The Recognition of a Right Principle.
By Editor
It may deal hardship; the question ought to have been settled before; and the principle may not wholly apply now; but the house of Lords has so decided it, and, as they are the last court of resort, so the decision must stand. We refer to the decision regarding the Scottish Presbyterian Church. In 1900 a fusion was effected between the Free Church of Scotland and the United Presbyterian Church, under the name of the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland. But out of about eleven hundred ministers twenty-four Free Church ministers in remote parts of the highlands and in the islands off the coast refused their assent to the union. They contended that the union was not in accord with the tenets of the ancient Free Church, and further that the fusionist church had no legal control over the trust funds of the Free Church. The case has passed through all the courts to that of the House of Lords. The judges held that nothing could exempt the Free Church from the rule that “funds given for one purpose could not be diverted to another.” Therefore the Free Church property remained in trust with the twenty-four ministers who dissented from the fusion. This means that a sum of thirty millions of dollars is in the absolute control of twenty-four men. How generous they will be and under what conditions, it will be interesting to note.