In order to understand this matter, we must know precisely what is meant by judicial decisions, to which it is said, appeals and complaints, or appeals alone, are confined. There is a good deal of confusion and error often occasioned by the mere designation of our ecclesiastical bodies as courts or judicatories. They are so called when not sitting in judicial capacity. We find lawyers much troubled to know what we mean by courts; and disposed to run analogies between the different civil tribunals and those found in our Church. This has been a fruitful source of mistakes as to the nature of our form of government.

If our system and nomenclature trouble the lawyers, it is no less true that the lawyers trouble us. They often bring with them into ecclesiastical bodies modes of thinking and reasoning borrowed from their previous pursuits, which are entirely inappropriate to our system. Our good brother, Winchester, will excuse our saying this is precisely his difficulty. His whole printed speech on the subject before us, is distinguished by this lawyer-like kind of reasoning; a strenuous insisting on the precise legal sense of terms, and thence deriving a rule of construction which makes the constitution speak a language which it was never intended to speak.

Our courts are bodies sui generis; they include within themselves legislative, executive and judicial powers. Yet this division is in a great measure arbitrary. These several powers are but different modes of exercising the general governing authority in the Church; and it is often very difficult to say whether a particular act should be placed under the one or the other of these heads. Still the classification, though not so definite as might be desired, is useful. To the exercise of legislative powers are referred the numerous rules which constitute our Form of Government, which were enacted in a certain prescribed way. To the same head belongs the various standing rules, which, though they form no part of the constitution, are of force until properly repealed; such, for example, as the rules which regulate the reception of foreign ministers, &c. The head of executive powers is the most comprehensive of all, as to it belongs almost every act, except such as concern the exercise of discipline, which is designed to carry into effect the various provisions of our complicated system. Hence the examination, the licensing, ordaining, installing, dismissing ministers; the erection, division, and dissolution of churches, presbyteries and synods, are all executive acts. On the other hand, “the judicial power of the Church,” says Principal Hill, of Scotland, “appears in the infliction or removal of those censures which belong to a spiritual society.” This passage has been quoted as defining the nature of those acts from which alone complaints and appeals can properly be taken. The class of acts contemplated, therefore, is that which concerns the infliction or removal of ecclesiastical censures. That this is a correct statement of the case, further appears from the nature of the arguments by which this doctrine is sustained. These arguments are derived from the words cause, trial, sentence, parties, &c., which occur in the chapter which treats of appeals and complaints, and which, it is said, determine the nature of the cases from which an appeal may lie, or against which a complaint may be made.

The definition given above of judicial acts, viz: that they are such as relate to the infliction or removal of ecclesiastical censures, is, however, far from being complete. A Church court often sits in a judicial capacity, without any reference either to the infliction or removal of censure. Take the case before the last Assembly. The Synod of Virginia decided that an appeal could lie in cases not judicial. Mr. A. D. Metcalf, and others complain of this decision. The matter comes before the Assembly. That body, being duly warned by the moderator that it is about to sit in its judicial capacity, hears what the synod has to say in defence of its decision, and what the complain ants had to say against it, and then gave their judgment. The Assembly acted judicially; it sat in judgment on the decision of a lower court. Yet it neither inflicted nor removed any ecclesiastical censure. The Synod of Virginia was no more censured by having its decision reversed, than a district court of the United States is censured when the supreme court reverses its opinion on a point of law. There are, therefore, a multitude of cases in which our courts act judicially, which are not judicial cases, in the sense of the above-cited definition; cases in which there is no offence, no offender, no testimony, and no trial in the ordinary sense of the terms. Besides, a case which is properly executive in one stage, may become judicial in another stage of its progress. Or to speak more correctly, any executive act of a lower court may be made the subject of judicial examination in a higher one. Thus, for example, when the Second Presbytery of Philadelphia, as organized by the Assembly, divided the Fifth Presbyterian Church in that city, contrary to the wishes of the majority of the people, Thomas Bradford, and others of the aggrieved party, brought the matter before the Assembly of 1835.

There the case was regularly adjudicated; both parties were heard, and the decision was reversed. This new doctrine, therefore, rests upon a very unstable basis. It is founded on an imperfect classification of the acts of our judicatories; and assumes that the judicial function has reference to the mere infliction or removal of censures.

Let us examine the nature of the arguments which have been adduced in support of this new doctrine. Our constitution says, “That every kind of decision which is formed in any Church judicatory, except the highest, is subject to the review of a superior judicatory, and may be carried up in one or the other of the four following ways: 1. General review and control; 2. Reference; 3. Appeal; and 4. Complaint.” The question is, what is the meaning of this plain declaration? It does not mean, because it does not say, that every individual decision, but every kind of decision may be carried up in either of these four ways. These different forms of redress contemplate different circumstances, and are not all available in every particular case. A reference, for example, must be made by the body itself, and not by an individual member; but the body may refer any kind of case. An appeal supposes an aggrieved party, but he may appeal from any kind of decision which directly affects himself. A complaint supposes some kind of impropriety in the act complained of, but it may be entered against any kind of act alleged to be improper. So that any kind of decision may be regularly brought up in each of the several ways specified above. That this is the true meaning of this article, might be inferred with certainty from the fact that it has always been so understood and acted upon; and that it is almost a literal transcript of the Scottish rule on the same subject, which has always been interpreted and applied in the same way. We are now told, however, that this is not its meaning; that we must lay particular stress on the word or. ‘Every kind of decision may be carried up in one or the other of the four following ways;’ one kind in one way and another kind in another way. In the Scotch rule, however, whence ours was taken, there is no or. Principal Hill gives it thus: “Every ecclesiastical business that is transacted in any Church judicatory is subject to the review of its ecclesiastical superiors, and may be brought before the court immediately above in four different ways, by review, by reference, by appeal, and by complaint.” If, therefore, the emendators of our book had left out the little word, and said; “Every kind of decision may be carried up in four different ways, review, reference, appeal and complaint;” there would have been an end of the matter; or rather, there never could have been a beginning to the new doctrine. Yet who can doubt that this is precisely what they meant to say, who compares the two rules, and remembers, that our practice, both before and since the emendation, was precisely, as far as the point now in debate is concerned, the same as that of the Scotch Church?

