administering the necessary oath on the New Testament only was no longer adhered to, and Jews have without any Act of Parliament having been passed in their favour enjoyed all the privileges of the citizenship of London. Exclusion In the same way the exclusion of Jews from the various legal and professions was due to their inability or unwillingness to other pro- comply with the regulations, especially where these included from the fessions. the taking of an objectionable oath, laid down by those who had the right to control the admission of candidates, and not to any impediment created by the general law of the country. It is sometimes said that the profession of the law was an exception to this general rule, and some colour is lent to this theory by the existence of provisions in certain statutes, namely 1 Geo. I, st. 2, c. 13, s. 2, 2 Geo. II, c. 31, and 9 Geo. II, c. 261, obliging "every person who shall act as a Serjeant at Law, Counsellor at Law, Barrister, Advocate, Attorney, Solicitor, Writer in Scotland, Proctor, Clerk or Notary," under pain of incurring severe disabilities and forfeiting £500, to take the oaths mentioned in the first-named Act. Among these was the oath of abjuration (affirming the legality of the Hanoverian succession, and renouncing allegiance to the exiled House of Stuart), which ended with the words "upon the true faith of a Christian," and therefore could not be taken by a self-respecting Jew. In the year 1766 the terms of the abjuration oath were slightly altered (by 6 Geo. III, c. 53), but the obnoxious final words were still retained. But these oaths had not to be taken before admission to the legal profession, but 1 The earlier statutes 5 Eliz., cap. 1, sec. 5, and 7 Jac. I, cap. 6, secs. 1218, providing that persons entering the legal profession should take an oath upon the evangelists, were apparently treated as no longer in force, either because they were regarded as being superseded by the later Acts, or because the oaths specified in them had been abrogated by 1 W. & M., cap. 8, and it would seem from sec. 25 of the Act of James I that it was never intended to be more than a temporary Act. These statutes applied equally to schoolmasters, and the last one to the medical profession, and were formally repealed in 1846 by 9 & 10 Vict., cap. 59, sec. I. within a certain time afterwards1. That time was originally three months, but the second-recited Act extended it to the end of the term following admission, and the third to six months. annual In In the first year of George II an indemnity Act was passed, The by which all persons who had neglected to qualify them- demnity selves for any office or employment by omitting to take Acts. the necessary oaths, &c., are indemnified and recapacitated provided that they qualified themselves on or before November 28, 1728, and every year until the year 1868, when the enactment of the Promissory Oaths Act made their continuance no longer necessary, similar Acts of indemnity were passed enlarging the time for qualification till some day in the following year. Therefore, after the reign of George II, there was nothing in the Acts recited to prevent a Jew from entering the legal profession, if he was willing to take the risk, not a very serious one, of the annual indemnity Act not being re-enacted, and his accordingly becoming incapacitated to continue to follow his profession upon the expiration of the time limited by the existing Act. mitted to But, on the other hand, admission to the legal profession Jews adcould only be obtained through the medium of certain the Bar, persons or societies who, though not bound to do so by 1833. any Act of Parliament, might lay down conditions with which Jews could not comply. For instance, the right to admit to the degree of barrister-at-law, holders of which alone are entitled to plead in the superior courts and are therefore considered the higher branch of the legal profession, has from time immemorial been vested in the 1 The position of Roman Catholics wishing to practise the law was different, for the statute 7 & 8 Will. III, cap. 24, providing under pain of incurring the penalties of praemunire that no person should practise law without first taking certain oaths (none of which were obnoxious to Jews) and making a declaration against transubstantiation, effectually excluded them, prior to the Roman Catholic Relief Act of 1791, from all participation in the legal profession except the calling of a conveyancer which was not expressly mentioned in the statute. Inns of Court. These are voluntary societies, and no member of the public has an inherent right to be admitted to them1. Persons once admitted members must then become qualified for call to the bar, and one of the qualifications which, having regard to the statutes already mentioned, can hardly be considered unreasonable, was the taking of certain oaths, including the oath of abjuration. In the year 1833 Mr. Francis