Part 7

_Ordered_ (after Debate), That Mr. Alderman Salomons do now withdraw.

Whereupon Mr. Speaker stated that the honorable Member for Greenwich had heard the decision of the House, and hoped that the honorable Member was prepared to obey it.

Mr. Alderman Salomons continuing to sit in his seat, Mr. Speaker directed the Serjeant-at-Arms to remove him below the Bar.

Whereupon Mr. Serjeant-at-Arms having placed his hand on Mr. Alderman Salomons, he was conducted below the Bar.

[The House refuses to hear Petitioners by Counsel at the Bar of the House in defence of their right to elect their own Representative.]

_Resolved_ (after Debate), That David Salomons, Esq., is not entitled to vote in this House, or to sit in this House, during any debate, until he shall take the Oath of Abjuration in the form appointed by law.

PRECEDENT of a MEMBER stating that he had a conscientious objection to take the OATH.

Baron MAYER AMSCHEL DE ROTHSCHILD, returned for the town and port of Hythe, came to the table to be sworn, and stated that, being a person professing the Jewish religion, he entertained a conscientious objection to take the oath, which by an Act passed in the last Session has been substituted for the Oaths of Allegiance, Supremacy, and Abjuration, in the form therein required. Whereupon the Clerk reported the matter to Mr. Speaker, who desired Baron Mayer Amschel de Rothschild to withdraw; and he withdrew accordingly.

_Resolved_, That it appears to this House that Baron Mayer Amschel de Rothschild, a person professing the Jewish religion, being otherwise entitled to sit and vote in this House, is prevented from so sitting and voting by his conscientious objection to take the oath, which by an Act passed in the last Session of Parliament has been substituted for the Oaths of Allegiance, Supremacy, and Abjuration in the form therein required.

_Resolved_, That any person professing the Jewish religion may henceforth, in taking the oath prescribed in an Act of the last Session of Parliament to entitle him to sit and vote in this House, omit the words "and I make this declaration upon the true faith of a Christian."

Baron Mayer Amschel de Rothschild, being again come to the table, desired to be sworn on the Old Testament as binding on his conscience.

Whereupon the Clerk reported the matter to Mr. Speaker, who then desired the Clerk to swear him upon the Old Testament.

Baron Mayer Amschel de Rothschild was sworn accordingly, and subscribed the oath at the table.

Appendix No. 2.

PAPER handed in by Mr. Bradlaugh, 2nd June, 1880.

PRECEDENTS RELATING TO PARLIAMENTARY OATHS.

CASE of Attorney General Sir FRANCIS BACON, Commons Journals, Vol. 1, page 459, 11th April, 1614, continued from page 456, 8th April.

ELIGIBILITY of the Attorney General to sit in Parliament. By 46 Edward III., 1372, no practising barrister could be Knight of the Shire.

Page 459.--"The precedents to disable him ought to be showed on the other side."

Page 460.--"Their Oath their own consciences to look unto, not we to examine it."

At that date each Member had to make Oath that he was duly qualified.

1. Question whether he shall for this Parliament remain of the House or not:--_Resolved_, He shall.

2. Question.--Whether any Attorney General shall after this Parliament serve as a Member of this House:--_Resolved_, No.

CASE of JOHN WILKES, Esquire, Commons Journal, 38, page 977, 3rd May, 1782.

THE House was moved, that the entry in the Journal of the House, of the 17th day of February, 1769, of the Resolution, "That John Wilkes, Esquire, having been in this Session of Parliament expelled this House, was and is incapable of being elected a Member to serve in this present Parliament," might be read, and the same being read accordingly;

A motion was made, and the question being put, That the said resolution be expunged from the Journals of this House, as being subversive of the rights of the whole body of electors of this Kingdom.

The House divided.

The Yeas went forth.

Tellers for the Yeas, Sir Philip Jennings Clarke and Mr. Byng, 115.

Tellers for the Noes, Mr. John St. John and Sir William Augustus Cunynghame, 47,

So it was resolved in the affirmative.

And the same was expunged by the Clerk at the table, accordingly.

_Ordered_, That all Declarations, Orders, and Resolutions of this House, respecting the election of John Wilkes, Esquire, for the county of Middlesex, as a void election, the true and legal election of Henry Lawes Luttrell, Esquire, into Parliament for the said county, and the incapacity of John Wilkes, Esquire, to be elected a Member to serve in the said Parliament, be expunged from the Journals of this House as being subversive of the rights of the whole body of electors of this Kingdom.