The main dependence of the advocates of the new doctrine, is upon the language employed in directing how an appeal is to be prosecuted. It is argued that where there has been no trial, strictly speaking, in the court below, there can be no appeal, because an appeal, is the removal of a cause already decided, from the inferior to the superior judicatory; secondly, because it is said that all persons who have submitted to a trial have a right to appeal; thirdly, because the grounds of appeal are stated to be such as partiality, the refusal of testimony, haste or injustice in the decision; fourthly, because the book directs that, in hearing an appeal, the following steps are to be taken, viz., to read the sentence, then the reasons, then the records including the testimony, then to hear first the original parties, and afterwards the members of the inferior judicatory. If this argument is valid in relation to appeals, it is no less so in its application to complaints. For if an appeal is the removal of a cause already decided, so a complaint is “another method by which a cause decided in an inferior judicatory may be carried before a superior.” The grounds of complaint contemplate “parties at the bar,” injustice of the judgment, &c. The steps also in the prosecution of a complaint are substantially the same as in case of appeal; the sentence is to be read, then the reasons, then the records including the testimony, then the parties are to be heard, &c., &c. The only difference between these modes of redress are the following. First, a complaint does not arrest the operation of a decision against which it is entered; and, secondly, an appeal can be made only by an aggrieved party; whereas a complaint can be made by any member of the court who disapproves of the decision. They do not differ at all as to the kind of decisions against which they are available. The same mode of arguing is equally applicable to the case of references. For a reference is defined to be a judicial representation of a case not yet decided. The superior judicatory, it is said, may remit the cause referred; and the inferior court is directed, in cases of reference, to send up all the testimony, in order that the higher court may consider and decide the case. It is evident, therefore, that we cannot, without the greatest inconsistency, stop half way in this matter. If the use of the words cause, parties, testimony, sentence, &c., under the head of appeals, shows that they must be confined to judicial cases; it proves the same with regard to complaints and references; and our whole system of government is overturned.

The fallacy of the above method of reasoning will appear from the following remarks. In the first place, these technical terms are to be understood, not according to their use in civil courts, but according to our own ecclesiastical usage. Our bodies are called courts; their decisions are called judgments; the matters brought before them are called cases. Are we to infer from this, as has been done by the New School lawyers and brethren, that they have nothing but judicial powers; that they are mere bodies for the administration of justice? The constitution says, indeed, that they are charged with the government of the churches, yet as civil courts have nothing to do with governing, it is insisted upon that ours can have nothing to do with it. This arguing from technical terms, and giving them a sense foreign to the peculiar nature of our ecclesiastical system, can produce nothing but confusion and embarrassment.

In the second place, our rules were drawn up with special reference to that class of cases which is of most frequent occurrence, and hence the language employed is adapted to such cases. Are we to infer, however, from the fact that the book directs the inferior judicatory, in cases of reference, to send up the testimony, that no case can be referred but one in which there is testimony to be presented? Yet this is the argument upon which so much stress is laid. It is, that because the rules, which relate to appeals, direct that the sentence should be read, and the testimony produced, there can be no appeal where there has not been a judicial sentence, and where there is no testimony. This is exactly the argument made on the floor of the Assembly in 1837 by Dr. Beman, in opposition to the motion to cite certain synods to answer for their irregularities. He insisted that the Assembly should look at the book and abide by it to the letter. But to what part of the constitution did he refer the house? Not to that which contains the radical principles of our system, which enjoins on the higher courts to take effectual care that the constitution is observed, but to the rules of detail. And sure enough, as might have been expected, these rules do contemplate some specific erroneous decision, and consequently direct that the delinquent judicatory should be cited to show what it had done “in the case in question,” after which the whole case was to be remitted to the said judicatory to be disposed of in a constitutional manner. It was hence argued that although the power of calling inferior courts to the bar, and seeing that they conformed to the constitution, was clearly recognized, yet the Church had by these rules of detail, effectually tied her own hands. A specific irregular act might be called up, and sent back for correction, but the synods themselves were beyond the reach of the Assembly. They might cherish what disorders they pleased; recognize what churches or presbyteries they pleased, trample on the constitution as they pleased, the Assembly could do nothing but correct specific acts in detail. This argument is just as good as that which is now urged about appeals or complaints. The argument is, that the rules of process limit the exercise of the right to those particular cases, in which every one of the rules can be applied.

In the third place it is a fallacy running through this argument that there can be no judicial investigation of anything but a judicial act. An appeal or complaint is indeed a judicial process. Hence it is referred to the judicial committee; and the members of the court are warned, when it comes on for decision, that they are about to sit in their judicial capacity. This, however, proves nothing as to the nature of the act appealed from. The higher court is called to sit in judgment on the constitutionality, wisdom, or justice of a particular act of the court below; it matters not whether that act itself were judicial or executive. If anybody was injured by it, he has a right to appeal from it, and have his brethren judge of its propriety. That our constitution contemplated such appeals is evident from the fact that it provides that an appeal shall suspend the operation of the decision appealed from, except it be a sentence of suspension, excommunication, or deposition. This is just as much as to say, except in judicial cases; for suspension, excommunication, and deposition are the only sentences, worth naming, which our courts are competent to pass. If then these are excepted from arrest in their operation by an appeal, all are excepted, unless an appeal may lie from other than strictly judicial decisions. It is evident, therefore, that such decisions form but one class of those acts from which an appeal can be taken.

Finally, if it can be shown that all the requisitions of the book may be fully complied with in cases of appeals from executive acts, then there is an end of the argument; as the whole argument rests on the supposed incompatibility of those rules with such appeals. Let us take for illustration either of the appeals presented in 1835 by Thomas Bradford and others. The presbytery had divided the Fifth Church of Philadelphia against its will, erecting two new churches, and giving a name to neither. The church felt itself aggrieved; it believed that not only the spiritual interests of the congregation, but the title to the property was injuriously affected by the decision. They had therefore the right not only to have it reviewed, but arrested. They accordingly appealed. The papers were referred to the judicial committee, and found to be in order. When the case was to be tried, the Assembly was duly warned that it was about to sit in a judicial capacity, to decide on the unconstitutionality and justice of that act of the presbytery. The first step was to read the sentence, or decision appealed from; the second to read the reasons of the appeal. The third to read the record in the case, including the testimony. The testimony in this case was all the evidence presented to the presbytery to prove the opposition of the church to the division. Fourth step was to hear the original parties. The only parties in the case were the presbytery who had done the wrong and the church that suffered it. They were accordingly heard. The fifth step, according to the book, would be to hear the members of the inferior judicatory. This direction was complied with in taking the fourth step, the presbytery being one of the parties. Thus every direction of the book was complied with, in this, as in a hundred similar cases of appeal from executive acts. It would be mere trifling to say that the directions were not all followed, because there were not two original parties distinct from the presbytery. There never are such parties, even in judicial cases, when the ground of prosecution is common fame. Besides, had this appeal been carried in the first instance to the synod, and there decided against the appellants, then the original parties in this case would have been the church and the presbytery, and the members of the synod, the members of the inferior judicatory whom the book directs to be heard in the fifth step of the trial. Thus the whole rule would have been complied with to the letter.* There is, therefore, no foundation in our constitution for this new doctrine. Every letter of the rules may be, and has been fully complied with in a multitude of cases, where the decision appealed from was merely an executive act.

