Resolved, Nemine Contradicente, "That the Thanks of this House be given to the other gallant Officers of Her Majesty's Army and Navy, and also of Her Majesty's Indian Forces, for the intrepidity, zeal, and endurance evinced by them in the arduous operations of the late Indian Campaign." Resolved, Nemine Contradicente, "That this House doth highly approve and acknowledge the valour, self-devotion, and brilliant services of the Non-Commissioned Officers and Private Soldiers, both European and Native, and of the Petty Officers and Seamen and Non-Commissioned Officers and Marines, who have taken part in the suppression of the recent disturbances in India and that the same be signified to them by the Commanders of their several Corps, who are desired to thank them for their gallant be haviour. Ordered, That the said Resolutions be transmitted by Mr. Speaker to the Governor General of India; and that his Lordship be requested to communicate the same to the several Officers referred to therein." Order for Third Reading read. SIR HENRY WILLOUGHBY said, he would take that occasion to ask the Secretary for the Treasury for information with reference to the expenditure of the votes of credit, amounting on the whole for the years 1854, 1855, 1856, to £8,000,000, which had been granted during the Russian war. He wished to ascertain whether the entire of that sum had been expended, and, if not, what the balance was which remained still unappropriated? SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE said, the actual state of the fund to which the hon. Baronet referred was, that £6,400,000, had been actually laid out on account of the service of the war. With regard to the remaining £1,600,000, the power to draw one million of it out of the Exchequer had been surrendered last year, which left a sum of only £600,000 to be accounted for. As soon as the Army and Navy accounts were wound up it was his intention to lay a statement of the manner in which the whole of the money had been expended on the table of the House. Only one account, he believed, involving a sum of any magnitude remained to be settled. It was connected with our arrangements with France, in reference to what took place during the Crimean war, and was in progress of settlement. It was possible, too, that there might be some charge on account of the German Legion; but as soon as those two items were arranged the balance of the votes would be formaly transferred to the Exchequer, and the accounts laid before Parliament. Bill read 3o and passed. JEWS' ACT-REPORT. Report of Select Committee read. MR. WALPOLE: I rise, to call the attention of the House to the Report of the Select Committee on the Jews' Act. The House will recollect that the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. T. Duncombe) placed a Motion on the paper for leave to introduce a Bill by means of which some difficulties which it was thought might probably arise in carrying into effect the pro visions of the Act of last Session, would be avoided; those difficulties being connected with the question whether a person of the Jewish persuasion would be enabled to take his seat at the commencement of a new Parliament. The hon. Member for Finsbury was anxious to introduce a Bill to enable the House to pass a Standing Order by means of which, until it was repealed, a person of the Jewish persuasion would be able to take his seat. Great difficulties have arisen as to the proper construction of the Act; those difficulties, however, have been considered in Committee, and the Committee think that the doubts created by that Act of Parliament are so great that it would not be prudent to attempt to do by a Standing Order that which the Legislature has empowered either House of Parliament to do by Resolution only. There is this difference between a Standing Order and a Resolu tion. I will explain it in the words of the late Speaker. In answer to a question which was put to him by the noble Lord the Member for the City (Lord John Russell) on the 12th April, 1842, the late Speaker (Mr. Shaw Lefevre) observed "The distinction between a Resolution and a Standing Order is this, that a Resolution is only binding throughout the then present Session of Parliament in which it is passed, and therefore during that Session it cannot be questioned, although it may be questioned during any other Session of Parliament; but a Standing Order is binding upon all future Parliaments until either repealed or revoked." Session commences. But before that time it is obligatory that those who take part in the business should have taken the oath. It was the opinion of the Committee that there should be nothing to prevent the Jewish Members from taking their seats as soon as the other Members; but they were also of opinion that it would be expedient to abide by the practice adopted in the last and present Session of Parliament. To meet the difficulty, however, they suggest that a time may be appointed for the House to decide whether effect shall be given to the statute by passing the ResoIution which the statute requires. The only remaining question then is, on what day will such a Resolution be best considered, so as to secure the deliberate I believe, Sir, when Baron Rothschild came to the table to take his seat, you expressed it to be your opinion (and if I may take the liberty of saying so, that was an opinion in which the Com-judgment of the House, with a full atmittee entirely concurred) that the mode then pursued was the proper one. A Resolution was then passed in the words of the