Batchelors and Widowers, for the terme of 5 years, for carrying on the War against France with Vigour." It imposed a duty of two shillings and sixpence upon the marriage of every person not in receipt of alms, and additional taxes in case of the marriage of persons of rank or property, and contained a proviso that Quakers, Papists, and Jews, and any other persons living together as man and wife, should be liable to the duties they would have been obliged to pay, if they had been married according to the law of England, but at the same time the Act was not to be construed as in any way making good or effectual any such marriage. Blas Again a few years later, in the spring of 1698, when "the The Act Act for the more effectual suppressing of Blasphemy and against Profaneness" was before Parliament, and an amendment phemy. was inserted after its return to the Lords, by which all persons openly professing the Jewish religion would have been made liable to the severe penalties it imposed; the House of Commons recognized the right of the Jews to remain here and continue the exercise of their religion by rejecting the amendment by a substantial majority. This incident is thus described by Narcissus Luttrell in his Diary, under the date March 22, 1693: "The Commons yesterday divided about a clause in the bill against prophanesse, relating to the Jews, who deny Jesus Christ; 144 were for it, and 78 against it: so the clause was added that the Jews shal not be molested 1." oblige The next occasion on which this subject was raised in The Act to the legislature was in the year 1702, when the Act to oblige the Jews to maintain and provide for their Protestant maintain children was passed. The way in which this statute was Protestant put in operation has already been described in the second children. of these articles, and calls for no further comment, but it Breta case. 1 The Commons Journals give the numbers as 140 and 78. In reality no clause was added, but the words which had been struck out by the Lords were restored to the Act. For the history of the Act, see supra, pp. 13-18. their The de may be advisable to recall the circumstances which led to its enactment. A few years earlier the Commons had rejected the Lords' amendment to the Act against Blasphemy and Profaneness, on the express ground that it would drive the Jews out of the country, and so deprive them of the means of being rightly instructed in the principles of the true Christian religion. It soon became clear that this desire of gaining proselytes would not be gratified to any great extent if the converts were exposed to financial ruin, nor, as there was not in those days a rich and highly endowed society for the promotion of Christianity among the Jews, were the conversionists prepared to support a burden which they had reasonable hopes of removing to other shoulders. In the year 1701 a case arose which gave an opportunity for introducing legislation. In May of that year Mary Mendez de Breta, a girl nearly eighteen years of age, who had been brought up as a Jewess, embraced the Christian faith, and was baptized by Mr. Thorold, a minister of the Church of England. Thereupon her father, Jacob Mendez de Breta, disowned her for his child, turned her out of doors, and refused to allow her any maintenance, and she, being afraid of her father's anger, applied to the Lord Mayor for protection, and at his order the churchwardens of St. Andrew's Undershaft, in whose parish the father lived, provided for her and maintained her at the charge of the parish. The churchwardens lodged a complaint against the father at the Quarter Sessions at the Guildhall, and an order was made under the Relief of the Poor Act of Elizabeth that the father should allow her twenty shillings a-month for her maintenance, but this order was subsequently quashed by the Court of King's Bench, on the ground that there was no jurisdiction to make it1. A petition was then presented 1 See the Inhabitants of St. Andrew's Undershaft v. de Breta, Lord Raymond's Reports, vol. I, p. 699. Before the Committee of the House of Commons it was stated that the allowance for maintenance was twenty shillings a-week. Commons Journals, vol. XIII, p. 799. to the House of Commons by the ministers, churchwardens, and overseers of the poor of the above-mentioned parish and the five neighbouring parishes, stating that most of the Jews in London lived in their parishes, and that, "though they enjoy the protection of the government and the free exercise of their religion and grow rich, yet they bear such a hatred to our national religion, that in case any of their children embrace the same, they utterly disown them and treat them with great cruelty; an instance whereof appears by the daughter of Jacob Mendez de Breta, a rich Jew in St. Andrew's Undershaft, who being converted to the Christian Faith, he utterly disowns her for his child and refuses to maintain her; so that she is now kept by the said parish for her encouragement, suitable to her education," and praying that a bill might be brought in to oblige Jacob Mendez de Breta in particular and the Jews in general to maintain and provide for their Protestant children. The petition was at once referred to a Committee. The Committee heard a large number of witnesses on both sides, including the father himself, who said that Mary was not his daughter, but with two or three more children had been laid at