It may be said, however, that it is very desirable to have appeals confined if possible to strictly judicial cases; that it is unreasonable that the executive acts of a body should be arrested by any dissatisfied member. This objection, however, overlooks the fact that no merely dissatisfied member has a right to appeal. That remedy is expressly confined to a person or persons directly affected by a decision. If a minister is tried before his presbytery for an offence and condemned, if he does not choose to appeal, no dissatisfied member can do it. And if he is acquitted, no member of the court, however he may disapprove of the decision, can appeal; his remedy is to complain. But if a presbytery dismiss a pastor, against his will, from his charge, as he is directly affected by the act, he may appeal from it; or if they divide a church, the church may appeal. The right of appeal is limited, therefore, not to a particular class of decisions, but to a particular class of persons, viz.: to those who are injuriously affected by the decision.

We have, however, acted long enough upon the defensive. We shall proceed to show that this new doctrine, especially if applied to complaints as well as appeals, (and we have seen that the two cannot in this matter be consistently separated,) is subversive of the fundamental principles of Presbyterianism, and inconsistent with the uniform practice of the Church. It is a radical principle of our system “that a larger part of the Church, or a representation of it, should govern a smaller, or determine matters of controversy which arise therein.” It is in virtue of this principle that every man who is aggrieved or injured by a decision of a lower court has the right to seek redress in a higher. He has the right to bring the matter up himself, and is not dependent on the majority of the body, whether it shall come up or not. It is further a fundamental principle of our system that any thing which has been unconstitutionally or injuriously done in a lower court, whether it affect an individual or not, may be corrected by a higher court. This is of the essence of Presbyterianism. It is involved in the declaration that the Church is to be governed not only by congregational and presbyterial, but also by synodical assemblies; and more expressly in the declaration that synods have authority “to redress whatever has been done by presbyteries contrary to order.” It is evident that any interpretation of words and phrases occurring in rules regulating details in the administration of discipline, which comes into conflict with these radical principles of our system, must be rejected as false and unwarranted. The new doctrine is liable to this fatal objection. It effectually prevents the exercise of control on the part of the higher courts, and renders the lower judicatories independent as to all their executive acts, which includes the larger and perhaps most important part of their proceedings. A presbytery may trample on the constitution with impunity; it may admit congregationalists to sit as ruling elders; it may receive ministers without requiring them to adopt our standards; it may dismiss a pastor against his own will and that of his people; it may, for party purposes, divide a congregation contrary to its wishes, or instal a pastor over them in spite of their remonstrances; and for these and a multitude of similar cases there is no redress, if the right to complain and appeal is to be confined to judicial cases. The review of records affords no remedy at all in nine out of ten of such instances. The records contain a bare statement of the facts, that such a man was received, such a pastor dismissed, such an one installed, or such a congregation divided, but whether these acts were constitutionally performed, they give no means of judging. They afford, therefore, nothing on which the higher court can lay hold. Besides, by withholding their records, it would be in the power of the inferior judicatory to prevent all knowledge of their irregularities, even in those few cases in which the Minutes might disclose them.

It may be said that fama clamosa affords ground for calling the offending judicatory to an account. But, in the first place, this is a remedy which applies only in extreme cases. And, in the second, this would be doing by indirection what ought to be done decently and in order. A minority grieved by the unconstitutional or injurious acts of the majority, not having the right to make an orderly representation of the case to the higher court, is driven to make a clamour about it, in order to attract their attention. This surely is not Presbyterianism. And besides, the citation and trial of judicatories on the ground of common fame, is the most invidious, the most cumbrous, and the least effectual of all methods for the correction of abuses. If, therefore, the right of appeal and complaint be taken away, except in judicial cases, there is no remedy for the largest and most important class of unconstitutional or unjust acts of ecclesiastical bodies. Our New School brethren have never brought forward a principle more completely subversive of Presbyterian government than the new doctrine, in its full extent, would certainly be. It would effectually prevent the legitimate operation of our system; it would place the constitution, order, and purity of the Church at the mercy of any one presbytery, and leave minorities completely in the hands of majorities.

It may be said that these remarks apply only to that form of the new doctrine which excludes complaints, no less than appeals, in all except judicial cases. We have already admitted that the evil is far less sweeping, if the right of complaining against unconstitutional or injurious executive acts be allowed to remain. But the right of appeal is no less sacred than that of complaint. The constitution places them on the same ground, as far as the present subject of debate is concerned. The Assembly has no more authority to take away the one, than it has to take away the other. The argument which has been applied to justify the denial of the right to appeal, except in judicial cases, applies in all its force to complaints. It is proper, therefore, to show what would be the effect of the full assertion of the new doctrine. Besides, the evil arising from denying the right of appeal where the constitution allows it, is no less real and grievous, though less extensive than when the denial is extended to complaints. A man dismissed from his charge, a congregation divided, or over whom a pastor has been installed against its consent, have a right not merely to have these acts reviewed, but their operation arrested. And it is often of the last importance that the effect of the decision should be suspended until a final determination can be had. The reversal of a presbyterial decision to divide a congregation, after it had actually been organized for nearly a year, into two parts, would often aggravate instead of healing the difficulty. And so in a multitude of other cases, of which abundant examples might be cited from the Minutes. This new doctrine, therefore, is inconsistent with the radical principles of Presbyterianism, and its full operation effectually subverts our whole form of government; and even in its restricted application to appeals, it is in direct conflict with the constitutional rights of aggrieved parties, and productive of much injustice and hardship.

This doctrine is at variance also with the undeviating practice of our own and all other Presbyterian Churches. This of itself is a fatal objection to any new doctrine. The fact that we have been going on in accordance with the usage of all other Presbyterian bodies, for a hundred and twenty years, interpreting and administering our constitution in a certain way, is answer enough to any man who comes forward with a new doctrine, extracted by legal subtlety from the technicalities of the constitution. The words of our book have the sense which they were intended to bear; and they were intended to bear the sense in which its authors and administrators have ever understood and applied them. If we depart from this rule of construction we might as well have no constitution at all. Stability is one of the primary requisites of good government. And hence it is a great evil that any long-established principle should be unsettled by some novel interpretation of our fundamental laws. That the practice of our Church has been uniform on this subject, is admitted. It is maintained, however, that this usage, as far as concerns the period anterior to the revision of the constitution in 1821, is of no authority, and that the time which has since elapsed is too short to give to usage any force in opposition to what is supposed to be the sense of the constitution. This principle is, no doubt, correct. Usage is not of authority in opposition to a written constitution. But it is of the greatest authority in a question of interpretation. It cannot be rightfully disregarded, unless the constitution be clearly in opposition to the usage. We have already seen that there is no such opposition in the present case; that the uniform practice of the Church is in harmony with our constitutional rules. This being the case, the argument from usage is of course conclusive.

