Traill, G. Motion negatived. The House adjourned at a quarter before Three o'clock. Ricardo, O. Robartes, T. J. A. Roebuck, J. A. Romilly, Col. Romilly, Sir J. Russell, F. C. H. Scrope, G. P. Seymour, Lord Seymour, H.D. Shafto, R. D. Shelburne, Earl of Smith, rt. hon. R. V. Smith, J. A. Smith, M. T. Stanton, W. H. Stephenson, R. Trevor, hon. T. Walter, J. Wawn, J. T. Wellesley, Lord C. TELLERS. Hayter, W. G. Motion made, and Question put HOUSE OF LORDS, MINUTES.] Friday, May 30, 1851. PUBLIC BILLS.-1a Standing Duties (Ireland) Continuance; Apprentices to Sea Service (Ireland). 2 Duchy of Lancaster (High Peak Mining Customs and Mineral Courts). 3a Administration of Criminal Justice Improvement; Prevention of Offences. THE OATH OF SUPREMACY. "That by a conscientious Objection to taking the Oath called the Oath of Supremacy, as at present administered, they are excluded from the exercise of the Privileges of sitting and voting in this House, to which by hereditary Right they are entitled, and praying that the Oaths as at present required to be administered to Members of Parliament may be considered with a View to the Relief of such Objection. The Clerk having read the petition, The EARL of WICKLOW requested their Lordships' serious attention to this petition, with a view to do an act of justice, in accordance with its prayer. Was it, he asked, decent or becoming in the present century to call upon Members either of their Lordships' House or of the other House of Parliament, or even of any municipal corporation, or upon any persons in this country, to take what was called the Oath of Abjuration? All oaths that were unnecessary were improper, if not criminal. It was criminal to force a person to take any oath that was not absolutely necessary. "That this House is of opinion, that the execution of eighteen persons, and the imprisonment, transportation, and corporal punishment of one hundred and forty other persons on this occasion, is at variance with the merciful administration of the British Penal Laws, and is not calculated to secure the future affections and fidelity of Her Majesty's Colonial subjects :-That this House is of opinion, that these severities are the more sincerely to be deprecated as they were exercised after the suppression of the disturbances, during which none of Her Majesty's troops or public serThis oath was entirely unnecessary. vants were killed, and only one soldier slightly wounded:-That this House is of opinion, that By the first part of the oath it was dethe conduct of the late Governor of Ceylon, in clared that, as regards the ecclesiastical keeping in force Martial Law for two months, and spiritual concerns of the Church of after his chief legal adviser had recommended its discontinuance, and during which period the Civil England, the Pope has no spiritual authoCourts were sitting without danger or interrup-rity, and no Roman Catholic ever denied tion, and also his refusal to allow a short delay in the execution of a priest, at the request of the Queen's Advocate, who wished further investigation into the case, was in the highest degree arbi that; but with regard to the second part of the oath, to which the Petitioners requested attention, was it true, as stated in it, that the Pope had no ecclesiastical or spiritual authority within this realm? When King George IV. visited Ireland, he received the Roman Catholic bishops appointed by the Pope; and Her Majesty, during trary and oppressive:-That this House is therefore of opinion, that the conduct of Earl Grey, in signifying Iler Majesty's approbation of the conduct of Lord Torrington during and subsequent to the disturbances, was precipitate and injudicious, severity in the government of Her Majesty's Her recent visit to that country, carried Foreign Possessions, and injurious to the char- the principle still further, for She not only tending to establish precedents of rigour and so much importance should be most deliberately and carefully considered, before they proceeded to legislate upon it, and he thought that would be better done by a Select Committee, than in Committee of the whole House. In order that the Bill might be made as perfect as possible, he had drawn up some observations upon its clauses, and he would suggest that the further progress of the Bill should be delayed for a few days, to give his noble Friend (Lord Campbell) and the Members of the Select Committee time to consider them. LORD CAMPBELL said, that he was exceedingly desirous that the suggestions of his noble and learned Friend on the woolsack should be carefully considered, in order, if possible, to obtain his support to the Bill. He would, therefore, willingly agree to any postponement which he might think necessary, in order that his suggestions might be considered. acknowledged the Roman Catholic archbishops and bishops appointed by the authority of the Pope, but She gave them precedence after prelates of the same rank belonging to the Established Church. It might be questionable whether their authority was sanctioned by the Charitable Bequests Act; but in the Cemeteries Act, passed the Session before last," his Grace Archbishop Murray of Dublin" was spefically named, and powers were given to him as archbishop, and to his successors. Could any one, therefore, say that by law the authority of the Pope was not sanctioned in this country? It was as much sanctioned as if a law had been passed declaring that the Pope had power to appoint bishops. He thought the Bill introduced by Lord John Russell in the other House had for its object the alteration of the law respecting the oaths taken by Members of Parliament, and was not solely introduced