sent. As regarded himself, he (Earl Nelson) knew nothing about the Amendment until he came up to town that day, and other Peers were in the same position, and, therefore, they required to take its effect into consideration. The measure had been supported by many of their Lordships and other people outof-doors, on the ground that it did not extend to ecclesiastical marriages which were celebrated in churches, and so did not affect clergymen who objected to celebrate such marriages. In his opinion, however, if the Amendment, as proposed, was made in the Bill, it would throw a new and heavy responsibility on the clergy, and would entirely alter its character.

THE EARL OF DALHOUSIE said, he could assure their Lordships that he had no intention of springing a mine upon the House in the shape of these Amendments, and thereby taking their Lordships by surprise, or of proposing anything which should alter the whole character of the Bill, as alleged by the noble Earl opposite (Earl Nelson). Neither had he any idea of the serious feeling of opposition with which it would be received. The fact was, he put down the Amendment on the Paper on account of a remark made by the noble and learned Earl himself (Earl Cairns) in the debate on the second reading, complaining that his (the Earl of Dalhousie's) Bill would introduce an entirely new principle into the Law of Marriage inasmuch as if a man married his deceased wife's sister in church, the marriage would be void, whereas it would be valid if he married her before the Registrar. He (the Earl of Dalhousie) quite agreed with that criticism of the noble and learned Earl, for it was very far from his wish to rob marriage of its religious character. He certainly should not be content himself with making a civil marriage, and he did not suppose that there were many Englishmen who would. It seemed to him that it was a mistake, from many points of view, to place the marriages in question in the position of purely secular contracts. In this particular instance there appeared to be an additional reason for not doing so, because the Bill was intended to remove a grievance; it was, in some sort, a remedial measure, and it would be robbod of much of its value in the eyes of those for whom it was inEarl Nelson

tended if the religious part of the marriage ceremony should be practically abolished. At the same time, he would admit that the noble and learned Earl had complained quite justly that there had not been time for considering the Amendments. He certainly did not wish to take the House by surprise, and he would consent to withdraw the Amendments, and to consider between that time and the Report stage whether he should bring them forward again.

LORD DENMAN said, that he had tried to address their Lordships at the close of the debate in the year before last, but was silenced by clamour; and likewise this year on the second reading, when the most rev. Primate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) followed the noble and learned Lord opposite (Lord Bramwell). On the first occasion, he (Lord Denman) had wished to explain that an argument by his lamented Predecessor in title had been republished and handed to him just before the debate. It had been obtained by a gentleman who was very anxious to marry his deceased wife's sister, and who went down to his (Lord Denman's) house in Northamptonshire to see the retired Lord Chief Justice; but he (the late Lord Denman) had advised that gentleman not to marry until the law was changed. But the gentleman went abroad and married; and he (Lord Denman) confessed that there might have been no marriage of any sort-only disappointment. In writing that argument, the late Lord Denman, who had had two paralytic seizures, used strong language. In the course of it he wrote that Bishop Blomfield had altered his opinion; but in his memoir-by the Bishop of Bedford, his son-he (the present Lord Denman) found that, although Bishop Blomfield had attached less weight to the prohibition (Lev. c. xviii. v. 18), yet he was convinced that such marriages were against the whole spirit of the Scriptures. He (the late Lord Denman) had ended his argument by a quotation from Numbers, c. xxiii., end of 8th verse"How shall I defy whom God hath not defied?" In the debate of 1835, both Mr. Warburton, M.P. for Bridport, and Dr. Lushington, then Judge of the Consistory Court, had wished such marriages to be at once, for the future, declared void, before two years, during which time Lord Lyndhurst would have

arose. In that case, any further explanation that might be required would be more conveniently made.

THE EARL OF DALHOUSIE, resuming, said, he was merely going to add that, in the case of those clergymen, it should be lawful for them to do so.

Motion agreed to.

House in Committee accordingly.
Preamble agreed to.

Clause 1 (Marriage between a man and his deceased wife's sister not void or voidable).

allowed them to remain questionable, | if the Amendments were taken as they in order to prevent such marriages, which were likely to increase if Mr. Poulter's exclusion of the 2nd clause were continued. In 1869, Lord Lyndhurst admitted that in Massachusetts, Boston, connections of his own had made such marriages with happy results; but added that a different state of society in another country might make them unsuitable. His Lordship attached great weight to the opinion of the Bishop of Exeter, and, although his Bill had been altered, did not attempt to repeal it. He (Lord Denman) had wished to explain, on the second reading of this Bill, that the opinions obtained from Professors on two verses only in Scripture-in Leviticus and Ephesians-did not convince him. He thought 1 Cor. c. vi., v. 16, more to the purpose. He thought there was mystery as to the union between Christ and His Church, but no mystery as to the connection between a man and his wife. He (Lord Denman) thought the expression" Chére entiere," which the Earl of Chesterfield, in his letters to his son, advocated as a means of influence on the Continent, though an incontinent one, explained his meaning. He (Lord Denman) believed that no good could be done by discussing this Bill in Committee. In 1869, on a Bill by Earl Russell for 28 life Peers, attempts were made to improve the Bill; but an hon. Member-late Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster-had written, or said, that their Lordships were tinkering the Bill." Yet, on the Motion of the Earl of Malmesbury-although he (Lord Denman) could not obtain a Teller on the second reading of the Bill, in his Motion against it on the third reading, it was thrown out by a majority of 30; and he (Lord Denman), instead of trying to improve this Bill in Committee, would move its rejection on the third reading.

