SECTION IV. A PETITION TO The King, PRESENTED TO HIS MAJESTY BY THE RIGHT HONOURABLE LORD HAWKESBURY. TO THE KING'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY : The Petition of his loyal, but aggrieved Subject, NATHANIEL HIGHMORE, Doctor and Professor of Civil Law, Member of Jesus College, Cambridge, and commissioned Advocate in His Majesty's Courts of Ecclesiastical jurisdiction, HUMBLY REPRESENTETH, That under the oppression of a most severe and grievous injury done to his just and legal rights, as one of your Majesty's natural-born subjects, and as a member of Cambridge University; and for redress whereof he has, in vain, sued for an hearing, and for permission to plead in behalf of his chartered rights and privileges, and those of your Majesty's University: He is led to approach your Majesty's sacred person, and to implore your Majesty's most gracious aid and interference, to obtain for him an hearing of his humble and dutiful remonstrance, and a decision of his case, according to the statute and canon law of the realm, before such one of the ministers of your Majesty's spiritual or civil authority, as may, in due course of law, appear to have cognizance thereof. And your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner, with a view of laying before your Majesty the substance of this his sore grievance and complaint, for redress of which he is thus compelled to resort to your Majesty's watchful and paternal care for the preservation of the rights, liberties, and immunities of your people, whensoever aggrieved or oppressed; and more especially, for the prevention of any abuses, tending to interrupt the free and unbiassed administration of public justice, in your Majesty's legal courts, whether spiritual or temporal, Doth further represent and state, That having by eleven years of academic education, in your Majesty's university of Cambridge, obtained the rank and degree of doctor of civil law; and thereby a full and legal qualification, as by the statute and canon law ordained, to practise the profession of an advocate in your Majesty's courts of ecclesiastical jurisdiction: and having regularly obtained the metropolitan fiat of the Archbishop of Canterbury, in pursuance whereof, his Grace's rescript, or commission, appointing him to that spiritual and canonical office, was duly executed, and sealed with the seal of his Grace's VicarGeneral ; Your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner has, notwithstanding such his legal qualification and appointment, been, by the ecclesiastical officers of the Most Reverend Primate, unduly refused admission to exercise the spiritual and civil functions of his office; as he has also been refused admission into the chartered society of ecclesiastical judges and advocates, although duly and legally commissioned to the former, and entitled to the latter. And your Majesty's petitioner further humbly and dutifully states, that he did, in consequence of such undue and unauthorised refusal of the ecclesiastical officers of the Most Reverend Primate, who, under your Majesty, exercises jurisdiction over these spiritual courts, and over this ecclesiastical college, respectfully prefer to my Lord Archbishop his grievance and his complaint; in reply whereto, his Grace did fully and expressly acknowledge the futility of that objection, which, although wholly unsanctioned either by the canon or the statute law, had still, by those officers, been wrongfully assumed from the former, and falsely set up, as a pretence for their disobedience of his Grace's metropolitan rescript, and as a colourable pretext for their unjust principle of exclusion, and for their invasion of the spiritual privileges, as well as the temporal rights of your Majesty's subjects. Justly, however, and conclusively, as your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner did, in consequence of this avowal of the Most Reverend Primate, in behalf of his claim and of his cause, conceive, that his otherwise due and legal qualification and appointment must thereby have been restored to that validity and energy, whereof it had been wrongfully attempted to deprive them ; still, to his sore grief and disappointment, my lord Archbishop did decline enforcing, by his metropolitan authority, obedience to his rescript; and did refer your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner to those ecclesiastical officers, who had already so unduly and unjustly refused to admit him under his regular and legal appointment. And your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner further states, that, with a view to influence the Most Reverend Primate, to prevent him from enforcing obedience to his rescript, and to induce him to recall his fiat, whereon it was founded, his ecclesiastical officers did falsely and wrongfully declare to his Grace, that his fiat had not been carried into execution, by the making out of such rescript or commission; neither could your petitioner obtain permission to furnish evidence to the contrary, and to prove that the rescript had been regularly executed, in pursuance of his Grace's fiat, and did actually exist: but which has since been publicly avowed and acknowledged in the Arches Court of Canterbury, by the deputy registrar of that province. Unable as he thus was to obtain the metropolitan aid of the Most Reverend Primate, although acknowledging the justice of his cause, your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner Further STATES, that he did, on the opinion of the learned counsel, at that time your Majesty's solicitorgeneral, appeal to the visitors of the college of ecclesiastical judges and advocates, against the unjust principle of monopoly and exclusion, thus set up by its members, to the great injury of your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner, to the hindrance of a free administration of public justice, and consequently to the prejudice of all your Majesty's faithful subjects, and to the infringement of your Majesty's sovereign jurisdiction and authority; And that such his appeal having been accepted by the visitors, and an hearing promised thereto, he did thus, during six months, remain an appellant before the Most Reverend Primate and the noble lords, appointed by your Majesty to visit and superintend this chartered college, in a patient and loyal expectation of being at length permitted to state his grievance and his complaint, and to obtain a just and impartial hearing and decision of his case. But to your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner's still further grief and mortification, he was, at the end of six months, informed, by order of my Lord Archbishop, that "his appeal having been submitted to the parties, against whom he meant to appeal, an answer had been received from Sir William Wynne and Sir John Nicholl, by which he would see, that the matter could not be brought before the visitors." And your Majesty's petitioner was therefore dismissed from before the visitors, without having been heard by them, as had twice been promised to him by the Most Reverend Primate. And your humble and dutiful petitioner further representeth to your Majesty, that he, in consequence of such dismissal of his appeal from before the most reverend and the right honorable visitors of this chartered