By Cavendish's Parliamentary Debates, Vol. I., page 73, 24th November, 1768, it appears that _inter alia_ were used to justify the original and subsequently expunged Resolutions--first, "the copy of the record of the proceedings, on an information in the Court of King's Bench, against John Wilkes, Esquire, for blasphemy"--page 123; "three obscene and impious libels"; "an impious libel with intent to blaspheme the Almighty God."

CASE of Mr. JOHN HORNE TOOKE, Parliamentary History, Vol. 35, page 956, 16th February, 1801.

Mr. John Horne Tooke took the Oaths and his seat for Old Sarum. He was introduced by Sir Francis Burdett and Mr. Wilson. This being done, Earl Temple rose and said, he had observed a gentleman who had just retired from the table, after having taken the Oaths, whom he conceived to be incapable of a seat in that House, in consequence of his having taken priest's orders and been inducted into a living. He would wait the allotted time of fourteen days to see whether there was any petition presented against his return; if not he should then move that the return for Old Sarum be taken into consideration.

Page 1323, 10th March, 1801.--Earl Temple moved that Mr. Boucher, Deputy Registrar of Salisbury, be called in to prove that Mr. Horne Tooke, being a priest in orders, was not eligible to a seat in that House. After debate, in which Mr. John Horne Tooke spoke--Amendment and Division--Motion agreed to (page 1342),--Select Committee appointed (page 1343). Two reports given, pages 1343 to 1349, were made, giving all the cases of "any of the clergy" returned to Parliament.

4th May, 1801.--Earl Temple moved (pages 1349 to 1374), "That Mr. Speaker do issue his warrant to the clerk of the Crown in Great Britain, to make out a new writ for the election of a burgess to serve in this present Parliament for the Borough of Old Sarum, in the county of Wilts, in the room of the Rev. John Horne Tooke, who being at the time of his election in priest's orders, was and is incapable of sitting in this House." A debate took place in which Mr. John Horne Tooke spoke (pp. 1350 to 1402), division, and the motion negatived.

Jurist, Vol. 17, Page 463.--Exchequer Chamber; Error from the Court of Exchequer: Coram, Lord Campbell, Chief Justice, and Coleridge, Cresswell, Wightman, Williams, and Crompton, J.

One judgment by Lord Chief Justice Campbell for the whole Court.

Lord Campbell (page 464).--The words "so help me, God," are words of asseveration, and of the manner of taking the oath; but the words preceding them are, it appears to me, an essential part of the oath.

Fisher's Digest, Vol. 3, page 6179.--By a private Act, no person appointed to act as tithe valuer shall be capable of acting until he shall have taken and subscribed an oath in the words following: "I, A. B., do swear that I will faithfully, etc., execute, etc.; so help me, God." Held, that the oath had nevertheless been properly administered according to the Statute, for the words omitted were no part of the oath, but only an indication of the manner of administering it. Lancaster and Carlisle Railway Company _v._ Heaton, 8 El. & Bl., 952; 4 Jur., N. S., 707; 27 L. J., Q. B., 195.

Appendix No. 3.

PAPER handed in by Mr. BRADLAUGH, 2nd June, 1880.

STATEMENT on the OATH QUESTION by Mr. BRADLAUGH.

20, Circus Road, St. John's Wood, London, N.W., 20th May, 1880.