The assumption that the amendments adopted in 1821 were designed to abrogate the old common law of the Church is a very extraordinary one. This common law had grown up in this country and in Scotland, under the brief and aphoristic statements of Presbyterian principles contained in the Westminster Directory. These statements were incorporated in the constitution of 1788, and are retained in the amended constitution of 1821. If from that time they were to be differently understood, it is strange that they were not so modified as to give some intimation of the fact. But how is it known that these amendments were intended to abrogate the old common law of the Church? The authors of the amendments declare, some in one way and some in another, that they had no such intention The Church certainly intended no such change, because it went on acting under the amended constitution precisely as it had acted before. It was not until fifteen years after the amendments were made, that any one discovered what they were intended to accomplish. It is evident that such a discovery cannot be entitled to much consideration.

To show how uniform has been the usage of our Church on this subject, even since 1821, we shall proceed to cite some of the examples to be found on our Minutes; and for reasons already stated, we shall not confine these examples to cases of appeals. In 1822, the Assembly entertained and decided an appeal from the Synod of Ohio, relating to the validity of the election of certain elders. Minutes, p. 18 and 21. In 1827, Dr. Green and others presented a complaint against a decision of the Synod of Philadelphia, which turned on the question, Whether the same person could properly hold the office of ruling elder in two churches at the same time? The decision of the synod was affirmed, p. 117. Two other complaints of a similar character were decided the same year, p. 125, 130, and 132. In 1828, an appeal was received from some of the pew-holders of the first Church in Troy, against a decision of the Synod of Albany, p. 228; and a complaint from the Presbytery of Philadelphia against the Presbytery of Columbia, relating to the licensure of Mr. Shaffer, p. 234. In 1829, two complaints were received against decisions which were not judicial. In 1830, an appeal was presented from the Church in Bergen from a decision of the Synod of Genesee, which, however, was dismissed for want of a date and other irregularities in the mode of its prosecution. p. 9 and 17. In 1831, the complaint of the minority of the Presbytery of Philadelphia, in the case of Mr. Barnes, was presented; and in 1832, a complaint against a decision of the Synod of Virginia relating to called meetings of synod, p. 315. In 1832, there appear to have been five, if not six, complaints of the same character presented to the Assembly, p. 476. In 1834, the Assembly received and decided the appeal of the Second Presbytery of Philadelphia against the decision of the synod, before referred to. The same year the Synod of Philadelphia referred for adjudication the appeal and complaint of the Fifth Church of Philadelphia relative to the call of Dr. Beman, p. 8. In 1835, the Assembly received and decided the appeal of Thomas Bradford and others from a decision of the Second Presbytery dividing their church, p. 20; and also an appeal and complaint of Thomas Bradford and others relating to the installation of Mr. Duffield, when the acts of the presbytery in relation thereto were reversed, p. 33. Immediately under the record of this latter decision we find the following minute, viz.: “The Assembly took up the report of the committee on the records of the Synod of Philadelphia, and the records were approved with the following exception, viz.: In regard to the doctrine of the said Synod concerning appeals, complaints and protests, and the application of this doctrine, about which the Assembly express no opinion.” There was the less necessity for expressing an opinion in words, as they had just expressed one so intelligibly, by acting in direct opposition to that doctrine. In 1836, we find several examples of the same kind, as, for instance, the appeal and complaint of the Second Presbytery against the Synod of Philadelphia for dissolving them as a presbytery, p. 273. In 1837, there was an appeal presented by Rev. A. G. Morss and others, of the congregation of Frankford, which does not appear to have related to a judicial decision, p. 417 and 480. In 1838, there was an unusual number of such complaints and appeals; for example, a complaint by the Presbytery of Wilmington; a protest and complaint by R. J. Breckinridge and others against the Synod of Philadelphia for their decision relating to the Third Presbytery of Philadelphia; an appeal and complaint of J. Campbell and others against a decision of the Synod of New Jersey; an appeal and complaint of certain persons claiming to be the Church of St. Charles, against a decision of the Synod of Missouri, that they were not the said church; which appeal was sustained, and the proceedings of the synod in the case were set aside. See pages 11, 13, 14, 15, 16, 19, 23, and 39 of the Minutes.

There is not then, upon our Minutes, a single case of an appeal or complaint, which was rejected on the ground that it did not refer to a judicial sentence. We have been going on for a hundred and twenty years entertaining such appeals without any one dreaming of their being irregular. This has been done as freely since, as before, the revision of the constitution, by those who proposed and by those who adopted the amendments. If after all this a new and opposite doctrine is to be introduced, there never can be any stability or security with regard to any principle of Presbyterian Church government. If precedents so long continued, so numerous, so highly sanctioned, are to be set aside, the Church will demand something more than verbal criticism, or ingenious inferences from collated passages. Nothing short of a plain and intelligible denial of the right to complain of oppressive and unconstitutional acts; or to appeal from unrighteous decisions, though they may not be judicial, will induce Presbyterians to forego a privilege which they have enjoyed from the very foundation of their Church. No one pretends that there is any such denial to be found in our amended constitution. The prohibition is a mere inference from the technicalities of the rules of process. We think, however, that we have shown that there is no such opposition between our rules of process and the radical principles of our system; that every one of those rules may be observed to the very letter, in cases of appeal or complaint against executive acts, and consequently that there is no foundation in the constitution for this new doctrine. If it is to be applied to appeals, we see not how any one can fail to apply it to complaints and references, and if so applied, all must acknowledge that our system of government would be completely overturned. The right of appeal is already restricted within very narrow limits. It is not the privilege of any member of the court. It belongs exclusively to an aggrieved party; to those whose character or interests are immediately concerned in the decision. And to all such it is a right guaranteed by the constitution and by the undeviating practice of the Church.

b. Review of a Decision that Appeals cannot lie except in Judicial cases

[Book of Discipline, chap. vii., par. ii., and sec. iii., par. ii.—Digest of 1873, p. 574.]

This was an appeal from the decision of the synod refusing to entertain Dr. Skinner’s appeal from the decision of the presbytery, dissolving his pastoral relations to the Church in Lexington. After hearing the parties, viz., Dr. Skinner and the commissioners of the synod, the vote was taken by calling the roll, for sustaining the appeal 42; for not sustaining 59. So the appeal was not sustained.

The accounts of the debate on this case published in the papers, are so brief, as to leave us at a loss as to the grounds of this decision. In one paper (New York Observer, June 10th), it is said, the synod “refused to entertain the appeal, as the presbytery had acted on his own request, and that of the people” in dissolving the pastoral relation between Dr. Skinner and the Lexington Church. If this were the ground of the synod’s action, then the decision of the Assembly does nothing more than sanction the correctness of their judgment. It involves no constitutional principle. But in other places it is stated that the synod refused to entertain the appeal in question, because the decision of the presbytery was an executive act, and not a judicial sentence. If this was the ground assumed by the synod, then the action of the Assembly would seem to sanction the principle that no appeal can lie except in strictly judicial cases. We presume this is the correct statement of the case, both from the drift of the reports in the newspapers, and from the fact that the former reason, though a very good one for refusing to sustain Dr. Skinner’s appeal from the action of his Presbytery, was no reason for refusing to entertain it.

