Some historical and global examples of tax resistance →
religious groups and the religious perspective →
British Nonconformists →
19th Century Vicars’ Rate resisters
From the Daily Saratogian comes a jaunty telling of resistance to the “Vicars’ Rate” across the pond:
The non-conformists in the English town of Coventry refuse to pay tithes and all the country round is having a good deal of fun over it.
The bailiffs attempted to levy on the pigs of a farmer who refused to pay, but the farmer had carefully lathered the porkers with grease and the bailiffs gave it up.
A Birmingham auctioneer tried to sell some goods that had been seized but he no sooner opened his mouth to announce the sale when an ancient egg cracked over his teeth and a cabbage hit him on the nose.
The auctioneer immediately retired to Birmingham.
There is great excitement and the police hesitate to answer the demands of the tithe collectors for assistance fearing a riot if they interfere.
This seems to be an abbreviated and altered version of a dispatch I found in the Boston Evening Transcript from :
Humorous Incidents Connected with the Collection of Church Dues.
London, . The tithe war in Coventry culminated today in a riot, in which thousands took part.
For a long time there has been bad blood in Coventry on the subject of the payment of tithes, a large proportion of the inhabitants protesting against the exaction.
The Nonconformists have declared that they would never pay, and a good many of the church people are in sympathy with the anti-tithe movement.
The quarrel was attended by a good many fights and some funny episodes as when a farmer, living in the suburbs, upon whose stock it was proposed to levy, greased all his pigs, so that they slipped through the hands of the bailiffs at every attempt, much to the delight of a crowd that witnessed the spectacle.
The bailiffs at length gave up the chase in disgust.
Today goods which were seized were exposed for sale in the market place.
Thousands gathered to the scene and the mob showed a determination to prevent the sale if possible.
The auctioneer was a man from Birmingham, as no local auctioneer could be procured for the dangerous undertaking.
He started to put up the goods and was just about to state the conditions of the sale when he was assailed by all kinds of missiles.
The Birmingham auctioneer had enough, and notwithstanding the protestations of the tithe collectors and police who offered to protect him from any further violence, he made his escape, though not without difficulty.
Meantime the mob scattered through the streets, some of them whose goods and chattels had been seized recapturing the articles and taking them home again.
The people are greatly excited and the police have wisely refrained from aggressive measures.
A London Times piece on the Coventry anti-tithe movement, reprinted in the New York Times , explained that the campaign grew slowly out of a single resister’s persistent and public stand of conscientious objection:
History of a Curious and Unrelenting Conflict — Livings of Famed and Noble
St. Michael’s and Holy Trinity Dependenton a Rate Levied on All Householders — Their Ancient Origin
From the London Times
The agitation now proceeding in Coventry against the Vicars’ rates is a fresh chapter in an old story.
The rates have never been paid with goodwill by Nonconformists, though hitherto there has been no organized resistance to the law.
A few individual citizens have maintained a consistent protest against a tax which they declared offended their consciences, and one tradesman, whose goods have been distrained year after year, has retaliated with equal regularity by issuing handbills setting forth his woes, and the rapacity of what he was wont to describe as “Mother Church.”
The leading Nonconformists, and it may be said the Nonconformists as a body, have until lately refrained from all open sympathy with this suffering brother, whose controversial tactics were generally regarded as somewhat wanting in good taste.
In the annual testimony borne in this quarter attracted more attention than usual in consequence of an open-air indignation meeting by which it was followed.
The meeting was by no means influentially attended, and it was not believed at the time that it would have any important consequences.
It led, however, to the formation of an Anti-Vicars’ Rate Association, whose action has brought about the present crisis.
The article goes on to give a history of the controversial tithe, then continues with a description of the resistance campaign:
When, in , the Anti-Vicars’ Rate Association set seriously to work and propounded a policy of passive resistance to the law, the announcement was deprecated by influential inhabitants who in political matters have been accustomed to act with the Nonconformist party.
The defense made by the association was, in brief, that this policy had been determined on to compel attention to the grievance.
In this it was successful.
The settlement of the rate in Trinity being considered the weightiest part of the question, negotiations were opened up between the Vestry of that parish and the Anti-Rate Association.
The result of the negotiations were disclosed in .
The Vestry had agreed that for the future the Church estate should be chargeable with the greater part of the Vicar’s stipend; the sum that could be thus spared was estimated at £500 per annum.
It was proposed to raise another £100 a year from investments of money to be otherwise obtained.