college, did carry his suit into your Majesty's Court of King's Bench, praying the aid of a writ of Mandamus; and was thereon informed by my Lord Chief Justice, that, however the court might regret the hardship and inconvenience sustained by your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner, still he could not, in that court, obtain the relief he humbly sued for, nor could the court at all take cognizance of his case. And your Majesty's petitioner, having received intimation that in another province, governed by the same ecclesiastical laws, and alike subject to your Majesty's royal supremacy, an hearing had in a late instance been publicly granted to a candidate for this spiritual office; and that such candidate had been allowed to plead, by his counsel, in behalf of his title and qualification, and against the exception taken thereto; FURTHER STATES, that he did respectfully present to the Most Reverend Primate a request for his Grace's metropolitan order, that he also might be thus publicly heard, and allowed to plead in behalf of his chartered academic rights, and of his due and legal qualification. And that, having, in consequence of such his application had different interviews with my Lord Archbishop, whereat he was informed, that his Grace had not yet been able to make up his mind, as to the propriety of granting such public hearing, your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner did at length receive a note from the Most Reverend Primate, informing him, that it was deemed unadvisable to comply with his application for a public hearing and decision of his case. And your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner FURTHER STATES, that, deeming it necessary to lay before your Majesty such canon or canons of the church, whereon, as alleged by the ecclesiastical officers of the Most Reverend Primate, was founded their refusal to admit your Majesty's petitioner to the exercise of that spiritual office, whereto, as being legally qualified, he had been duly and legally appointed; in order that your Majesty's royal wisdom and justice might, on a view of those prohibitory and disqualifying laws, be thus enabled to judge whether your petitioner is affected and disqualified thereby, as also how far he is entitled to a public hearing, and to plead against the exception founded thereon his regular academic qualification, and his due and legal commission, he DID RESPECTFULLY SOLICIT the Most Reverend Primate for an order, that he might be furnished either with a copy of, or a reference to such canon or canons of the church; and that to such his request your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner has received no reply. Your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner is therefore compelled to resort to the last means of redress provided by the constitution, for your Majesty's faithful subjects, when aggrieved and oppressed; and in approaching, as, under the refusal of all hearing to his just and founded complaint, he humbly and dutifully doth approach your Majesty's sacred person,—your petitioner feels himself emboldened by the acknowledged justice, and compelled by the sad necessity of his grievous case, humbly to represent to your Majesty's sovereign wisdom and justice, that, if the ecclesiastical officers of his Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury can thus, by any unfounded and frivolous pretence, exclude a person, duly and legally qualified and commissioned, from the privilege of exercising the canonical functions of an advocate in your Majesty's courts of spiritual jurisprudence; and can, by denying the existence of his commission, deprive him of all means of being heard in support thereof, and of his just, legal, and chartered rights; the privilege of thus practising and of advocating the spiritual and temporal rights of your Majesty's subjects is hereby placed under the arbitrary discretion and controul of those ecclesiastical officers, to exclude at pleasure, and to affect with pains and disabilities, whomsoever they shall think worthy. To obtain, before some competent tribunal, an hearing and a legal decision of his case, your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner has now during two years been vainly striving, and has thus during that time been prevented from exercising the only profession attaching to his rank and degree, as a doctor of civil law; from obtaining a livelihood adequate to the great expense of time, of labor, and of property incurred by the attainment of such his academic degree and qualification; and from supporting himself in a manner befitting the rank and condition he holds in the state, as also demanded thereby. And your Majesty's petitioner further humbly and dutifully representeth that, whereas the judges in these ecclesiastical courts have thus refused to obey the mandate of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and have objected to your petitioner, as being disqualified and rendered incapable of exercising the spiritual functions of this canonical office, by having formerly taken the orders of a Deacon; your Majesty's humble and dutiful petitioner is able, could he be any where heard, as sued for, to prove, in the first place, that he is duly and fully discharged from the obligations of the clerical character; and secondly, that, although he were even still a clergyman, he yet would not thereby be debarred from exercising these canonical functions; seeing that, by the canons of the church, as sanctioned by an act passed in the twenty-fifth year of King Henry the Eighth, and confirmed by the first of Queen Elizabeth, your Majesty's royal progenitors, and which canons of the church, (as laid down by the highest legal authorities,) cannot be altered, but in a spiritual convocation, and with your Majesty's royal assent,-none but a clergyman can exercise these spiritual functions; and it is only by an act of toleration and of indulgence, granted in the thirty-seventh year of the reign of King Henry the Eighth, that the laity are permitted, on condition of their being doctors of civil law lawfully create, to exercise the same, without subjecting themselves to the severe penalty of excommunication: And further, it is by the existing law of Parliament provided, that a dispensation from residence on their ecclesiastical livings shall be indulged to such of the clergy, as may be advocates in these ecclesiastical courts. Under the considerations, thus humbly and dutifully put forth to implore the benign attention of your Majesty's sovereign wisdom and justice, and in a firm and loyal reliance on your Majesty's paternal and superintending regard for the rights, privileges, and immunities, both spiritual and temporal, of your faithful and devoted people, your petitioner doth humbly look up to your Majesty for that aid and relief, he has in vain sought to obtain by the means ordinarily provided for the dispensation of spiritual and temporal justice; and doth beseech your Majesty, indulgently listening to the prayer of this his humble and dutiful petition, graciously to direct, that he may be heard, and his case be duly determined according to the law of the land and of the church. And your Majesty's humble and loyal petitioner, as in duty bound, shall ever pray. Dated London, May 23d, 1807. |