WHEN elected as one of the Burgesses to represent Northampton in the House of Commons, I believed that I had the legal right to make affirmation of allegiance in lieu of taking the oath, as provided by section 4 of the Parliamentary Oaths Act, 1866. While I considered that I had this legal right, it was then clearly my moral duty to make the affirmation. The oath, although to me including words of idle and meaningless character, was, and is, regarded by a large number of my fellow countrymen as an appeal to Deity to take cognizance of their swearing. It would have been an act of hypocrisy to voluntarily take this form if any other had been open to me, or to take it without protest, as though it meant in my mouth any such appeal. I, therefore, quietly and privately notified the Clerk of the House of my desire to affirm. His view of the law and practice differing from my own, and no similar case having theretofore arisen, it became necessary that I should tender myself to affirm in a more formal manner, and this I did at a season deemed convenient by those in charge of the business of the House. In tendering my affirmation, I was careful when called on by the Speaker to state my objection, to do nothing more than put in the fewest possible words my contention that the Parliamentary Oaths Act, 1866, gave the right to affirm in Parliament to every person for the time being by law permitted to make an affirmation in lieu of taking an oath, and that I was such a person, and therefore claimed to affirm. The Speaker neither refusing, nor accepting my affirmation, referred the matter to the House, which appointed a Select Committee to report whether persons entitled to affirm under the Evidence Amendment Acts, 1869 and 1870, were, under Section 4 of the Parliamentary Oaths Act, 1866, also entitled to affirm as Members of Parliament. This Committee, by the casting-vote of its Chairman, has decided that I am not entitled to affirm. Two courses are open to me, one of appeal to the House against the decision of the Committee; the other, of present compliance with the ceremony, while doing my best to prevent the further maintenance of a form which many other Members of the House think as objectionable as I do, but which habit, and the fear of exciting prejudice, has induced them to submit to. To appeal to the House against the decision of the Committee would be ungracious, and would certainly involve great delay of public business. I was present at the deliberations of the Committee, and while naturally I cannot be expected to bow submissively to the statements and arguments of my opponents, I am bound to say that they were calmly and fairly urged. I think them unreasonable; but the fact that they included a legal argument from an earnest Liberal deprives them even of a purely party character. If I appealed to the House against the Committee, I, of course, might rely on the fact that the Attorney General, the Solicitor General, Sir Henry Jackson, Q.C., Watkin Williams, Q.C., and Mr. Serjeant Simon are reported in the _Times_ to have interpreted the law as I do; and I might add that the Right Honorable John Bright and Mr. Whitbread are in the same journal arrayed in favor of allowing me to affirm. But even then the decision of the House may endorse that of the Committee, and should it be in my favor it could only, judging from what has already taken place, be after a bitter party debate, in which the Government specially and the Liberals generally would be sought to be burdened with my anti-theological views, and with promoting my return to Parliament. As a matter of fact, the Liberals of England have never in any way promoted my return to Parliament. The much-attacked action of Mr. Adam had relation only to the second seat, and in no way related to the one for which I was fighting. In 1868, the only action of Mr. Gladstone and of Mr. Bright was to write letters in favor of my competitors; and since 1868 I do not believe that either of these gentlemen has directly or indirectly interfered in any way in connection with my Parliamentary candidature. The majority of the electors of Northampton had determined to return me before the recent union in that borough, and while pleased to aid their fellow Liberals in winning the two seats, my constituents would have at any rate returned me had no union taken place. My duty to my constituents is to fulfil the mandate they have given me, and if to do this I have to submit to a form less solemn to me than the affirmation I would have reverently made, so much the worse for those who force me to repeat words which I have scores of times declared are to me sounds conveying no clear and definite meaning. I am sorry for the earnest believers who see words sacred to them used as a meaningless addendum to a promise, but I cannot permit their less sincere co-religionists to use an idle form in order to prevent me from doing my duty to those who have chosen me to speak for them in Parliament. I shall, taking the oath, regard myself as bound, not by the letter of its words, but by the spirit which the affirmation would have conveyed had I been permitted to use it. So soon as I am able, I shall take such steps as may be consistent with Parliamentary business to put an end to the present doubtful and unfortunate state of the law and practice on oaths and affirmations. Only four cases have arisen of refusal to take the oath except, of course, those cases purely political in their character; two of those cases are those of the Quakers John Archdale and Joseph Pease. The religion of these men forbade them to swear at all, and they nobly refused. The sect to which they belonged was outlawed, insulted and imprisoned; they were firm, and one of that sect sat on the very committee, a member of her Majesty's Privy Council, and a member of the actual Cabinet. I thank him gratefully that, valuing right so highly, he cast his vote so nobly for one for whom I am afraid he has but scant sympathy. No such religious scruple prevents me from taking the oath as prevented John Archdale and Joseph Pease. In the case of Baron Rothschild and Alderman Salomons the words "upon the true faith of a Christian" were the obstacle. To-day the oath contains no such words. The Committee report that I may not affirm, and protesting against a decision which seems to me alike against the letter of the law and the spirit of modern legislation, I comply with the forms of the House.

CHARLES BRADLAUGH.

MR. BRADLAUGH'S SPEECHES.

MR. BRADLAUGH'S First Speech at the Bar of the House of Commons, delivered June 23rd, 1880.