for the purpose of admitting Jews into Parliament. Therefore, it would appear that the prayer of the petitioners was sanctioned by Government, and by a majority of the other House, and was only objected to by their Lordships, because, in one of the clauses of the Bill, there were four or five lines introduced giving relief to the Jews. A Commission appointed to inquire into this subject had strongly recommended an alteration of the law as prayed for in this petition; and he found, from a statement in the Lives of the Lord Chancellors, by the Lord Chief Justice, that Lord Eldon had strongly urged the alteration of those oaths. He had himself brought in a Bill to carry into effect the recommendation of the Commissioners, but had withdrawn it, in consequence of the expressed wish of some of his noble Friends. He hoped that their Lordships would take the question into consideration, for he was sure that no man who did consider it, and who looked at the Acts of Parliament to which he had referred, and at the recommendation of the Commissioners, could avoid coming to the conclusion that it was highly expedient some such measure should be adopted as he had indicated. Petition to lie on the table. REGISTRATION OF ASSURANCES LORD CAMPBELL having moved that the House should resolve itself into a Committee upon this Bill, The LORD CHANCELLOR said, that it was highly desirable that a subject of The Earl of Wicklow EARL FITZWILLIAM said, that he was not satisfied with respect to the expediency of this Bill. Its result would be to compel every deed in the kingdom to be deposited in a registry office in the metropolis, where its contents might be examined into by every person who chose. Now it was impossible for any man who read the newspapers not to feel that a very improper use was often made of the right which the public possessed to inspect wills; and he therefore could not regard without apprehension a measure which proposed to extend this power of inspection to deeds. This Bill was different in principle from that which was in force in the county of York; for there the deeds themselves were not deposited in the registry office, but simply a memorandum, by means of which a person who had any right to inspect a deed could discover where it was, and thus obtain the means of doing so. The question at issue was not, as had been represented, whether there should be local registry offices, or one general office; but whether the present or the proposed system of registration should be adopted. This measure would impose a great hardship upon borrowers of small sums upon the security of landed property; for if their title-deeds were taken out of their custody, they would no longer be able to go to a banker, and, by depositing them with him, at once obtain a loan. If this Bill passed, no sale or mortgage of land could be safely effected without the expense and delay of a journey to London, and a search in the general regis- | of the deeds, the lender would then have try office there. LORD CRANWORTH said, that it was highly expedient that all the delay necessary to the perfecting of this measure should take place; but he could not concur with the noble Earl (Earl Fitzwilliam) in wishing that that delay should prejudice the eventual passing of the Bill during the present Session. Several of the noble Earl's objections seemed to be founded upon a misapprehension of the provisions of the Bill. The Bill would not compel the deposit of existing deeds in a general registry office, though its principle did undoubtedly require that every deed to be hereafter executed should be deposited there. But he could not see how that would prejudice any one; for the owner of any property might have a duplicate deed, which would have the same effect as the original, in case that were lost, and the owner would, therefore, have exactly the same advantages which he enjoyed at present. Another objection taken by the noble Earl was, that the Bill required the deposit of the deed, and not merely of a memorial; so that all persons might come and see the whole of its contents. But that was now the law as regarded the North Riding of Yorkshire, where, if not the deed, at least a full copy of it, was deposited. This certainly was the case in Ireland (for the present Bill on this point was but a copy of one which passed with respect to Ireland last year); and he believed that the same was the case in Scotland. The reason why the same provision was not in force in the other ridings of Yorkshire and in Middlesex was that the memorial gave all the information necessary; if so, why not have the document itself, which could not deceive? He did not think that there was much danger that persons would inspect the deeds deposited without good and sufficient cause. That a person should be able to go and see whether a man had encumbered his estate or not, was the great object of registration, for if it was penal for a man to obtain money under false pretences, it was something like it to obtain credit under false pretences. If a party had encumbered his estate, why should not there be the means of discovering it? He doubted much whether the loan of money upon the deposit of titledeeds was a common transaction at present, while this Bill would provide a more honest, and not less ready, mode of effecting such loans; for, instead of obtaining the deposit VOL. CXVII. [THIRD SERIES.] the security of lodging a caveat against the sale of the estate. In the present days of swift and ready railway communication, he could not regard the fact of a journey to London being required for some purposes as a very serious objection. He believed that there would