Though this is so, we are slow to believe that the Assembly deliberately intended to sanction the doctrine that appeals are a remedy confined to strictly judicial cases. A member of the house informs us that several members who voted with the majority, told him that the only point they intended to decide by their vote was, that Dr. Skinner ought not to be restored to his relation as pastor of the Lexington Church, that they did not mean to sanction the general principle as to appeals. We see also in the list of those who voted to sustain the action of the synod, the names of brethren who we know do not hold, unless their opinions have been suddenly changed, the doctrine that appeals can lie only in judicial cases. We trust that this decision, made under such circumstances, may not be pleaded as authority for that doctrine. As this is a subject which has been repeatedly discussed in this journal, we shall not trouble our readers with any extended argument on it now. We beg leave merely to submit the following remarks:

It must be allowed to be a great evil when the action of the Assembly is inconstant and contradictory on important constitutional principles. Such inconsistency not only tends of necessity to impair confidence, but it is in itself a very serious evil. All courts are governed, and should, to a great extent, be governed by precedent. Long-established usage has the authority of law. People have the right to depend upon it. It works manifest injustice, when a party avails himself of a remedy, which a court for years and generations has recognized as appropriate, and he is suddenly and unexpectedly, by a new construction of the constitution, refused a hearing because he has put his case in a wrong form. It is an undoubted fact, that the highest judicatory of our Church, in accordance with the uniform usage of other Presbyterian Churches, has for a hundred years uniformly recognized the right of appeal in an aggrieved party, in any case, whether judicial or executive. There is, as far as we know or believe, but one solitary decision of the Assembly to the contrary, and that preceded and followed by a multitude of cases of an opposite character. It is still more humiliating and injurious when we see men who one year or in one judicatory, take ground that an appellant shall not be heard unless the case be strictly judicial, and in the following year and on other occasions quietly entertain such appeals without a whisper of disapprobation. The only way to avoid these evils, to maintain the dignity and authority of the Assembly, and to deal justly with those who appear at its bar, is to adhere rigidly to the established interpretation of the constitution.

But if this new construction is against all precedent, it is, as it seems to us, no less clearly against the express language and obvious intent of the constitution. “Every kind of decision,” it is said, “which is formed in any Church judicatory, except the highest, is subject to the review of a superior judicatory, and may be carried before it in one or the other of the four following ways.” This cannot mean, that one kind of decisions can be carried up in one way, and another kind in another; for it is admitted that every kind may be brought up by review of records, by reference, and by complaint; and, therefore, the passage must mean that the several remedies enumerated, are applicable to any and every kind of error or injustice. But in this enumeration appeals are included, and therefore as any kind of case can be carried up by review, reference, or complaint, so it can be by appeal. This is the plain meaning of the passage as it has ever been understood and acted upon.

In the third section of that chapter it is said, “An appeal is the removal of a cause already decided, from an inferior to a superior judicatory, by a party aggrieved.” In the language of our Book a cause is a case, an act or decision of a court, about which diversity of opinion may exist, or in which different interests may be involved. Thus it is said in the next section, “Another method by which a cause which has been decided by an inferior judicatory may be carried before a superior, is by complaint.” Here a cause is any decision. This is admitted, for no one contends that complaints are limited to judicial matters. As then any decision or cause may be carried up by complaint, so also by appeal.

Again it is said, “The necessary operation of an appeal is, to suspend all further proceedings on the ground of the sentence appealed from. But if a sentence of suspension, or excommunication from Church privileges, or of deposition from office be the sentence appealed from, it shall be considered as in force until the appeal shall be issued.” The plain meaning of this is, that an appeal suspends the operation of the decision appealed from, except in judicial cases. Suspension, excommunication and deposition are all the judicial sentences known to our constitution, unless mere admonition be added, which last, from its nature, does not admit of being suspended, for the vote to admonish is the admonition itself. Here then the constitution expressly and most justly provides that an appeal suspends the operation of a decision, except in judicial cases, and therefore by necessary implication, admits that there are other than judicial sentences, from which an appeal may properly be taken.

Our book makes two and only two distinctions as to complaints and appeals. The one relates to the persons entitled to avail themselves of these remedies, the other to their operation. Any one can complain of the decision of a church court who thinks that decision is unconstitutional or injurious. It is the right of any member of the judicatory or of the Church, to see that an evil, as he deems it, may be examined into and redressed. But no one can appeal but “an aggrieved party.” If he does not see fit to arrest the operation of the decision, no other person has the right to interfere and prevent the will of the judicatory taking effect. An appeal, therefore, differs from a complaint, in being a remedy confined to those who consider themselves aggrieved or injured by the decision of the lower court. It differs also from a complaint inasmuch as the latter does not suspend the operation of the decision complained of. When however our book says, That “every kind of decision” can be carried up from a lower to a higher court, by appeal, it does not mean every decision, but what it says, “every kind of decision,” because the interests of parties may be most deeply implicated by every kind of act of a Church court, executive, legislative, or judicial. Appeals, from their nature, are confined to cases of real or supposed grievance.

This suggests the main reason after all for insisting on this right of appeal. It is essential to our system. Neither ministers or church members will ever submit to give it up, and put themselves entirely in the power of a session or presbytery. The denial of the right is an arbitrary stretch of power. There are innumerable cases in which a complaint would afford no redress. The evil is consummated before the remedy can be applied. Suppose, for example, a presbytery should decide that a congregation should be divided, and the people, or a portion of them, feel aggrieved by the decision, what good would it do them to complain? The sentence would take effect; two churches would be constituted and organized, and might both have pastors, before the synod could hear the complaint. It would be a mockery to tell such people, after the evil was all done, they might complain about it. They have no redress, unless by appeal they can arrest the decision, until the higher courts have decided on its wisdom or justice. The same remarks apply to other cases. A presbytery may dissolve the pastoral relation between a pastor and his people; the people may consider themselves deeply aggrieved. If they cannot appeal there is no remedy. Their pastor is gone, installed over another church, before their complaint comes to be heard. Or the pastor may be the aggrieved party, but if he can only complain, his place may be supplied by another pastor, before a final decision is had on the question whether he is to be removed or not. How unreasonable and unjust is this. A sentence is allowed to take full effect, before the competent authorities have decided whether it shall have any effect at all.

