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History of Orange County
Town of Newburgh
Page 26
     Again, no minister could be called, without the consent of a majority of the freeholders on the patent.  The trustees, alone had no power to appoint a minister.  But it is said, that if those who are not episcopalians are allowed to vote for trustees, or to appoint a minister, the intention of the original grant may be defeated.  But the rights of episcopalians are not infringed.  The trustees would be bound to fulfil the original intent of the charter; the inconvenience that might result from the necessity of compelling the trustees to act, furnish no legal objection to the charter for which we contend.  Whenever a minister of the episcopal church is properly inducted, the trustees are bound to appropriate the glebe to his use.  This is merely a question of property not of conscience.  No rights of conscience have been violated in this case.  Compare it to an advowson or patronage.  A patron, in England, possessing an advowson, or right of presentation to any church, may, by common law, be of any religious denomination whatever.  A Jew, if he purchase an estate, to which an advowson is annexed, may present.  By the statutes of 3 James I. c. 5. and of I William and Mary, sess. 1. c. 26. popish recusants convict, and persons who will not subscribe to the declaration, mentioned in the act against papists, are disabled from presenting to a benefice; but persons of every other religious sect, possessing an advowson may present.* There is no ground for the inference, in this case, that because the inhabitants of the patent, at the time the grant was made, were all episcopalians, that in the lapse of time, other inhabitants, who were not episcopalians, might not vote in the choice of trustees.  Such an inference is inconsistent with the principles of the English common law, and contrary to the liberal policy of this country.
     2.     Again, it is said that none but an episcopalian could be elected a trustee, or rector.  But after the adoption of the constitution of this slate, no episcopalian could be elected, or inducted under the charter.  Before the constitution was adopted, it was essential that the rector or clergyman should be inducted, by the governor of the state, pursuant to instructions from the king and council, or by the bishop of London.  As the rights of the king, or bishop of London, in regard to the churches in this state, were destroyed by the revolution, it was impossible to carry the charter into effect.  The trust, so far as it respected a clergyman of the church of England, ceased, and there remained only the trust as to a school and fair.  By an act of the legislature, passed the 17th of Aprill, 1784,** the charter of the Trinity church, as it respected induction, was repealed.  This act shows clearly the opinion of the legislature, that the charter, so far as it related to the induction of a clergyman of the church of England, could not, consistently with the constitution of the state, be carried into effect.  The regulations of this act, however, were confined to the southern district.  The constitution was left to have full effect upon all the charters in the other parts of the state, which were not, it is probable, thought of sufficient importance, to induce an application to the legislature to revive the uses and trusts, as it respected the episcopal church.  It is to be observed, also, that the legislature, by the act of 1784, in relation to Trinity church, recognized and confirmed the previous acts of the council, for the temporary government of the southern district, who, upon the petition of sundry persons, and to prevent dissensions, declared the places of the church-wardens and vestry-men vacant, and vested all the estate, real and personal, of the corporation, in certain persons named in the act.
     Induction in England, is an act done, ex mandato the archdeacon.*** In this state before the constitution, it was an act done according to a mandate from the king to the governor.  Who became the heirs and successors of the crown, in relation to the right of induction?  As the governor had a right to induct by command of the king only, surely, this right could not have vested in the church-wardens and vestry-men at Newburgh.

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      *Cruise's Dig. Tit. 21 c. 2. &22—50.
      **Greenleaf's ed. or the Laws of New York, v. I, p. 95.
       ***Cruise's Dig. Tit. c. 2. 13.