The £600 thus secured the Vicar was willing to accept in lieu of the rate on the understanding that the congregation undertook, by a weekly offertory, to raise sufficient to pay the assistant curates.
The arrangement involved a sacrifice on his part of about £150 per annum, and to carry it out £7,000 would be required, £3,600 of which would be devoted to paying off a debt on the Church estate.
Of the £7,000, the rate-payers of the parish were asked to contribute £5,000, the remaining £2,000 would be met by a subscription among churchmen.
The Nonconformist party were sanguine that the needed £5,000 could be raised by voluntary means, but there was not among churchmen the same confidence.
The Nonconformist feeling was, however, deferred to, and a committee was appointed to make the necessary appeal, it being hoped that each rate-payer would be willing to make a subscription equal to five years’ value of his share of the rate.
But it didn’t work out.
From those asked to subscribe, churchmen and dissenters alike, about £2,328 of the £5,000 were raised, and, according to the article, “there seemed no other alternative than to raise the needed funds by a legal commutation of the rate.”
A meeting proposed a new plan whereby ratepayers could pay five years’ worth of the rates at once, or six years’ worth, spread out over those six years, at which time the tax would be abolished.
Some of the Nonconformists seemed to be willing to go along with this, as it would finally (though not immediately) put an end to the offensive tax.
But the Anti-Vicars’ Rate Association had had enough:
The proximate cause of the present crisis was a refusal on the part of Trinity Vestry to cooperate with the Anti-Vicars’ Rate Association in a second attempt to raise the needed funds by voluntary means.
The Vestry seems to have felt that the fresh overtures on this basis made by the association indicated a resolution to settle the question in only one way — a way which had already been proved to be impracticable.
The recovery of the rate, which had been suspended for months, so far as Nonconformists were concerned, was therefore resumed, and, the policy of passive resistance being persevered in, the city is now divided into two camps.
It is indisputable that the Anti-Vicars’ Rate Association is largely supported by the Nonconformist party, but there are influential Nonconformists, and among them the Mayor, who strongly deprecate its policy.
It is still too early to estimate the strength of the forces on either side of the probable issue of the contest.
It is only just to record that the part played by the Vicar of Holy Trinity throughout the controversy has been most conciliatory, and that he has made great efforts, and no small sacrifice, to bring about its peaceful termination.
This has been generally admitted by the Nonconformists, who before the failure of the voluntary scheme expressed themselves tolerably satisfied with the concessions that had been made to them.
Until the other day they took their stand on the principle that while, as citizens, they were willing to unite with churchmen in an effort to extinguish the rates by voluntary means, they could not consent to pay them any longer as a legal impost.
In other words, if the Church was to be helped to a new and less objectionable form of endowment, the process must be accomplished consistently with Nonconformist principles.
The fatal objection to this policy is that it has already been proved impracticable and that a legal commutation presents the only peaceable solution of the difficulty.
Since the institution of legal proceedings for the recovery of the rate the Anti-Rate Association has withdrawn its offer of voluntary assistance, and its leaders are apparently hopeful that the collection of the tax, so far as resisting Nonconformists are concerned, will before long be abandoned.
On the side of the Church there are at present no signs pointing in that direction.
No one outside Halifax can have any idea of what I had to face in connection
with the “Vicar’s Rate.” On the death of Archdeacon Musgrave, in
, the Nonconformists, influentially and
numerically strong in Halifax, one of the very strongholds of Nonconformity,
commenced an agitation for the Repeal of the Vicars’ Rate Act of
, so far as the same related to the rate of
a house. They contended that, as the Rate upon houses imposed by the Act of
was in lieu of Easter Dues, and as such
Easter Dues were no longer recoverable by law, such Rate ought to be
abolished. They did not object to the charge upon Land, which was in lieu of
Tithes. Within a very short time a sum of £12,000 was raised to meet any
cases of prosecution for non-payment! On my arrival at Halifax, I saw, posted
and placarded in large letters on hoardings, with deep black-edged paper, the
following pleasant greeting: “Judas Vicar’s Rate, died
, buried in a pauper’s grave, to know no
Resurrection.” The Rate used to be collected like Gas or Water Rates.
Occasionally I found my letter-box stuffed full with them. I received a large
envelope, containing some thirty or forty, with this letter: “Dear Sir, we
found these poor little papers fluttering in the street, having no home, and
send them to you, as you will probably best know what to do with them.”
Dr. Mellor, of Square Chapel,
a tower of strength to the Nonconformists, a man of great gifts and
eloquence, gave notice one Sunday morning to this effect to his great
congregation: “The Vicar’s agent will be calling this week upon me, and I
advise you all to do what I am going to do: button up your pockets.”