be greater facility of obtaining money by sale, or upon the security of land after the passing of this Act, than before. In his opinion, indeed, it was not necessarily part of a good system of real property, that it should be as transferable as a bank note. It was a peculiar description of property, with its own advantages and disadvantages; the main things were to secure facility and security in the ordinary modes of transferring it; and if, in order to accomplish that, it was necessary to sacrifice the interest of those who wished to transfer it like a bank note, he thought that that was a disadvantage which must be incurred in order to obtain a greater advantage. LORD WHARNCLIFFE said, it was desirable that the facts should be clearly ascertained on which the arguments were founded. He rather thought the noble and learned Lord had fallen into one or two mistakes in the statement he had made. From a gentleman in charge of the registration in the county of York, he understood that the three registries in that county were erected by three separate Acts of Parliament; that the West and East Riding registries had been the first established, and in them merely a memorial was required of the deed-that the North Riding registry had been the last established, and it gave the option of depositing either a memorial or the whole deed; but the practice was not to register the full deed, but merely a memorial of it. If that fact was of any value to the present discussion, it rather tended to show that the registration of the memorial only was a more advantageous system than the registration of the full deed. In Ireland the practice, until it was altered by the Bill of last year, had been to register a memorial. He agreed with the noble Earl near him in saying that he was not satisfied with this Bill." The MARQUESS of WESTMEATH said, that in Ireland the registration was the registration of a memorial. LORD CAMPBELL said, that by the first Registration Act, passed with respect to Ireland, the deposit of the memorial was sufficient. But that was found to be so K inconvenient, that, by an Act passed last | established in connection with that scheme. Session, it was enacted that in future the He (Mr. Roebuck) held in his hand a deed itself, at full length, must be regis- paper in which the hon. Gentleman (Mr. tered. It had been considered deliberately O'Connor) gave notice to persons who for nearly twenty years, whether a memo- might feel disposed to deposit their money rial or the deed should be registered; and in that bank, that it was a legal bank, the almost unanimous opinion of those who that he was its sole proprietor, and rehad been consulted upon it--solicitors, sponsible for the moneys that might be barristers, and bankers-was, that it was deposited in it. He (Mr. Roebuck) also preferable that the deed should be regis- held in his hand a sort of circular which tered. Without such a registration we the hon. Gentleman issued for the estabcould not guard against the loss, suppres- lishment of a "bank for savings," at the sion, forgery, or alteration of deeds, while end of which were set forth the advantages it was much more economical than the de- to be derived from a National Savings posit of a memorial; for the memorial must Bank and a National Land and Labour be prepared by a professional man, while Bank; and that was addressed to the poor, a copy of a deed might be made by a law- provident population, whose earnings were stationer. He believed that no Bill had hardly acquired, and whose savings were ever been prepared with greater care than in small sums. The hon. Member having the present one; but it proposed to deal thus taken on himself the responsibility of with a most important subject, and he the bank, a large number of deposits were should not object to any alterations that made in it. He (Mr. Roebuck) held in his could be suggested which might have the hand a letter sent to a person who lived at effect of improving its details. He would Manchester, but was connected with the propose that the Committee should be ad- town of Sheffield, named James Pollard, a journed to Tuesday next in order to allow labouring man, sixty years of age, whose time for considering the suggestions of whole life had been spent as a worker in his noble and learned Friend on the wool- iron-a machine-maker. That poor man sack. had been enabled by his industry to save the sum of 671., which he transferred into the hands of the hon. Member for Nottingham. Afterwards, with the view to get back from the hon. Gentleman the sum which he had thus deposited, Pollard made a demand of it in the form prescribed by the regulations of the bank; and on the 14th May, 1851, he received the following answer: The MARQUESS of WESTMEATH expressed his strong objection to the deposit of the original deed in any public office. He had ascertained that he was perfectly right in the statement he had made as to registration at present in Ireland being by memorial. An Act passed last year to alter the law at a future period, but at this moment the law was as he had stated. Committee put off to Tuesday next. House adjourned to Monday next. HOUSE OF COMMONS, Friday, May 30, 1851. MINUTES.] PUBLIC BILLS.