Act of Parliament authorizing a Member professing the Jewish religion to take his seat. During the present Session another Member professing the Jewish religion came to the table, and as, according to the Speaker's ruling, the Resolution of the preceding Session did not affect him, another Resolution had to be passed, which will enable any other Member of that persuasion to take his seat and the oaths during this Session. But the case would be very different supposing the Member to come up in another Session. The Resolution will have no operation then. It is true you may turn the Resolution into a Standing Order, but if you do that, you must take care to keep within the statutory power, which makes no mention of a Standing Order, but merely provides that a member of the Jewish persuasion, on taking the Parliamentary oath, may omit the words "on the true faith of a Christian." The difficulty is, when a new Parliament is elected, to reconcile the power conferred by the Legislature on either House of Parliament to admit persons of the Jewish persuasion by Resolution, with the privilege which belongs to every Member to come and take his seat as soon as he thinks fit so to do. We propose to treat the question in this way. When a new Parliament is chosen, the Speaker is first selected, and he first takes the oath himself, and then proceeds to administer it to the other Members. No other business is transacted till Her Majesty has delivered the Speech from the Throne, and then the business of the tendance of Members. Three days occupied in swearing in Members gives every Member an opportunity to be sworn at the table if he choose, between the time of the election of the Speaker and the Speech from the Throne. If, therefore, we fix four o'clock on the fourth day as the time when the House may pass the Resolution to enable the Jew to take his seat, omitting the words to which he has a conscientious objection, you will secure a full House to decide the question, and you will deprive no Member of the privilege of taking his seat as soon as circumstances admit. We say, in recording the conclusion at which the Committee arrived, that the only question is on what day the best attendance could be secured; but, on the whole, the fourth day was considered the best for settling the question under consideration; and it was, therefore, recommended that the Resolution be made a Standing Order. I am going to move, therefore, that the course to be pursued shall be resolved on now, and that on the meeting of the new Parliament the Resolution passed in pursuance of the Act 21 & 22 Vict., c. 40, on which is founded the Resolution permitting Members professing the Jewish religion to take the oath, with the omission of the words "on the true faith of a Christian" be not taken into consideration till four o'clock on the fourth day after the meeting of Parliament. I believe the many difficulties in the case will be avoided by this course. Looking at both sides of the question, and endeavouring to avoid the various difficulties of the case, I think the Committee have been enabled to propose the course best calculated to deal with them. The The right hon. Gentleman concluded by for- twenty-four hours to collect its Members mally submitting the Motion recommended and deliberate as to its decision. by the Committee. Committee, however, had not provided for this case, and the impression of the Committee seemed to be that if a necessity for deliberation should occur to any Member of the House, he might, by moving the adjournment of the debate, afford the House the opportunity of deliberation. He (Mr. Newdegate) knew that such a course would be attended with considerable inconvenience to the Jewish Member, and perhaps to the House, as the debate thus adjourned would not have precedence of other Orders on the following day, and it was not fair to entail on any individual the odium of causing this inconvenience. But his object was to warn the House that no alternative remained but the adoption of this means of preventing the House from being surprised into the adoption of a Resolution which it might afterwards regret, as the decision of probably a small section of its Members, or of a section representing almost exclusively one cast of opinion, but which would be binding on the whole House during the remainder of the Session in which it was passed. MR. NEWDEGATE said, that having moved an Amendment to the Motion of the hon. Member for Finsbury, upon which the Committee, whose Report the House was considering had been appointed, and in which he had served, and having thus brought under the consideration of the House the propriety of requiring notice of the Resolutions which the Act enjoined as necessary to the admission of Jewish candidates to take the oaths required by law, he felt that, having in the first instance brought the matter under the consideration of the House, he was bound to refer to the omission from the Resolution now proposed by the right hon. Member for Cambridge, of all provision for securing adequate notice of the intention to require the House to pass such Resolutions as the Act sanctioned. The Resolution and the standing order which the House was now asked to adopt provided in part for the difficulty by preventing the House being required to pass a Resolution before the Members were sworn at the commencement of a Parliament. That absurdity would be obviated. But whenever afterwards the House might be required by the appearance of a Jewish Member at the table to pass a Resolution for the alteration