The Sunday following he told them that my Agent had called and that he had
refused to pay him. There was no alternative but to distrain for the amount,
some five or six shillings. “ ‘All right,’ I said, ‘take what you like.’ The
Agent went into my larder and took a ham, which you will be glad to
hear was bad.”
One could only take all this in good humour. The people of Halifax knew
perfectly well that I had not originated the Rate. They knew, also, that I
had no alternative, as matters stood, but to claim, and, if need be, to
enforce payment. It does not do to show the white feather in Yorkshire.
Yorkshiremen fully appreciate sticking up for your rights. It was evident,
however, that to persist in enforcing it would only intensify the bitterness
of animosity, as it did at St.
Michael’s, Coventry. The matter was referred to the Government. They brought
in, after much inquiry and debate, a Bill in
, providing for the extinction of the rate
on houses on payment of the sum of £11,200 to the Ecclesiastical
Commissioners; in other words, they proposed the redemption of the rate at
twenty-three years’ purchase. My faithful friend Mr. Robert Baxter came down
to Halifax, and consulting with local lawyers and men of business,
particularly with Messrs. Emmett and Walker, formulated with great care a
scheme for the redemption, fixed at £11,200. And thus the redemption was
brought about. I was calling on the late Mrs. Prescott, and expressed to her
my fear that I should have to place my resignation in the hands of the Prime
Minister, inasmuch as £1,300 a year was imperilled, and I could not afford to
work the parish on £700 a year, and have, as I felt I must have, six, or at
least five, curates. She said: “But you do not think, do you, that we are
going to let you leave us for the sake of the Vicar’s Rate? I will give you
£500 towards its redemption.” On leaving her, I met Mr. Hill, the well-known
solicitor in Halifax, and told him of this handsome offer. He immediately
went to Pye Nest to inform Sir Henry Edwards of it. Sir Henry called on me
next day and went with me to see Mr. Joshua Appleyard, at Clare Hill, and
this brief conversation took place, to show how quickly things are done in
Yorkshire: “Mr. Appleyard, there is no doubt that the right thing to do is to
redeem the Vicar’s rate. The Vicar has received £500 towards it; what will
you do?” “Whatever you do,” replied Appleyard. “I will give £1,000,” said Sir
Henry. “So will I,” said Appleyard. We started with three subscriptions
amounting to £2,500! The matter was at once taken up. A meeting, at which Sir
Henry presided, was summoned. A committee was formed, everyone engaged in
raising this fund cheerfully and gratuitously worked for it, and in about six
weeks no less a sum was contributed than £12,955 by 360 contributions! Many
Nonconformists, anxious that an end should be put to this internecine strife,
contributed, and through the most generous and hearty help of all
well-wishers to the Church, I was instrumental in bringing it about that the
income of over £2,000 a year is permanently secured to the Vicarage of
Halifax.
In a parliamentary committee was selected to look into the Vicars’ Rate at Halifax and make recommendations.
You can read their report at Google Books.
It’s typically dry, but I scanned through it for details about how the resistance to the rates was carried out.
Here are some excerpts:
Upon the death of the late vicar, which occurred on
, the hostility felt by the inhabitants of the Parish of Halifax
to the rate… assumed a very decided character; and meetings were held, and
associations were formed throughout the parish to resist the further payment
of the commutations of “Easter Dues” affected by the Act of
. Vehement articles were published in the
local papers, the public mind was greatly agitated against the rate, and a
fixed determination was expressed by leading men in Halifax to submit to
distraint on their goods rather than continue their payments. Of the depth
and extent of this hostile feeling there can be no sort of doubt…
The committee grilled Edward Crossley, Mayor of Halifax, on
:
When you say that there is a large number of the inhabitants who are
determined not to pay, I presume that they are prepared to submit to
distraint rather than pay?
Exactly.
They are fully aware of their own position if they refuse to pay?
Exactly.
To come to facts: have any meeting been held in Halifax within
upon this subject?
Several; the meeting for the levying of the rate was held this year.
On what day was that held?
It was held a fortnight ago at the parish church, when a large assembly
gathered to object to the rate.
Can you tell us anything which occurred at that meeting; was it a
peaceful meeting or the reverse?
It was not disorderly, but it was a very determined meeting.
Later that day, attorney Robert Baxter testified about the curious law that
enacted the Vicars’ Rate. It’s a little tricky to untangle, but there’s
one peculiarity of the law that the resisters were able to take advantage of.
