Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, Transmitted to Congress, With the Annual Message of the President, December 1, 1873
No. 416.
General Sickles to Mr. Fish.
Madrid, August 8, 1873. (Received August 30.)
Sir: I have the honor to forward herewith for your information a copy and translation of a communication from Mr. Moreno Rodriguez, minister of grace and justice addressed to the Cortes, accompanied by a bill proposing the absolute and final separation of church and state in Spain.
The bill without essential modification will undoubtedly become a law.
I am, &c.,
Bill presented by the minister of grace and justice, declaring the independence of the Church
[From the Diario de Sessiones, No. 56, August 2, 1873.]
To the Cortes:
Among the reforms exacted by right and demanded to-day by public opinion there is, perhaps, none more pressing than the recognition of the mutual independence of the church and the state.
The new principles by which society aspires to self-government, casting aside the artificial bonds with which the old régime hampered the free development of all social institutions, imperiously demand that each of these institutions should possess the sovereignty that belongs to them by virtue of their aims and objects, so that being duly organized, and dwelling under the shadow of the law, they may freely work together as harmonious members of the social organism for the fulfillment of the destiny of the human race.
The equality of all forms of worship before the state, while being the most efficacious sanction of the sacred inviolability of conscience, gives also the best guarantee for this noble alliance of all the rational aims of life. By means of such equality alone is it possible that neither the power nor even the favor of the state can be allowed to decide the lot of the different religious beliefs which, animated by the noble emulation of good against evil, aspire to represent the truth in its highest and most fundamental sphere.
The reason, the right, and even the honor of republican principles, join in demanding that the Catholic Church be neither subjugated nor especially favored by the state, but recognized by it in the plenitude of its right. That the Catholic Church should, according to this principle, renounce all privileged protection on the part of the state; and that the state should, in turn, renounce all interference with or control over the life of the Church, restoring to it its own internal prerogatives, in so far as common law assigns such prerogatives to lawful corporations, admits of no doubt, although the old order of things and the régime of the Concordats have given rise, with respect to the economical relations between church and state, to a situation complex in the extreme, and which can be alone resolved with justice by a noble equity on the part of each. The Church acquired in Spain, in the course of centuries, an immense property, about the legitimacy of whose origin doubts have not seldom been raised, and whose object was to meet, not only the necessities of religion, but also to provide for others now watched over by divers institutions, and especially by the state. This ownership of property having been subsequently modified, whether against the will of the Church or by its consent, it has given rise to the budget of public worship, the Church still preserving and enjoying, in addition, property due in part to the sacrifices of the state, and figuring lastly among the creditors of the latter as the possessor of an enormous capital invested in public bonds. The complexity of these facts requires that, in order to put an end to them, both the institutions concerned should proceed in concourse, animated by high principles of equity and justice.
Founding his action on these considerations, the undersigned, with the approval of the executive power of the republic, has the honor to propose to the Cortes the following bill:
- Article I. The state recognizes the right of the Catholic Church to govern itself in complete independence, and also the free exercise of its form of worship, and, consequently, its rights of public meeting, discharge of its functions, holding property, and establishing systems of instruction, with all other rights guaranteed by the constitution and the laws to all lawful corporations.
- Art. II. The Spanish Catholic Church, and other religious corporations, may acquire and hold property in the manner prescribed by law, but subject to the prohibitory exception established by law 15, title xx, book 10 of the Novisima Recopilacion, which extends to all classes of bequests made in the last testamentary devises executed during the illness of which the grantor dies.
- Art. III. The state renounces:
- First. The exercise of the right of nomination to all vacant ecclesiastical charges, or those which may hereafter become vacant, whatever be their class and category, but without thereby relinquishing the rights of the lay patronage, (patronato laical.)
- Second. Supreme jurisdiction and rights of all kinds relative to all the exempt jurisdictions specified and recognized in article 11 of the Concordat, sanctioned October 17, 1851.
- Third. The visa, or regium exequatur, of all bulls, apostolic briefs, pontifical rescripts, dispensations and other documents emanating from the ecclesiastical authorities, leaving to the courts and common legislation the prosecution and punishment of whatever offenses may be committed by these means.
- Fourth. The gracias de cruzada and indulto quadragesimal, and their proceeds.
- Fifth. All intervention in the printing and publishing of liturgical books and others of equal or similar nature.
- Sixth. All intervention in the dispensations which, until now, have been issued through the office called the Agenda de Preces.
- Seventh. And lastly, all the powers, rights, control, prerogatives, and pontifical concessions, wether existing under the ancient royal patronage, (patronato real,) or of other origin, by virtue of which it has the power of intervention in the internal affairs of the Church, reserving, however, its right acquired, for valid consideration, (titulo oneroso,) to receive the proceeds of expolios (property belonging to deceased prelates) anterior to the Concordat of 1851.
- Art. IV. The state recognizes:
- First. The right of nuns in convents to receive the pensions they now enjoy under existing regulations. The register of these shall be transferred to the budget of the minister of finance, extinguising the pensions of those who die.
- Second. Contracts legally entered into with private parties for the repair of churches and other contracts executed conformably to existing regulations.
- Art. V. All the members of the Catholic Church are in the character of citizens, subject to the duties common to all Spaniards.
- Art. VI. All matters relating to the property and rights at present belonging to the Church, as well as those referring to the incomes which it has until now received from the state for various purposes, shall be made the subject of a special and definitive law, in the preparation of which the government of the republic will endeavor to proceed in accord with the authorities, corporations, and individuals especially interested.
- Art. VII. All the buildings at present devoted to worship, or other religious uses, shall remain destined to the service of the Catholic Church, saving the rights which may be held thereon by private parties or corporations, until the law prescribed in the foregoing article shall be prepared. Those buildings which may properly be considered as artistic monuments by the scientific corporations to which they correspond shall be forthwith declared under the protection and immediate inspection of the state.
PEDRO JOSÉ MORENO RODRIQUES.