We are persuaded the churches will never give up the right of appeal; the right of arresting the operation of decisions which they regard as disastrous or unjust, until the court of the last resort has given its judgment. It is a primary principle of justice that no sentence should take effect, until all who have a right to sit in judgment in the case, have decided that it shall be carried out. This is “the necessary effect of an appeal,” says our book. It is the righteous provision of our standards that an injury shall not be inflicted, before it be finally determined that it is unavoidable or deserved. The exceptions made as to the application of this principle in judicial cases, is plainly a sacrifice of the individual to the whole—it is better that one person should suffer for a while under an unrighteous sentence, than that the whole Church should be disgraced and injured by an unworthy member or minister, until an appeal can be carried through all our courts. The fact is that so far from appeals being confined to judicial cases, those are precisely the cases where they are of the least importance. They have in such cases no advantage over a complaint —they do not arrest the operation of the sentence, and they do not bring it more effectually under the review of the higher court.

There is another remark we cannot refrain from making. The action of the Assembly in this case involves a contradiction. They decide that an appeal cannot lie in a particular case, while in the very act of entertaining such an appeal. If the synod were right in refusing to entertain Dr. Skinner’s appeal from the presbytery, how could the Assembly entertain his appeal from the synod? If the case was not a judicial one before the synod, it was not a judicial one before the Assembly. It could not change its character by passing from one court to the other. The only consistent course for the Assembly would have been, the moment the appeal was reported, to refuse to hear it, because the decision against which it was entered was not a judicial sentence. This was what the synod did. But instead of this, the Assembly gravely entertain an appeal from a non-judicial decision of the synod, resolve themselves into a court, hear the parties, deliver as their judgment that they have no right to do what, with so much solemnity, they are actually engaged in. They say appeals are confined to judicial cases, while engaged in trying one from an executive decision. So deeply wrought into the consciousness of the Church is the conviction that the right of appeal is a right sacred to every aggrieved party, no matter under what form the grievance may be inflicted. If Dr. Skinner had no right to appeal from the decision of the presbytery, he had no right to appeal from a similar decision of the synod, and the Assembly in hearing his appeal from the latter, contradict their own decision, that the synod did right in refusing to hear him as an appellant from the presbytery.

Some of the special advocates of liberty of speech and opinion, are apt, when in the majority, to find out that it is very heinous to express any dissent from the decision of the General Assembly. This is not Protestantism; nor is it Christianity. It is perfectly consistent with all due deference and obedience, for any member of the Church to express without reserve his opinions as to the wisdom or justice of any decision of our ecclesiastical courts. Least of all can the exercise of this right be disputed when the decision in question is opposed to the established usage of the Church, and the previous decisions of almost every Assembly since the first organization of that body. We do not, however, believe that the Assembly, whatever may be the legal import of their decision, consciously intended to sanction the new doctrine on appeals; we believe they simply meant to say that Dr. Skinner ought not to be restored to the pastoral office over the church in Lexington,—a decision, we presume, in which all parties concur.

c. Legitimate Grounds of Complaint

[Book of Discipline, chap. vii., sec. iv., par. ii.—Digest of 1873, p. 596. —Comp. Form of Gov. v. iv., p. 204.]

The Rev. R. J. Breckinridge, D. D., presented to the Synod of Philadelphia, at its late meeting, two papers expressing dissent from the decisions of the General Assembly of 1843, touching the constitution of the quorum of presbyteries, and the right of ruling elders to join in the imposition of hands in the ordination of ministers, and proposing that the synod should overture the Assembly to reverse these decisions. The question being on the adoption of the said papers, the synod decided not to adopt; and thereupon Dr. Breckinridge and others appealed and complained to the next Assembly. The papers connected with the subject having been referred to the judicial committee, the Rev. S. B. Wilson, chairman of that committee, reported that they had examined the same, and that, in their opinion, the decisions complained of were not, according to our Book of Discipline, matters of appeal or complaint, and recommending that the papers be returned to the parties who presented them.

The adoption of that report was advocated by Dr. Wilson, Dr. Hoge, Dr. Elliot, Messrs. A. O. Patterson and N. L. Rice; it was opposed by Dr. J. C. Young, Mr. Junkin, Mr. Stonestreet, Mr. Gildersleeve, and others. After a protracted discussion the vote was taken and resulted as follows, Ayes: Ministers 88, Elders 53—total 141. Nays: Ministers 21, Elders 26—total 47. Thus the report was adopted, and the Assembly decided that, in the case before them, there was no ground on which either an appeal or complaint could rest.

Until within a comparatively recent period there was no diversity as far as we know either of opinion or practice, in our Church, on the legitimate grounds of appeals and complaints. At present it would seem that there are no less than four different views more or less prevalent on the subject. The first is that any decision of a lower, may be brought up before a higher judicatory by either an appeal or complaint, at the option of those concerned. The second opinion goes to the opposite extreme, and denies the right of either appeal or complaint except in cases strictly judicial, i.e. cases in which there has been a trial and a sentence. The third opinion is, that appeals are limited to judicial cases, but that complaints may be entered against any decision of a lower judicatory. The fourth, which we believe to be sustained by the plain doctrine of our book, and the uniform practice of our own and of all other Presbyterian Churches, is that taken by the Rev. N. L. Rice, and we presume by a great majority of the late Assembly, viz. that appeals and complaints may lie not against any decision, but against any kind of decision of a lower court. That is, it matters not whether the act be judicial, legislative, or executive, it may be brought under the revision of a higher court by either of the methods mentioned. But as both appeals and complaints are measures of redress, they from their nature suppose a grievance, a wrong done or charged, and therefore cannot possibly lie in any case where no grievance or wrong-doing is supposable.

It is somewhat remarkable that after nearly a century and a half of practice, during which appeals and complaints have almost yearly and often many in the same year been brought up and decided, it should still be a matter of debate when a man has a right to avail himself of this mode of redress. To the best of our knowledge there never were two opinions on this subject until the year 1834, when the late Rev. Mr. Winchester, in defending the Synod of Philadelphia against the complaint of the Third Presbytery of Philadelphia, took the ground that no appeal or complaint could lie except in a judicial case, a case of trial and censure. At that time the synod which he defended repudiated that ground of defence, for they themselves referred to that very Assembly an appeal from an executive act. The following autumn, however, the synod, under the lead it is believed of some of the present appellants, took the ground, that no appeal, complaint or even protest could lie except in cases of a strictly judicial character. This, however, was a momentary delusion, for the members of that synod without the least hesitation or objection joined in entertaining and issuing, the following spring, an appeal of Thomas Bradford and others from a decision of a presbytery to divide the Fifth Church of Philadelphia, contrary to the wishes of the people. It was found by the very authors and advocates of the new doctrine that it would not work, without destroying the rights of the people and subverting the constitution. In the case of Mr. Bradford’s appeal, the church with which he was connected considered themselves not only aggrieved, but their title to their property jeoparded by the act of the presbytery, and they had therefore the clearest right not only to have that act reviewed, but its operation arrested, until its constitutionality and justice were passed upon by the highest judicatory of the Church. Neither a complaint nor a review of records could afford them redress, for it was necessary that the operation of the act of presbytery should be suspended or the evil would be past remedy. This doctrine therefore was abandoned, and in 1836 there were several cases of appeals or complaints from other than judicial decisions; another in 1837, and in 1838 no less than four or five cases of the same kind; one a complaint by the Presbytery of Wilmington, another a protest and complaint of R. J. Breckinridge and others; another an appeal and complaint of J. Campbell and others; another an appeal and complaint by certain persons claiming to be the Church of St. Charles, against a decision of the Synod of Missouri, that they were not said church. The whole Church therefore went on after this new doctrine was started just as it did before, hearing and issuing appeals and complaints, as in duty bound, from all kinds of decisions. In 1839, however, a complaint was presented to the Assembly by A. D. Metcalf and others against the Synod of Virginia for deciding that appeals may lie in cases not judicial. This complaint the Assembly sustained. This was the origin of the modified form of the new doctrine, viz., that appeals are confined to cases of trial and sentence but that complaints have a wider range, which is the third of the four opinions on this subject mentioned above.