Apparently, each year under the law the vicar is to convene a meeting of five
churchwardens (or perhaps, five or twenty other Halifax citizens he is
authorized to conscript for the purpose) and say “cough up my Rate.” The
chosen five (or twenty) must then cough it up as asked. They then are to
convene a meeting to decide how to recoup this money from the rest of Halifax.
Resisters took advantage of this by attending this meeting and using
parliamentary procedure to immediately adjourn it, thus preventing the poor
five-or-twenty from recouping their payments. In Baxter’s opinion, this tactic
doesn’t comply with the law, but it has nonetheless been effective in delaying
payment, as it would be legally cumbersome to compel a meeting to levy the tax
against its will.
A later witness testified that in the district: “In nearly every township a
meeting of inhabitants has been held; and at every one of these meetings the
motion for adjournment has been carried, which means a refusal to lay the
rate.”
One of the churchwardens later gave his point of view on this tactic:
I understood you to say [the rate] was laid before the meeting?
No, I say at the meeting; before the meeting was adjourned.
There was time for five people quietly to lay the rate, I suppose?
The two churchwardens signed the rate, and we are advised that that is
sufficient. We could have had it signed by a dozen inhabitants and
ratepayers, if the rate-book had not been forcibly borne away from the
table and carried away into the churchyard.
Charles Mills, Legal Advisor of the Anti-Vicar’s Rate Association addressed
the committee about the Association’s take on the law, its history, and its
interpretation.
You can tell us something of the feeling of the people of Halifax and the
neighbourhood about this rate?
The feeling is such that whether the Act of Parliament remains or not,
they will not pay it.
I want to know how it is they have come to that conclusion, after having
paid it, as we are told, , in
full?
Because they paid it simply out of respect for the late archdeacon. This
question has not just cropped up now; there was an Association formed
years ago. This undercurrent of feeling has been felt in Halifax for
years past; it only awaited the death of the vicar for it at once to find
expression.
Out of pure respect to Archdeacon Musgrave this rate has been paid to this
time in full?
I do not say that that feeling has been in existence for over 40
years.
I want to know if the Society of Friends paid the rate?
They have been distrained upon.
And it is understood that two or three clergymen have refused to accept
the living on the very ground that this very difficulty would arise?
Yes; it was known the difficulty would arise the moment there was a
vacancy in the living.
Thomas Ormerod, President of the Anti-Vicar’s Rate Union (distinct from the
Association, of a similar name, which was formed later), was questioned next.
How long has that Association been formed?
A few months.
How many months?
It was formed in .
Was that after the death of the late Archdeacon Musgrave?
Afterwards; it might be of service to the Committee if I gave a little
history of how the union has been formed, and the feeling that has
originated it. Although there was very strong feeling existing both in
the borough and in the out-townships for many years previous to the
archdeacon’s death , yet,
excepting in individual cases, no action was openly taken to allow
distraint to ensue on goods for the Vicar’s rate. But when the
archdeacon’s death occurred, although it took place somewhat suddenly,
it did not find us unprepared. The feeling of the people had been evinced
at various meetings that had taken place on different questions in
connection with Nonconformist principles.
Ormerod testified that shortly after Musgrave’s death, “a short and somewhat
pithy memorial was signed and sent up to the Premier” indicating that the
people of the parish intended to work for the repeal of the Act that legalized
the Rate, and meanwhile “that every legal obstacle would be thrown in the way
of the collection of the rate.”
What do you mean by “every legal obstruction”?
We meant to put it plainly, that every inconvenience would be given to the
officials in the collection of the rate, and that distraint would ensue;
that is what was understood.
That means to say that you had determined to violate the Act of
Parliament?
Not to violate it. The Act provides for distraint. We did not intend to
violate the Act; certainly not.
Omerod gave a brief history of the Union he presided over, including this:
The Union was publicly inaugurated in the Mechanics’ Hall in Halifax, at
which two resolutions were passed, the first supporting the formation of the
Union, its object being the total and unconditional repeal of the Act; and
the second resolution being that of a preliminary guarantee fund of not less
than 1,000 l. be formed
to support any poor man who should suffer from the spoiling of his goods
under distraint.
William Brook, a Quaker, testified next.
I am a member of the Society of Friends, and I am in a position to controvert
the statement that the operations of the Act up to a certain time were
generally acceptable. The members of the Society of Friends from the first
declined to be parties to the Act by voluntarily paying the amount demanded
of them. I myself have had a demand repeatedly made upon me, and have never
paid it. I have once been distrained upon, but for a number of years whilst
the amount has been regularly demanded no distraint has been made.
