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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 39

The Law Applicable to Mr. Bradlaugh's Claim

The Law Applicable to Mr. Bradlaugh's Claim.

Your Committee have been furnished by Sir T. Erskine May with a list of precedents which illustrate the jurisdiction and proceedings of the House in regard to the taking of Oaths. These precedents, and others which Mr. Bradlaugh placed before your Committee as bearing on the case, will be found in the Appendix to this Report. They may generally be divided into three classes : first, cases of refusal to take the Oath; secondly, claims to make an Affirmation, instead of taking the Oath; and, thirdly, claims to omit a portion of the Oath of Abjuration. Among them there is no precedent of any Member coming to the table to take and subscribe the Oath, who has not been allowed to do so, nor of any Member coming to the table and intimating expressly, or by necessary implication, that an oath would not, as an oath, be binding on his conscience. The present case is, therefore, one of first impression.

Now there is not only a prima facie right, but it is the duty of every Member who has been duly elected to take and subscribe the Oath, or to affirm according to the Statute. No instance has been brought to the attention of your Committee in which any inquiry has been made into the moral, religious, or political opinion of the person who was desirous to take any Promissory Oath, or of any objection being made to his taking such Oath. It would be impossible to foresee the evils which might arise if a contrary practice were sanctioned. But the question remains whether, if a Member when about to take the Oath should voluntarily make statements as to the binding effect of the page 9 Oath on his conscience, it is not within the power of the House to take such statements into consideration, and determine whether such member would, if he went through the form of taking the Oath, be duly taking it within the provisions of the Statute. In the present instance, when Mr. Bradlaugh claimed under the Parliamentary Oaths Acts his right to affirm, and also stated that he had on several occasions been permitted in a Court of Justice to affirm, and had affirmed under the Evidence Amendment Acts, 1869 and 1870, he thereby in effect informed the House that on such occasions a judge of such court had been satisfied that an oath would have no binding effect upon his conscience. Your Committee did not think it right to accept this implication as conclusive without permitting Mr. Bradlaugh an opportunity of making a statement to, and giving evidence before, them. Nothing that has come before your Committee has affected or altered their views as to the effect of that which occurred when Mr. Bradlaugh claimed to affirm, as above stated.