THE EARL OF DALHOUSIE said, he wished to add one or two words of explanation, for he was very anxious that their Lordships should understand his position. His view was, that the two Amendments in his name should be taken together. That was to say, that if any of the clergy did not object to celebrate these marriages between a man and his deceased wife's sister

EARL BEAUCHAMP rose to Order, and said, it would be much more regular

EARL BEAUCHAMP, in rising to move, as an Amendment, the omission of the words which gave the Bill a retrospective character, said, there were many reasons why a Bill such as this should not be retrospective, but none, as far as he could see, for the present proposal. Lord Lyndhurst's Act of 1835 was, no doubt, retrospective; but there was no analogy between that Act and the Bill before the House. That Act clothed the temporal Courts with power to decide that all these marriages were void. The main reason for making the Bill retrospective, according to its promoters, was the sentimental argument that an injury would otherwise be inflicted on the innocent children of these marriages; and, as far as it went, that was a fairly good argument. But, he might ask, what view did the law take of other children born also out of wedlock, who were no less innocent, in his view, than the children born of these marriages? He was not speaking as a theologian; but to him all children were, more or less, equally innocent, whether their parents were married or not. But the proposal now was not to legitimate them all, but only to legitimate the offspring of the unions affected by the Bill; and, that being the case, he failed to see the cogency of that sentimental argument. Grievances were spoken of; the Bill was to redress grievances; but they were the grievances of persons who had transgressed the law, and might be supposed to know the consequences of doing so.

He contended that the effect of the clause, if it were allowed to remain as it stood, would be to set up marriages again which had been by the Ecclesiastical Courts declared void, and it would

enable parties to claim titles and estates capable of being altogether dissociated under such marriages, and might have from each other. Ten years ago, when the effect of upsetting rights which had a similar Bill was under discussion, he been settled. Their Lordships would at placed before the House his views as to once see how dangerous such a course the danger of the principle involved in would be. No doubt, there were some such a retrospective clause as was now grievances under the Law of 1835; but under controversy. The matter did not reit should be remembered that they had ceive much consideration upon the second been greatly exaggerated, and that the reading, although his noble and learned parties affected had entered into these Friend behind him (Lord Bramwell) marriages, knowing that by the law of had made some comment upon it; and if England they were doing wrong. At he (the Lord Chancellor) had addressed any rate, it was an entirely new doctrine; their Lordships last week, he should and he thought it would be a remark- have adverted to that portion of the able innovation on Parliamentary prao- subject. In the Bill there were two distice, that the law should be altered to tinct principles. One was that debated suit the convenience of those who had last week as to the religious, moral, and broken it, by placing them in the same social bearing of the proposition that position and with the same advantages marriage with a deceased wife's sister as those who had obeyed it. He hoped, should be legal; and, to that question, therefore, that whatever change might the point of its retrospective operation be made in the law, the House would was not relevant. Whatever religious not show so much deference to the very or moral principle in the view of anyactive agitation that had been carried one was involved in marriage with a deon as to make the Bill retrospective; for ceased wife's sister, was, of course, as he could not help feeling that it would, much involved in the same union withindeed, be a very evil day for the Par-out legal marriage; and what belonged liament of England, if their Lordships to the past was irrevocably done, and admitted that provision of the Bill to become operative. An active canvass had been carried on upon the question; but he would call upon their Lordships to decide on their own responsibility. He begged to move the Amendment standing in his name on the Paper.

must be so regarded. So, again, with respect to any disturbance of social relations, that which was irrevocably done could not, for the future, operate upon social relations more than it had done in the past. Therefore, the arguments founded upon religious, moral, and social considerations were not relevant to

Amendment moved, in page 1, to the present question of the retrospective leave out from ("sister") in line 7, to operation of the Bill. There was, un("which") in line 9.-(The Earl Beau-doubtedly, another principle involved, champ.)

THE LORD CHANCELLOR said, that this was a subject upon which he thought it his duty to address their Lordships. The House had read the Bill a second time, and he was sorry for it; but much as he regretted that, in doing so, it had affirmed the principle of the Bill, and, although on the division he had voted in the minority, he was bound to say that he was in the habit of bowing to its decisions, and therefore he could not vote for the Amendment, for he could not but think that the House, in accepting that principle, had accepted also the substance, though not necessarily the form, of this provision to which the noble Earl opposite (Earl Beauchamp) objected. He (the Lord Chancellor) regarded them as being in

Earl Beauchamp

which he could not help hoping would be taken note of, either here or in "another place." If the 1st clause, as to its retrospective operation, were to remain in its present form, he could not but think that it would amount not only to a repudiation of what their Lordships did 40 years ago, but to a declaration by the Legislature of its own moral incompetence to legislate upon this subject. And if they were morally incompetent to legislate upon this subject, it followed that they must be morally incompetent to legislate on a variety of kindred subjects also. The same principle would certainly apply, at all events, with regard to all degrees of affinity. He said "at all events; because he was by no means sure that, in the view of those who thought the Legislature morally incompetent, the objection to its competency