of the oath to suit the convenience of this Jewish Member, the inconvenience of the want of notice would again be felt. He spoke with deference of the opinion of the Committee, but he confessed that he was surprised at the decision at which they had arrived. He could not think that the House ought to expose itself to the danger of being surprised into the adoption of a Resolution which conveyed a solemn decision of that House, with the authority of law, by the absence of all notice of the intention to require the House to exercise an option and pronounce a judgment. He was surprised that the very distinguished Committee, of which he was a member, had made no provision against such a contingency. He admitted the right of the Jewish Member to time his appearance at the table, as a matter of privilege; but he did not think that it was consistent with the dignity of the House, when made aware of the necessity for its proceeding in accordance with the Act, which it last year sanctioned, by giving a solemn judgment as to the admissibility of a Jewish Member that the House, should not require MR. EDWIN JAMES said, he thought it most desirable that this matter should be set at rest, without reference to party questions, and, in his opinion, the proposition of the right hon. Gentleman met the difficulty in the most satisfactory manner. MR. HADFIELD said, he must object to the delay of four days before a Member was allowed to take his seat, as a thing unprecedented in the Parliamentary history of this country. The effect of it would be to disqualify the Member for that time, and he believed render him liable to a penalty if he voted for the election of the Speaker. At all events, it would have the effect of continuing a distinction between one class of Her Majesty's subjects and another, which ought no longer to exist. Nothing so bad or intolerant had taken place in the worst days of the Test and Corporation Acts. MR. CONINGHAM said, he was also of opinion that the proposal of the right hon. Gentleman would continue a distinction which ought to be abolished; but this could only be regarded as a temporary adjustment, and he hoped they would soon see this system of the compulsory administration of oaths put an end to. Resolved, no That, on the Meeting of a New Parliament, Vict. c. 49, which shall have the effect of admit- Ireland were prepared. He now begged ting a Member professing the Jewish Religion to to lay them on the table, and he hoped be sworn at the Table, be taken into consideration before Twelve of the clock on the fourth day that early in the new Parliament they appointed for taking the Oaths required by Law." "would become law, and result in an entire consolidation of the law. Ordered, "That the said Resolution be a Standing Order be more convenient, in order that those MR. WHITESIDE said, that it would of this House." OFFENCES AGAINST THE PERSON. LEAVE-FIRST READING. THE ATTORNEY GENERAL said, he rose to move for leave to bring in a Bill to consolidate and amend the Statute Law of England and Ireland relating to offences against the person. This and seven other Bills to amend the Statute Law were the first of a series of Bills amounting, in the whole, to 150, which were in a forward state of preparation, and which, if approved of by Parliament, would complete the consolidation of the entire Statute Law of the United Kingdom. At this period of the Session, and of the Parliament he felt reluctantly withheld from submitting to the House any detailed statement of the intentions of the Government on this important subject. He would merely observe, that after 350 years of inertion-after the efforts of so many of our greatest lawyers and statesmen had failed, the late Government, in pursuance of certain proposals and sugges tions of the Statute Law Commission, which was presided over by Lord Cranworth, undertook the commencement of the task. These Bills were arranged with great pains by some of the first lawyers and statesmen of the country, and were introduced into the House of Lords and passed that House in 1856. The late Solicitor General introduced them in this House in 1857, but their progress was interrupted by the dissolution of Parliament. Last Session the House was so occupied with other business that it was found impossible to bring them forward; but early this Session he (the Attorney General) was prepared to lay them on the table. In the interval, however, the Government had come to the conclusion that while consolidating the Statute Law of England, it would be as well to extend the consolidation to that of Ireland. With the able assistance of his right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General for Ireland, and the late Solicitor General for Ireland, now a learned Judge in that country, those Bills to amend and consolidate the Criminal Statute Law of England and Gentlemen who were interested in the subject should be able to examine them, that the seven Bills which were finished should be printed. They could not, however, well understand the scheme without the Procedure Bill and the Punishment Bill, which were not yet completed. He would, therefore, mention, that instead of specifying the punishment at the end of the clause which constituted the offence, it had been thought advisable to bring in a separate Bill, defining the punishment assignable to each offence. They proposed to do away with capital punishment in ten cases in which it was now legal, reserving it only for treason and murder. In Ireland conspiracy to murder was a capital offence, but it was proposed to change the law in that respect, so that the Bills would not only consolidate, assimilate, and amend the Criminal Statute Law, but would also ameliorate it in favour of Ireland. MR. M.MAHON said, he begged to tender his thanks to the Mover and Seconder of the Motion for the steps they had taken towards assimilating the law of Ireland to that of England, and he hoped they would not stop there, but make the assimilation complete. Leave given. Bill to consolidate and amend the Statute Law of England and Ireland relating to Offences against the Person, ordered to be brought in by Mr. ATTORNEY General, Mr. ATTORNEY GENERAL for Ireland, and Mr. Secretary SOTHERON ESTCOURT. Bill presented and read 1o. Ilouse adjourned at a quarter after HOUSE OF LORDS, Friday, April 15, 1859. MINUTES.] PUBLIC BILLS.