This decision of the Assembly is against all precedent. It is no disrespect to that body to think and say that it is more probable that they erred in their judgment, than that all other Assemblies that ever sat in this country were mistaken. We beg leave to refer our readers to the account of that case in our volume for 1839, where they will find the precise doctrine on the subject, which we are now advocating, stated and defended. We may be excused from making the following brief extract from our history of the Assembly for that year. “Our constitution says, ‘That every kind of decision which is formed in any Church judicatory, except the highest, is subject to the review of a superior judicatory, and may be carried up in one or the other of the four following ways: 1. General review and control; 2. Reference; 3. Appeal; and 4. Complaint.’ The question is, what is the meaning of this plain declaration? It does not mean, because it does not say, that every individual decision, but every Kind of decision may be carried in either of these four ways. These different forms of redress contemplate different circumstances, and are not all available in every particular case. A reference, for example, must be made by the body itself, and not by an individual member, but the body may refer any kind of case. An appeal supposes an aggrieved party, but he may appeal from any kind of decision which directly affects himself. A complaint supposes some kind of impropriety in the act complained of, but it may be entered against any kind of act alleged to be improper. So that any kind of decision may regularly be brought up in each of the several ways specified above.”* We make this extract and reference to the article whence it is taken, because we understand that our pages were frequently referred to on the floor of the Assembly, and quoted in support of the right of the appellants in the case then before the house. It will be seen however that the doctrine taught in our pages is not that every particular decision may be made the subject of appeal or complaint, but that these modes of address are applicable to every kind of decision. It is not only when a man is tried and suspended from the Church or the ministry that he has the right to appeal, but if dismissed from his pastoral charge, against his will, or in any way personally aggrieved by the act of a Church court, he has the same right.

The difference between an appeal and complaint is, that a complaint does not arrest the operation of the decision against which it is entered, and secondly, that an appeal can be made only by an aggrieved person; whereas a complaint may be made by any member of the court who considers the decision unjust or unconstitutional. If a presbytery divide a congregation against its will, it is only the people who have a right to appeal, but any member of the presbytery may complain of the act. Our doctrine, therefore, on this subject is the common doctrine of our Church, viz: that any kind of decision of a judicatory can thus be brought under the review of a higher court. No man can appeal from a decision that does not affect himself, and no man can complain of a decision which is not wrong either actually or supposably; which is not charged with having violated some rule of the constitution or of justice. As a complaint is a mode of redress, where there is no grievance there can be no complaint.

We fully agree, therefore, with Dr. Young and Mr. Stonestreet, in the main drift of their able arguments before the late Assembly, as far as we can judge from the reports given in the papers. Those gentlemen argued to show that the fact that the decision of the Synod of Philadelphia from which Dr. Breckinridge appealed and against which he complained, was not a judicial sentence, was no legitimate bar in the way of the Assembly’s entertaining the case. We differ from them, however, in thinking that that principle covered or even touched the case before the house. Had some ruling elder claimed the right in the Presbytery of Baltimore to join in the imposition of hands in the ordination of a minister, and been refused by a vote of that body, he could have complained to the synod, and if the synod sustained the presbytery, he might complain to the General Assembly. Or if the synod had passed a resolution prohibiting elders from taking part in such service, any member of the body would have had a right to complain. But the case before the Assembly was of a very different nature, and was properly dismissed.

The principle just adverted to, viz.: that a complaint supposes a grievance can hardly be called into question. Does any man complain of anything which he does not think wrong or injurious? Does not the nature of the act imply a charge against the body complained of, that it had no right to do the thing in question, or that it infringed on the rights of others? Does not our book say that a “complaint is a representation,” that “a decision by an inferior judicatory has been irregularly or unjustly made?” Of course where there is no room for the charge of irregularity or injustice there can be no room for a complaint. If the decision is not charged with being in violation of any rule, or with inflicting any injury on those concerned, it is preposterous to assert that there is a right of complaint. A body cannot be summoned to a higher court for the exercise of its acknowledged rights, in accordance with the constitution, and in cases subject to its own discretion. If a presbytery elects A. B. instead of C. D. moderator, no one can complain since the presbytery has a right to choose their own moderator, and, within the limits of the constitution may choose whom they please. They may choose the oldest man or the youngest man, the wisest or the weakest, and no man may call them to account because in his judgment they might have made a better choice. If such an act is made a ground of complaint, it must be charged that it was irregularly or unjustly or corruptly performed. The complaint must rest not on the act itself, but upon the assumption that it violates some rule which the judicatory was bound to observe, or that it affects unjustly the rights or interests of others. There are then certain acts which are purely discretionary, which a judicatory have a perfect right to do or not to do at pleasure, which cannot possibly be made the ground of a complaint, unless they can be charged as unjust or irregular.

