South Australia on questions of a somewhat similar character. From these you will collect that in Colonies in which the Church of England, or, as I will call it to avoid verbal con- troversy, the Anglican Communion, is in no sense established, 1 am desirous of seeing that Communion treated on the same footing as any other unestablished religious community. I think this due to thất Church · itself, which no longer derives any special advantage from its connexion with the English Establishment, and I think it also most desirable to the Government as relieving the Secretary of State from any necessity for interfering in religious or ecclesiastical controversies, from which I conceive the Civil Government ought to hold itself studiously aloof.
For this purpose, however, it is, in the first instance, necessary that the Anglican Communion should be a community-not a mere juxta- position of independent congregations (the position which it occupied before the establishment of a Bishoprie, and which I perceive is still assigned to it by Mr. Justice Bell), but a body organized episcopally, since the Church of England is Episcopal, and capable, through that organization of treating with the Government, of managing its own funds, of undertaking and controlling missionary and other operations, of assigning duties to its officers, and of enforcing the performance of those duties.
You will further collect, from the papers which i transmit, that these objects would; in my opinion, be best secured by the passing of colonial laws to give to each diocese, or aggregate of dioceses, certain of the privileges conferred in this country by incorporation, but that I am by no means wedded to that method of proceeding, and that, whenever the members of the Anglican Communion find or apprehend a difficulty in obtaining a legal status by local enactment (as is the case in South
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Australia), I am quite ready to aid their efforts to organize themselves by voluntary contract.
The Bishops of Cape Town and Graham's Town, as I understand from the various printed pamphlets which are enclosed in your despatch, appear to have given to the members of the Anglican Communion in their respective dioceses the opportunity of having recourse to such a voluntary organization.
In Graham's Town, I infer (Bishop's Speech, p. 93) that the decision in favour of such an organization was practically unanimous, and “a Synod was held without remark, the clergy and laity concurring, in it."
In the Diocese of Cape Town the unanimity does not appear to have heen absolute. There appear to have been at this period forty-three elergymen, and the number of congregations must, I suppose, have been not less than twenty or thirty. Out of these numbers three clergymen protested against the assemblage of the Synod, mainly, as would appear, on the ground of its supposed illegality; and three congregations (for the Parish of Wynberg must, for the present purpose, be clearly counted as (lissentient) refused to send delegates. Two or three more clergymen subsequently adhered to the recusants. But it is evident that their number was not such as to affect materially the proportions between the adherents and the opponents of the Synod.
Now, if this assemblage of the clergy and laity is forbidden by law, it will be the duty of the Government, until that illegality is removed, to ignore its authority, whether in Cape Town or in Graham's Town, and not only to refuse the aid of its influence to give effect to any so-called Synodical act, but perhaps to take active measures in order to arrest its proceedings.
But if the Judgment of the Supreme Court, which declares the legality of the Synodical meetings, should either be affirmed by the Privy Council or left undisputed by the withdrawal of Mr. Long's appeal, it will, I think, be the duty of Her Majesty's Government to recognize a body constituted with the assent (as far as public acts can declare that assent) of so large a majority of English Churchmen, as representing, for all practical purposes, the Anglican Communion in the Diocese of Cape Town. In this event I think that the Home Government should withdraw, as much as possible, from any peculiar connection with that Communion (beyond that of appointing their principal officer, their Bishop), leaving them under their new organization to manage their own affairs and to settle their own disputes without interference on the part of the Executive-an interference which was doubtless valuable while the only authority in the Church was that of the Bishop, but which will become unnecessary, and consequently inexpedient, when the clergy and laity have assumed in Cape Town those constitutional functions which they are exercising with so much advantage to the peace and progress of the Church in other Colonies.
I now come to the immediate subject of your despatch-the Church patronage. In the absence of contradiction I assume it to be correctly stated that the annual contribution of money from the Civil List to the Diocese of Cape Town is about 2,2007., forming of course no very large proportion of the funds out of which forty-three (since raised to forty-five) clergy are supported, and being dependent in respect to its duration on the will of the Legislature. I see it also stated that the share of public money given to the Roman Catholic and Dutch Churches is handed over in a lump sum to the heads or representatives of the different Communions. Now, I see no reason why the Government should claim a greater influence or adopt a greater responsibility in respect to the distribution of this 2,2001. than appears to be claimed or adopted in the case of the Roman or Dutch Churches.
Holding these views, I have to give you the following instructions:- While Mr. Long's appeal to the Privy Council is being carried on effectually I should wish you to avoid any public or official recognition of the Synod, or on the other hand any step, whether public or private, which would impair its authority. I should wish you to express to the Bishops of Cape Town and Graham's Town my readiness to place the patronage which has Jong been virtually disposed of by them at the disposal of any authority
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