Goldsmid, who had been previously admitted a fellow of the society, applied to the benchers of Lincoln's Inn to be called to the bar, and to be permitted to omit the final words from the oath of abjuration. There was some discussion, at a full meeting of the benchers, during which Lord Campbell, who was then Mr. Campbell, K.C., M.P., says that he pointed out the hardship to be imposed upon the young gentleman, who had been allowed to keep his terms and whose prospects in life would thus be suddenly blasted; to which Mr. Clarke, K.C., leader of the Midland Circuit, and at that time master of the library, replied: "Hardship! no hardship at all! Let him become a Christian, and be d―d to him!" but this reply was not taken as a serious argument, for it was unanimously resolved that the application should be granted, and Mr. Goldsmid was called to the bar and afterwards became a Q.C. and a bencher of his Inn 2. The precedent was followed by the other Inns, and so a disability, which had long been supposed to exist, was removed without the necessity of the intervention of Parliament. As this is an instance of the way in which almost all the disabilities of this kind could have been, and in many cases were, removed, it may be of interest to append the relevant entries in the records of Lincoln's Inn: 1 See the King v. the Benchers of Lincoln's Inn (1825), 4 B & C., 855; Neate v. Durwan (1874), L. R., 18 Eq. 127; and Manisty v. Kenealy (1876), 24 W. R., 918 for the legal position and government of the Inns of Court. 2 Lives of the Chancellors, vol. V, p. 544 (note). "1827. Dec. 27. Francis Henry Goldsmid (19) I 8. Isaac Lyon G., of Dulwich Hill Ho., Surrey Esq." Upon the application of Francis Henry Goldsmid, gentleman, a Fellow of this Society, relative to his call to the Bar, It is ordered that the question whether a person of the Jewish persuasion is eligible to be called to the Bar, be adjourned to Wednesday next." "Special Council held on January 30, 1833. Nineteen Benchers present. Upon the motion of the Rt. Hon. Thomas Erskine, Mr. Francis Henry Goldsmid was unanimously called to the Bar.' "2 It remains but to add that the benchers on this occasion Admission of Jews as merely followed the praiseworthy example which had been solicitors, set by the leaders of the lower branch of the profession 1770. nearly sixty years before. And here again it will be well to set out extracts from the records. In the draft minutes of the Society of Gentlemen Practisers for June 25, 1770, appear the following notes, written apparently by a member of the committee: "No Jew to be bail for any person but a Jew. Abraham Abrahams Jacobs admitted as attorneys." Fore Street in the Artillery Ground, In another document, also to be found in the printed edition of the records, the exact steps by which the admission was effected, are given. It reads as follows: "Oath by Jewish Solicitor. Joseph Abrahams, son of Abraham Abrahams of Mitre Court, Leadenhall Street, was on the 29th Decr., 1763, 1 Admission Register, no. 19, fo. 65; Records of Lincoln's Inn, vol. II, p. 127. " Black Books of Lincoln's Inn, Book XXII, pp. 233, 234; Records of Lincoln's Inn, Black books, vol. IV, p. 185. The pro schoolmasters and tutors. articled as clerk to George Ellis the younger of Deans Affidt. of due execution of the Articles sworn 25th On ye 18 July 1769 the said Joseph Abrahams was assigned over by Articles by the said George Ellis to Robt. Gill of Angel Court, Throgmorton Street, Attorney in the Common Pleas. 23rd Jan. 1770 the said Joseph Abrahams was admitted as an Attorney of the King's Bench by Mr. Justice Yates. 13th ffebry 1770 was admitted a Sollr. in Chancery. The Deputy Clerk of ye petty Bagg informed me Abrahams was sworn on the Bible. 10th Geo. Ist. cap. 4. Subjects professing ye Jewish Religion presenting themselves to take ye Oath of Abjuration (the words Upon the true faith of a Christian to be omitted) and deemed a sufft. taking of the abjuration Oath 1." The profession of a tutor or schoolmaster was also fession of closed to the Jew in the same way as that of the law, for the statutes already enumerated ordaining the taking of obnoxious oaths embraced the followers of the teaching profession as well as the practisers of medicine and law. The disability thus imposed was, however, practically obviated in the way already described after the reign of George II by the passage of the annual indemnity Acts. Yet from this particular profession the Jew was excluded by other statutory provisions. The Act of Uniformity provided that "all masters and other heads, fellows, chaplains and tutors of or in any college, hall, house of learning or hospital, and every public professor and reader in either of the universities and in every college elsewhere... and every schoolmaster keeping any public or private school and every person instructing or teaching any 1 Records of the Society of Gentlemen Practisers, pp. 120, 121, 288. |