The only question then, is, whether the act of the Synod of Philadelphia was such an act. To determine this point, we have only to ask what the act was, and secondly, whether it can be charged or supposed to violate any rule or to infringe any right. As to the act itself, it was a simple refusal to adopt an overture. Dr. Breckinridge presented two memorials condemning in strong language the decision of the Assembly of 1843, as to the constitution of a quorum of presbytery, and the right of elders to join in the imposition of hands in the ordination of ministers, and calling upon the synod to overture the Assembly to rescind the obnoxious resolutions, and to adopt others of a contrary import. This the synod refused to do. Now the only question is, whether a synod is bound to adopt any and every overture presented to it; or whether any right is infringed by their refusing to do so? This question has nothing to do with the correctness or incorrectness of the views contained in the overture. It may assert self-evident or acknowledged truths, still it is a matter entirely within the discretion of the body to receive or reject it. Because a synod may present overtures to the Assembly, it does not follow that it is bound to do so. It may, if it chooses, call upon the Assembly to assert that Calvinism is true and Romanism false, but it cannot be forced to make such a call, or charged with acting unjustly or irregularly for refusing to make it. This is plain from the nature of the case, for such an overture is a petition, and it is absurd to say that a body can be forced to petition. It is clear, therefore, that the act of the synod was purely discretionary. It is equally clear that the synod’s act violated no right, it inflicted no grievance, because no member of a body has a right to make that body adopt his sentiments, or if they hold them, publicly avow them, or to call upon a higher judicatory to avow them. If a man wishes the Assembly to avow certain doctrines, let him make the request, but what right has he to force others to join in that request, or to charge them with acting unjustly or irregularly for refusing to do so? All this is so perfectly plain that Dr. Young, and other advocates of the appeal and complaint, were forced to assume that the synod had decided adversely to the doctrine of the overture. They felt the absurdity of complaining of the mere refusal to adopt a certain paper, and therefore were forced to assume that the refusal to adopt was an expression of an opinion contrary to the contents of the paper. But this is obviously a gratuitous and unwarranted assumption. Had the whole synod agreed with Dr. Breckinridge, and with every word contained in his overtures, they might, with perfect consistency, have rejected them. If a man present a long paper to a synod, asserting the doctrine of the Trinity, and calling upon the Assembly to join in affirmation of the doctrine, do they deny the doctrine because they refuse to adopt the overture? There may surely be other reasons than the incorrectness of its doctrines, to lead a synod to reject such a paper. It may be unnecessary, or uncalled for, or so obviously true as to make the assertion of its sentiments by the body unwise or undesirable. It is therefore obviously a false assumption, contrary to the very face of the record, to say that the Synod of Philadelphia decided that the presence of ruling elders is not necessary to a quorum of presbytery, or that elders may not join in the imposition of hands in the ordination of ministers. They made no such decision; they neither affirmed or denied any thing, they simply refused to adopt Dr. Breckinridge’s overture, which cannot be charged with violating any rule, or infringing any of his rights. Of course their action afforded no ground for appeal or complaint.

That this is a correct exposition of the doctrine of our Book is obvious if we ask what is the design of appeals and complaints. They are intended to redress some grievance or secure the censure of those who inflicted it. Suppose then the complaint before the house had been taken up and sustained, what would be the operation of such a vote? One or the other of two things; either to reverse the decisions of the court below, or to censure them. If the former, then the synod would be required to rescind their vote refusing to adopt Dr. Breckinridge’s overture, and ordered to adopt it. Would not this be absurd? One Assembly order a synod to petition another Assembly to condemn the act of a previous Assembly! Or if sustaining the complaint was to amount to a censure on the synod, what were they to be censured for? Why for not joining in a petition. Is this not again absurd? It is plain, therefore, the complaint could not be taken up, because to sustain it, could work no effect which would not be ridiculous or nugatory.

Another legitimate ground on which this extraordinary appeal and complaint were opposed was, that the mere entertaining of it would work a great injustice, if it was to have any effect at all. Properly speaking the complaint would not have brought up any other question than this. Did the synod do right in refusing to adopt Dr. Breckinridge’s overture? But the propriety of their action did not depend on the correctness or incorrectness of the sentiments the overture contained. The synod neither affirmed nor denied any thing as to that point. They simply refused to adopt. The truth of the doctrines taught in the overture, therefore, would not fairly have been brought into discussion by considering the appeal. That was not the way to bring up that point, for the synod was not complained of for having denied those doctrines, but for having refused to petition the Assembly to avow them; and as remarked in the preceding paragraph, to sustain such a complaint would not be to affirm the doctrines of the overture, but to censure the synod or to reverse its vote. But if the merits of the question were to be brought up in that way then an obvious injustice would be wrought. For what was the question? It did not relate to the administration but to the meaning of the constitution. But with what colour of justice could one of the largest of the synods of the Church be debarred from taking part in deciding in thesi what is the meaning of the constitution? The object professedly sought was to get the judgment of the highest judicatory of the Church as to the principles of our constitution. Why then not ask the whole judicatory? What fair end could be answered by bringing up the question in a form to exclude from all participation in the decision so large a part of the body? They had no more prejudged the matter than other synods and other members of the the house, and the injustice of excluding them would have been flagrant.

Again, if the principle on which this appeal and complaint were advocated should be sanctioned, then any man in the Church could at any time force the General Assembly to consider any abstract question he might choose to propose. The control of the house over its own time and over the subjects that should come before it, would be destroyed. If one of our modern abolitionists, for example, were to overture a synod to request the General Assembly to declare that no slaveholder should be admitted to Church communion, the synod would be bound to present the petition, or be subject to be arraigned at the bar of the Assembly for refusing to do so. And then the Assembly would be bound to consider, not the propriety of the synod’s action, but the merits of the question. Thus any and every abstraction in theology, morals, politics, or polity might be forced upon the house, and its time consumed and the peace of the Church destroyed by any man who chose thus to trouble his brethren. No Church court could act on this principle; and if our constitution allowed of such complaints, it would work our ruin or a change in a very short time. Such were the principal arguments urged against the propriety of entertaining Dr. Breckinridge’s appeal and complaint, as they are embodied in the answer drawn up by Rev. N. L. Rice, to the protest of the minority, and, as we have seen, the house, by a majority of nearly one hundred, pronounced them valid.

d. In Favor of a Commission to try Appeals and Complaints

There is no part of our system which works so heavily as that of appeals and complaints. There are great inconveniences connected with it. 1. The whole Church is liable to be harassed and occupied by causes of no general importance. Three hundred men sitting in Philadelphia as the representatives of the whole of our Church, may have their time largely occupied in deciding whether a man in Georgia showed, on a given occasion, six months ago, a bad spirit. 2. The General Assembly is, from its size, an incompetent tribunal. Most persons would rather be tried by twelve men chosen out of the Assembly by lot, than by the whole three hundred. 3. The consumption of time is intolerable. A judicial case recently occupied one of our presbyteries sixty days. It would require three weeks’ session of the General Assembly, intelligently and righteously to review that case. This is out of the question; and hence, 4. There is a frequent denial of justice. Such is the disposition of the house to get rid of a protracted judicial case, that every expedient is resorted to, to stave it off.

We know that the minds of many are directed to the means of correcting these evils, consistently with our principles. Some propose to make the decisions of synods final in all cases of appeal or complaint from the presbyteries. But this violates our great principle that the whole must govern the parts, and that each part has a right to the protection of the whole. Besides, the remedy does not meet the case. It is impossible that our synods can devote the time required to hearing such cases. We think we shall have to adopt the Scottish (and the Kentucky) method of commissions. A commission is a body consisting of not less than a quorum of the court appointing it, and in which every member of the court who chooses to attend, has the right to a seat, clothed with full power of the court itself. The Synod of Kentucky set the example of acting judicially by commission in the case of the Cumberland Presbytery. We think the practice must utimately be sanctioned and incorporated into our system.

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