THE RITUALISTS AND THE LAW.
(TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR"] SIR,—Kindly allow me one brief reply to your argument that even granting the Purchas Judgment to be such that it ought to be, and probably will be, reversed, it nevertheless is law for the time, and consequently ought to be obeyed.
Our contention is that it not only is not the law, but that its framers know it is not the law, and set themselves to override the law because they disliked it. We say that no doubt whatever attaches to the legal meaning of the statute, and we are not thus in the position of people who know that the law is against them, and who are, therefore, agitating to have it altered, or who have discovered that a law intended to do something has by faulty drafting done something else, or the contrary. We have, be it observed, a formal ruling of the Privy Council itself, when more respectable in numbers, character, and legal attainments than it was in 1871, expressly in our favour, and the only legal question, in our minds, is what penalty has been incurred by the Purchas Judges themselves for their misconduct. There was a famous case in Ireland during the troubles at the close of the last century. A man was charged with murder, and though his supposed victim was produced alive and unhurt in Court, the jury brought in a verdict of "Guilty," from dislike of the prisoner's religion and politics. If that man had been sentenced to death and hanged by reason of that verdict, would the law have been carried out, or scandalously violated ? I need not press the parallel, as it is obvious enough.—I am, Sir, &c., RICHARD F. LITTLEDALE.
9 Red Lion Square, W.C., December 30.
[If the Ritualists intend to get Lord Hatherley and his col-
leagues impeached for gross misconduct on the Bench, we have nothing further to say. That seems to us a straightforward and manly course, though one that will not recommend itself to the judgment of the House of Lords or the English people. But if, while not taking that strong line, they only intend to defy the decision of the highest English Court because they do not like it,
we do not think their course defensible at Spectator.]
Previous page
