To the Honourable the SENATE of the STATE of (L. S.) The PETITION of the CORPORATION of Humbly Sheweth, THouse of Resembly of the seventh instant, a re HAT your Petitioners find on the journals of the port of a Committee of that body concurred in by the House, in which after stating several circumstances relative to the title of the lands in the city and county of New York, formerly called and known by the name of King's Farm and Garden, it is declared, that the title to the said lands called the King's Farm and Gar den, was of right before the revolution, vested in the King of Great Britain, and now belongs to, and is of right vested in the people of this state. Your Petitioners beg leave to observe, with all due deference to the honourable Body, who have come to this determination, that they conceive this mode of enquiry into the right of property, is not warranted by the spirit of our happy constitution, and that it intends to sap that grand bulwark of private right, the trial by jury, which it is declared shall remain inviolate for ever. Your Petitioners though confident in the stability of their claim to the lands in question, forbear to enter into a vindication of the same, before your Honourable, House, who they are fully convinced will never destroy these barriers, which the wise framers of the constitu tion have raised betwixt the legislative, judicial and executive branches of government. They content themselves with praying, that in case the report of the honourable House of Assembly, relative to the lands in question, or any law which may affect the rights of the long established and respectable community, of which your Petitioners are the Trustees, should be brought into your honourable House, due notice may be given to your Petitioners of the same, and they be permitted to be heard at the bar of your House, before any measure be taken in the premises. And your petitioners as in duty bound shall ever pray, &c. By order of the Corporation, JOHN RUTHERFORD, Clerk. To the Honourable the REPRESENTATIVES of the PEOPLE of the STATE of NEW YORK, in Assembly convened. (L. S.) The MEMORIAL and REMONSTRANCE of the CORPORATION of TRINITY CHURCH, in the CITY of NEW YORK. Respectfully Shew, THAT your Memorialists on examining the journals of your honourable body, find that a Committee was appointed on the twenty second of November last, to examine the laws and records of the State, concerning certain lands in the city and county of New York, formerly called and known by the name of the King's Farm and Garden; which lands so called were in the year 1705 granted by Queen Anne, by letters patent under the great seal of the then colony of New York, to the rector and inhabitants of the city of New York, in communion of the church of England; who have been in possession of the same from that period to the present day, and have regularly paid the quit rents reserved therein to the year 1768, as will appear by indorsements on the said letters patent, signed by the different Receivers General of the King of Great Britain. That the said Committee on the seventh instant made a report to your honourable House, in which, after stating certain circumstances, relative to the title to the lands called by the name of the King's Farm and Garden, they infer, "That the title to the said "lands called the King's Farm and Garden, was of "right, before the revolution, vested in the King of "Great Britain, and now belongs to, and is of right, "vested in the people of this state;" with which report your honourable House was pleased to concur. Your Memorialists, not only as Trustees of a respectable religious community, but as citizens, zealously attached to the principles of the late glorious revolution, are constrained with regret to observe, that they conceive the mode of this enquiry and the concurrence of your honourable Body, not warranted by the spirit of our happy constitution, whose wise framers have studi ously separated the legislative, judicial and executive functions of government-that it tends by giving an undue influence on the public mind, to weaken and render inefficacious, the trial by jury, that grand bulwark of the right and property of the subjects, which the voice of the constitution has declared shall remain inviolate forever. Notwithstanding the confidence which your Memorialists derive of the stability of their claim to the lands in question, from the opinion of the ablest law sages in Europe, as well as in this country, they wave entering into it before your honourable Body, from a respect to the principles of our free constitution, and that they may not involve you by such an enquiry, in that predicament so painful to the mind of a true patriot, of rendering himself at once the party and judge. In duty however to their constituents, they are bound to observe, that if the Committee appointed by your honourable Body, had thought proper to call upon your Memorialists, for such evidence on the premises as they from their official character were best qualified to give, the conclusion drawn from such an investigation, would have been far different from that which at present appears on your journals. With that deferent boldness which freemen have a right to use to the representatives of a free people, your Memorialists beg leave to observe, that it is the right of the citizen to be heard in all cases which may affect his life, his liberty or property, in whatever mode such an enquiry may be conducted; they therefore trust, that an application for this purpose cannot be refused to a long established Corporation, whose political weight and attachment to the present government, claim the public attention. In this confidence your Memorialists, in behalf of themselves and those whose interests are committed to their charge, request that they may be permitted to shew cause at the bar of your honourable House, why the report of the Committee of the seventh instant, relative to the King's Farm and Garden, should not appear of record on your journals. By order of the Corporation, JOHN RUTHERFORD, Clerk. Loudon's New York Packet, Monday, February 28. 1785. [The following tract in reply to the foregoing article is reprinted from the original, entitled SOME REMARKS on the Memorial and Remonstrance of the Corporation of Trinity Church; addressed to the Honourable The Representatives of the People of the State of New York, in Assembly Convened. Humbly offered to the Public. 12mo. pp. 34. [New York, 1785.]] Some REMARKS on the Memorial and Remonstrance of the Corporation of TRINITY CHURCH, in the City of New-York.-Humbly presented to the Public. HROUGH the medium of Loudon's News paper, Tof the 25th day of February last, a Memorial and Remonstrance under the seal of the Corporation of Trinity Church, in the City of New-York, and signature of John Rutherford, directed to the Honourable the Representatives of the State of New-York, in assembly convened, did make it's pompous appearance: To prevent imposition on the judgment of the uninformed, It is now become necessary to publish a few facts: but before I enter on any remarks on the Memorial I shall give a few extracts, shewing the rise and progress of the religious denomination called Episcopalians in this State, and the manner how the Corporation of Trinity Church crept into possession of the King's Farm and Garden. The first that I find recorded of that denomination, is in the Hon. William Smith's history of New York, page 104, 5, and 6, and is in the words following, viz. 66 "The inhabitants of Jamaica consisted at that "time, partly of original Dutch planters, but mostly of "New-England emigrants, encouraged to settle there "after the surrender, by the Duke of York's conditions "for Plantations, one of which was in these words, That every township should be obliged to pay their own "Ministers according to such agreements as they should "make with him; the Minister being elected by the major part of the householders and inhabitants of the "town. These people had erected an edifice for the "worship of God, and enjoyed an handsome donation "of a parsonage-house and glebe, for the use of their "Minister. After the Minister Act was passed by Gov"ernor Fletcher in 1693, a few Episcopalians crept into “the town, and viewed the Presbyterian Church with "a jealous eye. The town vote in virtue of which the building had been erected, contained no clause to pre"vent its being hereafter engrossed by another sect. The Episcopal party, who knew this, formed a design "of seizing the edifice for themselves, which they shortly "after carried into execution, by entering the Church "between the morning and evening service, while the Presbyterian Minister, and his Congregation were "in perfect security, unsuspicious of the zeal of their "adversaries, and a fraudulent ejectment on a day con“secrated to sacred rest. Great outrage ensued among "the people, for the contention being pro aris et focis, "was animating and important. Lord Cornbury's noble "descent and education, should have prevented him from "taking part in so ignominious a quarrel; but his lord"ship's sense of honour and justice, was as weak and "indelicate as his bigotry was rampant and uncon"troulable; and hence we find him guilty of an act "complicated of a number of vices which no man could "have perpetrated without violence to the slightest 66 |