his door in Portugal, and that he had maintained them purely out of charity, and further that he had never owned her as his daughter, but had always treated her as a servant, and that if she was entered in the parish books for the poll-tax as his daughter it was without his knowledge or consent. The Committee, however, found that the allegations in the petition were fully proved, and recommended that a bill be brought in according to the prayer of the petition. When the bill was read a second time a petition from several Jews, merchants in London, was presented against it, and after certain amendments had been made in the Commons, it was passed in the Lords without any amendment and almost without debate1. On other occasions occurring at frequent intervals before 1 Commons Journals, vol. XIII, pp. 748, 798-800, 813, 839, 848, 886, 889, 895, and Lords Journals, vol. XVII, pp. 125, 126, 128, 131, 148. Relaxation of the Act compelling land owners 1846 Parliament took cognizance of the presence of the Jews, generally with the view of mitigating in their favour new enactments which would have otherwise pressed heavily upon them, but it will for our present purpose be sufficient to enumerate briefly the principal of these occasions. For instance, in the year 1722, in order to place a check upon the Jacobites, many of whom were Roman Catholics, it was enacted by 9 Geo. I, cap. 24, that all persons owning land, who refused or neglected to take the oaths appointed for to take the the security of the king's person and government, which injuration cluded the oath of abjuration as framed in the reign of James I, and ending with the words "on the true faith of a Christian," should register their names and real estates before a fixed day, or in default should forfeit their lands. But, in the following year, an amending Act, 10 Geo. I, cap. 4, was passed, which allowed persons professing the Jewish religion to take the oath without the final words, in like manner as Jews are admitted to be sworn to give evidence in Courts of Justice. oath of ab in favour of the Jews. Similar privileges given the Again in the year 1740 an Act was passed enabling all persons who had settled for a period of seven years in any Jews by of the British colonies in America to be naturalized, under other Acts of Parlia- certain conditions, without the necessity of obtaining a ment. The private Act of Parliament, by which naturalization was Naturali- granted in those days, but it contained a proviso that all zation such persons should first receive the Sacrament of the Act, 1740. Lord's Supper in some Protestant and reformed congrega Colonial Lord Hardwicke's Marriage Act, 1753. tion in Great Britain or one of the colonies, except the people called Quakers, "or such who profess the Jewish religion." It was also further provided that Jews taking the necessary oaths for the purposes of this Act might omit the words "on the true faith of a Christian," in the same way as they were enabled to do under 9 Geo. I, cap. 24. Thirteen years later Lord Hardwicke's Act for the better preventing of clandestine marriages (26 Geo. II, 1 13 Geo. II, cap. 7, repealed by the Naturalization Act, 1870; see especially secs. 2 and 3. ish Natu cap. 33), which made null and void all marriages solemnized without the publication of banns or licence, expressly excepted marriages amongst the people called Quakers or amongst the persons professing the Jewish religion, and most of the subsequent marriage Acts have contained similar exceptions. In the same year was passed the famous The JewJew bill (26 Geo. II, cap. 26), which permitted persons ralization professing the Jewish religion to be naturalized by Act of Act, 1753. Parliament without having previously taken the Sacrament. The Act passed through the House of Lords with great ease, but when it came down to the House of Commons met with strong opposition; indeed it would have possibly been wrecked in the Lower House, had not some of the enemies of the Government slackened their efforts against it, in the belief that it would cause widespread unpopularity throughout the country against the party in power. Nor was this belief ill-founded, for the storm of prejudice and fanaticism that arose during the recess compelled the Government to pass as their first effective measure of the next session an Act repealing the obnoxious Jew bill. For more than seventy years the Jews were not specially mentioned in any Act of Parliament, but they were again expressly excepted from the provisions of the marriage Acts of 1824, 1836, and 1840, and the Registration Act, 1836, provided for the due registration of Jewish marriages by the Secretary of a synagogue certified by the President of the London Committee of Deputies of the British Jews. The Jews benefit of ration Act, 1845 and This brings us down to the years 1845 and 1846, when admitted the measures of relief were granted, and the Jewish reli- to the gion finally admitted to the benefit of the Toleration Act. the ToleTill then the immunity of the Jews from the consequences of the penal laws had rested on the royal dispensations 1846. Till granted by the king in Council in answer to the petitions of Abraham Delivera and others in 1674, and of Joseph tected Henriques and others in 1685, and the preceding summary the Disof Parliamentary enactments concerning the Jews shows pensing then they were pro only by Power of the king. |