INTRODUCTION.

THE first edition of the following Letter on the Coronation Oath was published a few days after his Royal Highness delivered his memorable speech on the 25th of May 1825. The writer trusts that he has uniformly expressed himself in it, in the terms of high respect, to which that illustrious personage was eminently intitled.

It has long been out of print; a second edition of it appears at this time, in consequence of a recent publication of great importance, intitled,—" Letters from his

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late Majesty to the late Lord Kenyon on the Coronation "Oath, with his Lordship's Answers: and Letters of the Right Honourable William Pitt to His late Majesty, with " His Majesty's Answers, previous to the Dissolution of the "Ministry in 1801."

IN dutiful attachment to the sacred person and government of his late Majesty, while he lived, none exceeded the Roman catholics; none respected more his Majesty's conscientious feeling on the Coronation Oath. They knew it to be sincere; and they revered its sincerity. In their memory and gratitude, the Acts passed, in their favour, during his reign, will ever live.

SEVERAL circumstances have long led the writer to suspect that the true state of the question, supposed to arise on the Coronation Oath, was never properly presented either to his Majesty, or his Royal Brother. The writer's suspicions are confirmed by the correspondence. It cannot be said that the statements made by his Majesty's direction,

to Lord Kenyon, shew, either all the facts, or all the bearings of the case.

LORD KENYON'S ANSWERS AND MR. PITT'S LETTERS contain several important declarations.

Lord Kenyon, after conferring with Sir John Scott, then his Majesty's Attorney General, says explicitly, in the first of his Answers published in the collection:

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1. That," so long as the King's supremacy, and the "main fabrick of the Act of Uniformity, the doctrine, discipline, and government of the Church of England "are preserved as the national church, and the provision "for its ministers kept as an appropriated fund, it seems "that any ease given the sectaries would not militate against the Coronation Oath, or the Act of Union :"

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2. And that," though the Test Act appears to be a very wise law, and in point of sound policy not to be departed from; yet that it seems that it might be repealed or altered, without any breach of the Constitution, or 66 Act of Union :"

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3. In his second Answer, he states it to be" a general maxim, that the supreme power of a state cannot "limit itself.""

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On the great question of Catholic Emancipation Mr. Pitt's Letters are invaluable. They abundantly demonstrate the opinions of that great man,—

1st. That it was a salutary measure;

2d. That it should be accompanied with certain securities; 3d. What he thought those securities should be; 4th. That, accompanied with these, he deemed it the duty of the legislature to sanction the measure;

5th. And that he felt it to be his duty to quit his Majesty's service, when he saw him decidedly hostile to the measures proposed by him for the relief of the Roman Catholics.

LETTER

FEW

ON THE

CORONATION OATH.

EW Parliamentary documents possess, in any point of view, so much importance as THE SPEECH DELIVERED ON THE 25th OF LAST MONTH,* IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS, BY HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE DUKE of York, on presenting the petition of the Dean and Canons of Windsor against granting any further relief to his Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects.

Lamenting, as they must do, that his Royal Highness is so adverse to their petitions, still, the Roman Catholics are grateful for his open avowal of his opinions, and of the reasons upon which they are grounded. It allows them free liberty to discuss them with the respect due to his exalted rank.

Availing himself of this circumstance, an humble individual of their number trusts that he may, without offence or impropriety, submit to his Royal Highness, some observations upon the following passage in his speech.

His Royal Highness states in it, that he "wished to "ask whether their lordships had considered the situation ." in which they might place the King; or whether they re"collected the Oath which his Majesty had taken at the "altar, to his people, upon his coronation? He begged to "read the words of the oath. I will, to the utmost of

my power, maintain the law of God, the true profession "of the Gospel, and the Protestant Reformed Religion, "established by law; and I will preserve unto the bishops "and clergy of this realm, and to the churches committed "to their charge, all such rights and privileges as by "law do or shall appertain to them, or any of them.' * 25 April 1825.

"Their Lordships," continued his Royal Highness," must "remember, that ours is a Protestant King who knows

no mental reservation, and whose situation is different "from that of any other person in this country; that his “Royal Highness, and every other individual in this

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country, could be released from his Oath by the au"thority of Parliament; but the King could not. The "Oath, as he had always understood, is a solemn obligation, entered into by the person who took it, from "which no act of his own could release him; but the King was the third part of the State, without whose voluntary consent no act of the Legislature could be valid, and he could not relieve himself from the obligation of an Oath."

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વહ

With the utmost deference and respect to his Royal Highness, it is suggested to his consideration, that the expressions copied from his speech give rise to the following observations :—

I.

Is it not the bounden duty of the Sovereign of these realms to give his Royal assent to every bill presented to him by the two Houses of Parliament, which he himself believes to be conducive to the welfare of the empire?

In an ancient statute, (25 of Edw. III. stat. 6), this is unequivocally expressed. It is there said, that "the right " of the crown of England and the law of the realm, is "such, that, upon the mischiefs and damages which

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happen to this realm, the King ought and is bound "by his Oath, with the concord of the people in Parlia"ment assembled, to make remedy and law." Does it not follow, that, if the two Houses of Parliament should present a bill to the Monarch, for the repeal of the laws remaining in force against the Roman Catholics, and the Sovereign should be of opinion that, not to repeal those laws, would bring mischief and damage to the realm, he would be constitutionally bound, in the words of the act,

to make the remedy, by assenting to the bill of repeal? Would not any Oath taken by the Monarch not to assent to such a bill be a nullity? Must not not every such Oath be necessarily understood to be accompanied by an im plied condition that nothing contained in it should oblige him to act against the principles of the constitution, or the rights or welfare of his subjects, or to forbear from assenting to any bill which enacted, in his opinion, any measure for their good?

II.

No prospective act of the Legislature can discharge the King from the paramount duty thus imposed upon him, of giving his assent to a bill presented to him by the two Houses of Parliament, which he himself approves of and deems salutary.

In this, the highest authorities in the law agree.

We beg leave to call the attention of his Royal Highness to what is said by Sir William Blackstone of the omnipotence of Parliament; of its uncontrollable power in “making, restraining, abrogatiug, and repealing laws "concerning matters of all possible denomination, eccle"siastical or temporal." He avers most explicitly, that "Parliament can alter the established religion of the "land." This is the very strongest act of legislation that can be supposed. His Royal Highness must be sensible that a repeal of the few laws yet remaining in force against the Roman Catholics is immeasurably distant from it.

Lord Coke lays it down as a constitutional maxim, and a fundamental principle of law, that "acts against the 66 power of Parliament bind not."

In the 21st of Richard II. (Rot. Parl. 50. 52.), an Oath was taken by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and also by the proctors of the clergy and the knights in Parliament, that "they would not reverse, break, irritate, annul,

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or repeal any of the judgments, establishments, statutes, or ordinances made, rendered or given in that Parlia"ment. "But our Lord the King," continues the record,