The Sun.
London, England, 1822-07-31 00:00:00

MARRIAGE ACT AMENDMENT BILL.

FOR -71`11E SUN.

TO THE RIGHT HON. THE EARL OF ELDON,
LORD HIGH CHANCELLOR OF ENGLAND, &C. &C.
LETTER 11.
MY LORD--I shall now proceed to make
some remarks upon the. Bth Section of the Bill,
which provides for the manner in which Licences
of Marriage are to be granted from and after the
Ist September next. It has always been held
impolitic and dangerous to throw any unnecessary
obstacles in the way of marriage, and every one
is aware that the stamp duties and expence
already attendant on obtaining a licence are so
heavy as to render this description of legal in-
strument not within the reach of all classes of
society. Perhaps it may be said it was never in-
tended that these dispensations should extend to
all ; I am not prepared to combat the question,
but I will say it would be extremely difficult
and invidious to draw a proper distinction. I beg,
my Lord, to be distinctly understood as offering
no opinion on the policy or impolicy of marriage
by licence in general ; all I wish to convey is,
that so long as such marriage is recognised by
law, it ought to be put upon as moderate and
cheap a footing as possible, with respect to the
public ; otherwise the objectionable principle
will be extended, of having,one law for the rich,
and another for the poor.
It is well known that hitherto, in cases where
both parties have been alleged to have attained
twenty-one years of age, it has beeh sufficient for
the party seeking the licence to make affidavit of
his own age, and his belief as to the age of his
intended partner. The new Act requires each
party to swear as to his or her age, and as to his
or her belief of the age of the other party.* In
addition to these affidavits, copies of the regis-
ters of the baptisms of the parties are to be pro-
duced, and their authenticity established by
the affidavit of a person who has examined
such copies with the original registers. Now,'
my Lord, I cannot help thinking that the affi-
davit of the Lady might have been dispensed
with ; I may be wrong—probably am—but to
me there is an appearance of absolute indelicacy
in the proceeding. A young Lady on the eve of
forming the most interesting and delicate con-
nection that can be conceived, is to be hurried
into the presence of an official person, to do what ?
why (inter din) to swear that she believes her in-
tended husband to be of, age ! The provision
was probably intended to guard against fraud in
cases of minority; but in such cases, I fancy it
will be found, on inquiry, that the female has
generally been the party injured ; it has not
very frequently happened that a man of full age
has been entrapped by a minor. Of what use, I
ask, is it for a female to be sworn as to her belief
with respect to the age of her intended hus-
band ? She at best can only swear as to her be-
lief—according to what he has told her—and by
being dragged into publicity in the way required
by the Act, she will, in the event of any de-
ception on tile part of her intended husband,
or of any undue ascendancy he may have gained
over her mind, only render more certain that con-
fiscation of property which the 10th Section of the
Bill will produce, and upon which I shall here-
after observe; at all events, in cases of majo-
rity, where Registers are to he consulted, this
unpleasant proceeding, as far as the female is
concerned, might be dispensed with.
With respect, my Lord, to the production of
the copies of Registers at the time of granting
the- licence, I am fully convinced that the abso-
lute impracticability of doing this in some cases,
and the great trouble and inconvenience in all,
have not been sufficiently considered. The Act
provides, that no licence shall be granted (after
Ist September next), where both or either of the
parties is or are alleged to be of age, until there
shall be produced to the person from whom the
licence shall be required, an extract or extracts
from the register of the baptism of such par-
ties or party so alleged to be twenty-one,
such extract or extracts to be proved on
oath by some other person or persons, to
be a true extract, &c. Now really, my Lord,
allow me to direct your attention for a moment
to the extreme inconvenience and (under some
circumstances) absolute impracticability of all
this. We will reduce the Act to practice, and
suppose a party applying for a license to a Cle-
rical Surrogate in a provincial town or village.
The applicant has perhaps travelled 100 or more
miles to marry a person resident near the town
or village. The marriage arrangements for pro-
bably the very next day are all completed, but
an insurmountable barrier is at once opposed to
the grant of the License. He must obtain a copy
of his baptism from a distance, and the affidavit
of a friend to prove it a true copy, before any
further proceedings can take place; added to
these inconvenient circumstances, the case will
not unfrequently happen that no Register can be
found : then, according to the Act, a more cir-
cuitous method must he pursued ; and in cases
where a conscientious dissent from the Church of
England has occasioned baptism to be performed
out of the pale of that Church, arid deferred it
until the recipient has arrived at the age of matu-
rity—how are the Provisions of the Act to be
satisfied ? Here is a piece of partial Legislation
truly ! parties, merely on account of their con-
scientious religious opinions, will be restrained
from marrying by License ! My Lord, the
framers of the Bill appear to have been entirely
ignorant of the manner in which Licenses are ob-
tained in general.—They are usually procured
from the Clergy (Surrogates to the different Or-
dinaries) throughout the country ; and, in nume-
rous instances, parties have to come many miles
to obtain them. As the law stood before the
passing of the Act of Monday sen'night, the parties
seldom went away from the Surrogate without
having obtained their object—without taking
home the License in the pocket ; and it is well
known, the application for the License is an act
generally deferred until almost the moment of
the solemnization of the nuptials. Now, what

11" The Act provides that " if a licence shall be required for
the Marriage of Parties, both or either of whom shall be alleged
to be of the age of twenty-one years, such parties shall respec-
tively make oath that they are respectively, and that each of
them believes the other to be, of the full age of twenty-one years
or upwards !" Supposing. only one of the parties are alleged to
be 21, how can this provision be complied with ?