-2 Pauper Maintenance Act Continuance; Local Government Supplemental; Confirmation and Probate Act (1858) Amendment; Naval Medical Supplemental Fund Society Annuities, &c. Act Continuance; Consolidated Fund (Appropriation); Exchequer Bills (£13,277,400). 3 Glasgow Public Parks and Galleries of Art; Superannuation; Combination of Workmen. LOCAL GOVERNMENT SUPPLEMENTAL BILL. SECOND READING-QUESTION OF FORM. THE EARL OF CARNARVON moved the second reading of the Bill. THE DUKE OF SOMERSET objected to the Bill being read a second time, on the ground that it was not among the Orders of the Day. LORD REDESDALE explained that the object of the Bill was only to confirm certain provisional Orders. THE DUKE OF SOMERSET objected to confirming these Orders without knowing what they were. EARL STANHOPE agreed with the noble Duke, and suggested that the Orders might wait for confirmation until the assembling of the new Parliament. THE EARL OF DERBY said, that the Orders were set out in a schedule of the Bill, and therefore if there was any objection to any of them it might be raised in Committee. There could be no reason why the Bill should not be read a second time. Bill read 2a (on Motion) committed to a Committee of the whole House on Monday next; and Standing Orders Nos. 37, and 38, to be considered, in order to their being dispensed with. RED SEA AND INDIA TELEGRAPH THIRD READING. BILL WITHDRAWN. Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a. LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY said, he wished to say a few words with respect to the peculiar character and circumstances of this Bill, which partook more of the character of a public than a private measure, and ought not to be passed without due consideration by their Lordships. Being an unopposed Bill, the Chairman of the Committee to which it was referred was merely bound to see that there was nothing irregular or informal in its provisions, and had no control whatever over the policy of the mea sure. The Bill referred to an agreement between the Company and the Treasury; but that agreement was not recited in the Bill, as it certainly ought to have been, and their Lordships were quite ignorant of its terms up till yesterday, when certain papers relating to contracts of this description were laid before them. This agreement was a direct violation of the principle on which the noble Earl oppo site had admitted that all such contracts ought to be framed. The Treasury engaged to give the Company a guarantee of 4 per cent on a capital of £800,000, to be expended in establishing telegraphic communication between Suez and Kurrachee; and, moreover, the undertaking was to take effect even although the work should never be completed, or, if completed, should prove a failure. If the wire should be laid down and then lost, the Treasury would be bound to refund to the Company the whole of the money expended, together with the interest from the time of signing the contract. It was not even conditional on the Company, making an earnest endeavour to complete the line. Thus, any merchant who subscribed his money would be entitled to receive his interest for fifty years, irrespective of any advantage imparted to the public. The Government could borrow money at 3 per cent, and it would be much better if they made the line themselves, than submit to such conditions. He thought the contract was of so monstrous a nature that the House ought to pause before they lent their sanction to a Bill intended to carry it into operation. Other portions of the measure were extremely objectionable. The agreement with the Treasury merely extended to the making of a line of telegraph from Suez to Kurrachee, but the Bill gave the Company the power of also laying down one or more submarine cables between Alexandria and other places in Egypt and India, via the Red Sea, as well as of completing the communication by connecting it, if desirable, with Great Britain. As this would probably be the main, if not the only, line of telegraph between this country and India, power ought to be reserved to the Government, if it thought fit, at the end of a certain period to take possession of the wires upon a fair valuation, and after paying a reasonable amount of compensation to the Company. THE EARL OF DERBY said, that he should be happy to give any explanation upon the subject in his power. With regard to the measure being treated as a private Bill, he thought that was no disadvantage, for private Bills were discussed much more fully in Committee than public Acts. At any rate, if the Government had erred in treating it as a private Bill, they had erred in very good company, for the Atlantic Telegraph, which was a precisely analogous Bill, had been dealt with |