CO885-(10-11) — Page 443

No. 363.

(CAPE.)

┬༴། ། :། T །

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O.

885

:

SIR,

LAW OFFICERS to COLONIAL OFFICE.

Lincoln's Inn, October 23, 1865.

We are honoured with your commands, signified in Sir Frederic Rogers' letter

of the 28th of September ultimo, stating that he was directed by you, Sir, to transmit

to us the enclosed copy of a Despatch from the Governor of the Cape of Good Hope No. 67,

on the subject of the judgment of the Judicial Committee of Privy Council in the case 27 July of the Bishop of Natal v. the Bishop of Cape Town.

Sir Frederic Rogers was also pleased to state that in this Despatch Sir P. Wode- house arrives at the conclusion that the Letters Patent of 1847 constituting the diocese of Cape Town, including the dioceses of Graham's Town, Natal, and St. Helena, are still in force, having never been lawfully altered, and consequently that the four present so-called dioceses are not actual dioceses.

Sir Frederic Rogers was also pleased to enclose copies of two opinions of the Law Officers of the Crown, one dated 28th July 1854, which is that referred to by Sir P. Wodehouse, and the other, dated 14th March 1863, as to the power of the Crown, after the grant of the present constitution to the Cape of Good Hope, to alter Letters Patent, viz., the Charter of Justice, issued before the grant of that constitution, and to request that, having respect to these opinions and to the state of the case as represented by Sir P. Wodehouse, we would favour you with our opinion upon the five positions taken by Sir P. Wodehouse at the close of his Despatch.

1865.

. 1865.

Sir Frederic Rogers was pleased to annex a copy of the judgment in the case of Printed copy, Bishop of Natal v. Bishop of Cape Town. Also of extracts from the Letters Patent 20 March of 1847 and the subsequent Cape Town and Graham's Town Letters Patent of 1853.

Also of an Act of the Legislature of the Cape of Good Hope, No. 30 of 1860, in which the dioceses of Cape Town and Graham's Town are mentioned by name.

Also of a printed paper which contains (pages 3 and 4) a statement respecting the Printest legal position of the Colony of Natal in 1853.

merat),,

1863.

Sir Frederic Rogers added that St. Helena is undoubtedly a Crown Colony, which 19 May raises the question whether the Letters Patent of 1847, even supposing them irre- vocable quoad the Cape or Natal, might not have remained still revocable quoad St. Helena.

In obedience to your commands we have taken this matter into consideration, and have the honour to

Report

That if there had been no legislative recognition of the existing dioceses (or reputed dioceses) of Cape Town and Graham's Town by the Legislature of the Cape Colony, we should have found it difficult to dissent from any one of the five positions laid down by Sir Philip Wodehouse at the close of his Despatch, as the conclusions derived by him from the recent judgments of the Privy Council in the cases of Mr. Long and Bishop Colenso, except so far as the Colony of St. Helena is concerned. As to that Colony, the Crown had undoubtedly full power, by the Letters Patent of 1853, to sever it from the original diocese of Cape Town, and to erect it into a separate bishopric, and we are of opinion that such power was well and effectually exercised by these Letters Patent.

With respect, however, to the dioceses of Cape Town and Graham's Town, created (or assumed to be created) by the Letters Patent of 1853, we find it (on the other hand) difficult to look upon the Colonial Act, No. 30 of 1860, as anything short of a legislative recognition, for some purposes, at all events, of these two dioceses; and even if the original diocese of Cape Town were regarded as still having an abstract existence in strict theory of law, in the Cape Colony and Natal it is and must remain practically in abeyance, unless and until another bishop is appointed thereto by the Crown, an event which (we assume) is not at all likely to happen.

•

On the whole, the suggestions of Sir Philip Wodehouse appear to us only to add further elements of embarrassment and perplexity to those with which this subject was already surrounded, and from which we see no method of escape except by some new Colonial or Imperial legislation.

The Right Hon. Edward Cardwell, M.P.,

We have, &c. (Signed)

ROUNDELL PALMER.

R. P. COLLIER.

&c.

&c.

• 16278,-85,

25.-2/86.

&c.

• No. 166.

10 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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