Did you regularly refuse to pay the rate, or was it only on one occasion
you refused, and were distrained upon?
Personally I have refused to pay the rate ever since I was a householder.
The members of the religious society to which I belong, without exception,
from the passing of the Act, have refused to pay the rate, and up to the
period of about 13 years ago they had, from time to time, their goods
seized, in satisfaction of the demands of the churchwardens, for this
rate. At that period, from some representations that were made, I believe
personally, to the vicar, he gave a distinct intimation that the members
of our body should not any longer be distrained upon.
He later added: “there are a number of others who have taken the ground of the
wrongfulness of paying, and have been willing to suffer the consequences, who
also have not been distrained upon.” One of the churchwardens testified later
that he believed it was the practice for other people in the community to come
forward and pay the rates of Friends “to prevent them being summoned.”
Next, William Henry Clay, a Halifax Baptist, spoke:
I think it was in that I was summoned
the first time because I objected to pay this rate. I omitted to pay it
one year, and of course, instead of holding my noise, I told that I had
got off.
Were you distrained upon?
No, I was summoned; I was not as fully aware of the Act as I am now, and
so I tried in the first place to upset the legality of the rate, and had
a barrister from Manchester; of course in that I failed. Being rather
young and timid I paid then. There was a distraint warrant issued, and I
paid that.
What was the amount for which you were summoned?
Two shillings and threepence.
Your objection to the payment, I presume, was a conscientious objection
simply?
Yes, like the rest of my fellow parishioners. I think we have some
grievance to complain that are worthy of the consideration of this
Committee, independent of Halifax [he had said earlier that “I represent
the outlying townships”]. I stood in Erringden on Sunday night, and I was
able to count 16 different places of worship… Fourteen of those are
self-supporting dissenting bodies, and two of the belong to the
State.
To the Church?
Yes; that is one grievance, that we have to support those 14 freely, and
that they go eight miles away to support what we consider the richest
church in the whole parish. We go five miles further up to Garple and
Ridge and those places, outlying districts where the inhabitants are very
poor, and where they have never seen the vicar, and very likely never
wish to do so. I may say that I have gone a great deal about to public
meetings, and so forth, and have got a pretty accurate opinion of the
inhabitants, and they are very bitterly against it.
Is it on the principle that you have just laid down that you object to
pay the rate?
That is the foundation, certainly.
It is not the amount?
No, the amount has nothing to do with it. To show you the feeling that
has grown, I think there is no better proof that the rate used to be
collected for 50 s.
in Heptonstall, and I believe the last time the rate was collected it
cost 20 l.
Are you able to account for the difference between
50 s. and
20 l.?
Yes; it is owing to the opposition. I may say I was summoned, along with
some more in , and I was distrained upon.
The cost of getting my
2 s.
3 d. was
1 l.
13 s.
7 d.
You had to pay that?
Yes, of course; that aroused my indignation greater than before.
You voluntarily incurred that additional expense from conscientious
motives?
Yes; and shall do again if the rate is collected. Of course it put the
churchwardens to very considerable inconvenience, which roused the matter
up, and for the time being it caused a great amount of party feeling.
The plan they adopted last year was this: There is a clause in the Act
that gave them power to appoint whom they liked as collector; so seemingly
they thought I was a suitable person, and they appointed me to collect
the rate.
Did you undertake that duty with much willingness?
Of course I did not regret that they had taken such a step, because I
thought it would be a good thing for our cause. There is another clause
in the Act that notice is to be served within 14 days, so I quietly took
a trip to Ireland and other places till the 14 days expired. Of course
the matter has been very much talked about in the neighbourhood, and we
formed an Anti-Vicar’s Rate Association. I believe I am the president at
the present time, and all the members are pledged that they will not pay
any more.
Then the rate has never yet been collected?
It has been partially. Perhaps they have about a third of it. Everybody
really is standing out.
William Henry Rawson, a magistrate for Halifax county, and a member of the
official church, testified (among other things):
Already a large Anti-Vicar-Rate Association has been formed, numbering, I am
told, nearly 1,000 members. On , in
my magisterial capacity, I issued distress warrants against three individuals,
the least of them owing
8 d. only, but refusing to
listen to advice or reason, and this is the beginning of the end. When the
Nonconformist ministers advocate an open defiance of the law, what else can
be expected from their flocks?
