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The
Seventh Annual Examination of the children of the Hebrew Sunday School of Philadelphia, took place as
usual on the Sunday after Purim, the 30th of March last, at the
Synagogue Mikveh Israel, in Cherry Street. There have been about one
hundred and thirty children under instruction during the past year, and
the examination amply proved that the labour of the teachers had not
been in vain. This institution has again met with the approbation of the
parents and friends of the scholars, and we learn that the donations
received on the occasion amounted to one hundred and forty-two dollars.
The school continues as heretofore under the superintendence of its
first founder, who, we trust, will long be spared to us, to aid in the
good work in which she has so effectively embarked. One evidence of the
good results arising from the course of instruction pursued, may be
found in the fact, that several who are now teachers, were scholars in
this school, and have acquired their ability to impart instruction from
the instruction they themselves received.
Grisons,
Switzerland.—The
Federal Gazette contains a letter from Coire, Canton of the Grisons,
which reports as follows: On the 24th of December, all the Israelites
residing in the city were called before the judge of instruction, who
declared to them that they must quit the canton immediately, by order of
a decree of the lesser council, founded upon a law of the grand council,
stating that the Israelites shall not, henceforward, carry on business
in the canton, and that no license for this purpose shall be granted
them any more. The Israelites immediately addressed a petition to the
government, to withdraw the order which was levelled against them. The
lesser council answered that there had been no opportunity to take their
request into consideration.
England.—It
seems at length the intention of the British government to remove
partially the civil disabilities under which the Jews labour. When first
we saw it announced in the papers that Sir Robert Peel meant to
introduce a bill for the relief of the Jews, we had hoped that it was a
measure equalizing Jews and Christians all over England; but the present
measure is not only partial in its details but inoperative in Scotland
and Ireland. Probably at a future day more concessions will be granted,
till the foul blot of intolerance will be quite wiped out from the
statute book. We quote from the Voice of Jacob of March 14.
“Her Majesty’s government, with a view to render the
anomaly of the position in which conscientious Jews, elected by their
fellow-citizens to municipal offices, have hitherto been placed, have
themselves originated a bill in Parliament, of which the following is a
copy. It was introduced on Friday night last, by the highest legal
dignitary in the realm, and read a second time on Monday night.
A Bill intituled an Act, for the Relief of
Persons of the Jewish Religion elected to Municipal Offices.
“Whereas
the declaration prescribed by an act of the ninth year of the reign of
King George the Fourth, intituled ‘an act for repealing so much of
several acts as imposes the necessity of receiving the Sacrament of the
Lord’s Supper as a qualification for certain offices and
employments,’ on admission into office in municipal corporations,
cannot conscientiously be made and subscribed by persons of the Jewish
religion:
Be
it therefore enacted by the Queen’s most Excellent Majesty, by and
with the advice and consent of the Lords spiritual and temporal, and
Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of
the same, that, instead of the declaration required to be made and
subscribed by the said recited act, every person of the Jewish religion
be permitted to make and subscribe the following declaration within one
calendar month next before or upon his admission into the office of
Mayor, Alderman, Recorder, Bailiff, Town Clerk, Councillor, or any other
municipal office in any city, town corporate, borough, or cinque port,
within England and Wales, or the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed:
“
‘I. A. B., being a person professing the Jewish religion, having
conscientious scruples against subscribing the declaration contained in
an act passed in the ninth year of the reign of King George the Fourth,
intituled “an act for repealing so much of several acts as imposes the
necessity of receiving the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper as a
qualification for certain offices and employments,” do solemnly,
sincerely, and and truly declare, that I will not exercise any power or
authority of influence which I may possess by virtue of the office of
—— to weaken or injure the Protestant Church as it is by law
established in England, nor to disturb the said church, or the bishops
and clergy of the said church, in the possession of any right or
privileges to which such church or the said bishops and clergy may be by
law entitled.’ ”
“II.
And be it enacted, that such declaration shall be of the same force and
effect as if the person making it had made and subscribed the
declaration aforesaid contained in the said act of the ninth year of the
reign of King George the Fourth.”
Erratum.—In
the list of the officers of the Richmond Publication Society, we omitted
the name of Henry Hyman, Treasurer, and the name of the Recording
Secretary should be T. K. Lyons. |