-1° Survey of Great 2° Colonial Property Qualification; Court of "Sir-I am desired by the manager to return your certificate for 671. balance, as, pending the decision of Parliament, Mr. O'Connor is unavoidably compelled, under the circumstances explained in the enclosed circular, to submit to a temporary suspension of payment to the depositors." This reply was signed by "G. J. Toucher " on behalf of the manager. Annexed to that letter was the following circular, dated 483, Oxford-street, 10th May, 1851: "Sir-I am directed by Mr. Feargus O'Connor to inform you that, pending the decision of Parliament on the subject of the liability of the National Land Company to repay the advances made was established, he is reluctantly but unavoidably by him, and to assist which Company this bank compelled, in compliance with the unanimous vote of the Land Company's directors, to submit to a temporary suspension of payment to the NATIONAL LAND COMPANY. MR. ROEBUCK would take that opportunity of putting a question to the hon. Member for Nottingham (Mr. O'Connor) with respect to what he termed his land scheme, the more so as the hon. Member depositors." had appealed to that House for assistance | Now, in 1848, the hon. Gentleman had in reference to the losses which he al- taken on himself all the responsibility of leged he had sustained through the bank the bank; and, in 1851, he told the poor Lord Campbell portunity of addressing an inquiry respecting a petition which he had had the honour of presenting on Monday, and which, on his Motion, had since been printed and circulated among hon. Members. He now begged the permission of the House to make a short statement before he put a question which, in his opinion, nearly concerned the national honour, and appealed to the best feelings of hon. Gentlemen on both sides of the House. In the year 1835 an English gentleman, in the military service of the Honourable East India Company (Lieutenant Wyburd) was sent by the British Envoy at the Court of Persia on a highly important and perilous diplomatic mission to Khiva. No information had ever been received that Lieutenant Wyburd had reached Khiva; and ten years elapsed, after he left Persia to proceed to Khiva, before any information respecting that gentleman trans unfortunate depositors that he was compelled by a unanimous resolution of the Land Company's directors to suspend payment to the depositors. By last night's proceedings in that House, hon. Members learnt that the Committee appointed to take into consideration the Bill for the settlement of the Land Company's affairs, had distinctly and most properly divided the question of the bank from that of the National Land Company. The question of the bank was, therefore, altogether withdrawn from the consideration of Parliament, who had wholly refused to deal with it; and the question he (Mr. Roebuck) wished to put to the hon. Gentleman (Mr. O'Connor) was, whether or not, as Parliament had determined to lend him no aid in withholding from the depositors in that bank their hard-earned savings, he now intended to continue that mode of putting off the demands of his just credi-pired. In 1845 it was reported that Lieu tors. tenant Wyburd had never reached Khiva, but on his way thither had been seized and put to death by the Ameer of Bokhara. Under these circumstances, the ladies, his sisters, whose petition he (Mr. Disraeli) had presented the other day, addressed the Government, and entreated them to make inquiries as to the fate of their brother. Her Majesty's Government instituted such inquiries, and the information they obtained was, that Lieutenant Wyburd, their brother, had been seized and placed in captivity by the Ameer of Bokhara, but that it was believed he was dead. Some time after that the petitioners learnt that, although it was a fact that Lieutenant Wyburd had been placed in captivity by the Ameer of Bokhara, he was not dead; and they called on Her Majesty's Government to make representations to the Potentate in whose power they believed their brother was, and to claim him as a British subject in the employment of the Crown; but their representations were met by the assumptionand the probable assumption he (Mr. Disraeli) was bound to admit that Lieutenant Wyburd was no more. Now, three years after that, namely, in 1848, thirteen years after the period when Lieutenant Wyburd had been sent by the British Envoy at the Court of Persia on that perilous mission, it was discovered that he was not only alive, but that he had escaped from the power of the Ameer of Bokhara, and, in seeking refuge, had been seized by the Khan of Khokan, and was at that moment in a state of slavery. The Khan of Khokan had desMR. DISRAELI said, he took that op- patched a letter to Lieutenant Colonel Law MR. O'CONNOR said, in reply to the question put to him by the hon. and learned Member for Sheffield, he had to state, that, when the Land Company's affairs were wound up, which was now being done, the demands of those small depositors in the bank would all be discharged. He would tell the hon. and learned Gentleman that the bank was established in consequence of the resolution of a conference held at Manchester, and contrary to his (Mr. O'Connor's) wishes and consent. He also begged to state that the bank was separated from the Land Company in consequence of decisions of the Judges, given in the different courts, to the effect that it was illegal; and the late Attorney General told him, if it was kept on foot in connection with the Land Company, he (Mr. O'Connor) would be prosecuted. He had paid into that bank out of his own pocket 3,6057., in order to keep it open; and the Land Company now owed him nearly 7,500l. [Mr. ROEBUCK intimated dissent.] The hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Roebuck) shook his head. The hon. and learned Gentleman had been the greatest opponent of the Land Company, and the greatest opponent he (Mr. O'Connor) had had in that House. The censure of slaves was adulation; and he had given the hon. and learned Gentleman the only answer he intended to give him. LIEUTENANT WYBURD. |