■ 
 
"TlilMTY CHURCH." 
 
 * 
 
 .TWO LETTERS FROM Oi\E OF ITS CONGREGATION. 
 
 9 
 
 To the Editors of the X. Y. Express : 
 
 I belong to one of the congregations of Trinity Church. 
 When I joined it, and paid a certain sum of money for my pew, 
 I supposed that I was acquiring certain rights, such as belong- 
 to the members of every congregation or religious society, and 
 that nobody could take these rights from me except " by due 
 course of law." 
 
 But it now appears that Mr. Thurlow A\ r eed, Mr. Bradish, 
 Mr. Spencer, Dr. Tyng, Dr. Taylor, Mr. Grinnell and Mr. Min- 
 turn are vehemently beseeching the Legislature to take them 
 away, and to pass a law that some ten to fifteen thousand 
 strangers shall come in for an equal share, — that the congrega- 
 tions of Trinity Church shall no longer elect their own church 
 officers, but that all the Episcopalians in ]STew York shall have 
 an equal voice in electing them, whether they have ever seen 
 the inside of Trinity Church or not. 
 
 Such a law is, on its face, about as reasonable as a law that 
 the congregation of Grace Church should vote for the Vestry- 
 men of Calvary Church — that the stockholders of the Mer- 
 chants' Bank should appoint the Directors of the Bank of Xew 
 York — or that the Mayor and Aldermen of the city of 2sew 
 York should be elected by the inhabitants of all the counties of 
 the State. If it gave me, by way of compensation, a right to 
 
hi 
 
 vote in some one or more of the other churches of the city to 
 which I do not belong ; if it enabled me to retaliate on the 
 congregation of Grace Church, should they compel me to listen 
 to a stupid clergyman every Sunday, by imposing some equally 
 dreary and offensive divine upon them, it would still be absurd- 
 But since it gives to strangers a preposterous right of controlling 
 my affairs, without allowing me the equally irrational indul- 
 gence of interfering in theirs, it is not only absurd, but one- 
 sided and unjust. Therefore, when I became aware of the pro- 
 posed measure, I humbly and dutifully took it for granted 
 that there was something special and peculiar in this case which 
 the Legislature, and Mr. Thurlow Weed, and Mr. E. B. Min- 
 turn knew, and which I did not know — and which explained 
 what seemed so extraordinary and outrageous. 
 
 I proceeded to search for this unknown something, and I 
 diligently read an indefinite number of charters, acts, reports 
 and pamphlets, dating from 1G97 to the present time ; but the 
 result of my investigation was a total failure. I cannot find 
 out, and I hereby beg to be informed, why the congregations 
 of Trinity Church should be an exception to the general rule 
 that every congregation, Presbyterian, Methodist, Episcopalian, 
 Roman Catholic and Latter Day Saint, elect its own officers — 
 vestrymen, trustees, ruling elders, or whatever they may be ; — 
 why these particular congregations should be put in subjection 
 to a crowd of strangers who have no interest in their affairs ; 
 and why (if this anomaly must be established,) they should not 
 have the like privilege of invading Grace Church and St. 
 George's, and compelling their rectors to preach in a surplice 
 and their pewholders to obey new and uncongenial sextous. 
 And until I am informed of some good and satisfactory reason 
 for so strange a violation of universal usage and natural right, 
 I beg leave, as one of the individuals injured and disfranchised, 
 to enter my protest against it. 
 
 The first reason generally assigned is, that Trinity Church is 
 " rich." This is true. By paying the clergymen of its four 
 churches less by half than the churches up-town pay their 
 rectors, it has an annual surplus of income which it gives away. 
 But if its property belongs to it by law, this is an insufficient 
 reason for taking it away. If the Legislature decide that it 
 
3 
 
 can lawfully take away the property and the rights of Trinity 
 Church, (which are my property and my rights) on this ground, 
 there will be joy among the disciples of Fourier, when the 
 fact becomes generally known — the Five Points will call for 
 a Committe of Inquiry to investigate the affairs of the Fifth 
 avenue — and bank stocks and real estate (that of the Church 
 and its enemies included) will fall to a lower figure than they 
 have reached within the memory of the oldest Episcopalian 
 inhabitant. 
 
 Next it is said — as a second reason — that my agents and ser- 
 vants, the Vestry of Trinity Church, whom I helped to elect 
 last Easter Tuesday, have managed my affairs unwisely ; that 
 they have given away money to U High Church n parishes, 
 whereas they ought to have given it to " Low Church " 
 parishes ; that they built a chapel on Twenty-fifth street, for 
 members of their own congregation who lived up-town, where- 
 as they ought instead to have brought up all the old down- 
 town churches, whose congregations had moved away, and sold 
 them at a profit for building lots ; that when they reported to 
 the Senate the value of their property, they stated that each 
 lot was put down as worth so much on the assessors' books for 
 that year, and for how much each was rented ; whereas they 
 ought to have gone farther, and returned opinions as to its 
 value in the market, which any person could determine from 
 these data just as well as they could have done, and generally 
 that "in the opinion of" a number of persons who do not pro- 
 fess to have any special information on the subject, (and who 
 are parties interested in getting away my rights, and many of 
 whom belong to a " committee " appointed by some unknown 
 authority to take measures for getting them away,) the Vestry I 
 employ have not been quite as judicious or quite as efficient as 
 they might have been. 
 
 Now, if we, the congregation of Trinity Church, or our 
 agents, have done any legal wrong, or neglected any legal 
 duty, I suppose the Legislature is not the tribunal to try us. 
 That is work which Judges and Attorney Generals are paid to do. 
 And, if neither we nor our agents have done any legal wrong, 
 but have merely managed our own property and affairs less 
 discreetly than we might have done, neither Court, nor Legis- 
 
4 
 
 lature have power to interfere with us. The remedy is to pass 
 general laws, by which the like abuse or neglect may be pre- 
 vented or remedied for the future. If the Legislature is pre- 
 vailed on to disfranchise me, and take away my property on 
 grounds like these, I shall certainly ask that powerful body at 
 its next session for a Committee of Inquiry to ascertain whether 
 the pew rents of Grace Church be not too high — whether the 
 Vestry of St. George's did not err grossly when they spent the 
 money that would have built a Free Church, in adjoining their 
 own costly, church edifice with a pair of open-work stone stee- 
 ples — and also, whether the estimable and philanthropic private 
 gentlemen who instigate the present prosecution against me, be 
 not really richer than they appear to be on the assessors' 
 books — whether they give away as much of their income as 
 they ought ; and whether their property would not be better 
 taken care of, if I had a share in its management. If they 
 say that all these are questions of private right and private dis- 
 cretion, with which I have nothing to do, I fully admit the 
 force of the objection ; but I reply that they cannot set it up 
 after inviting the Legislature to interfere with my private 
 rights, on the ground of an error in the exercise of a private 
 discretion vested in my agents. And if they say that they 
 have legal rights in Trinity Church, though they do not belong 
 to it, I answer that whether they have them or not, is just as 
 much a question of law for the Court, and not for the Legisla- 
 ture, as the question whether I have a right to interfere with 
 the property of St. George's Church, to which I do not belong, 
 or with the stores and dwelling-houses they suppose themselves 
 to own in fee simple absolute. 
 
 I know of no other ground than these two, on which it is 
 sought to justify the act of confiscation now pending in the 
 Legislature. Wealthy men and conservative men like those 
 who arc active in promoting it, must be visited with judicial 
 blindness, or they would never ally themselves with blind po- 
 pular clamor against a " wealthy religious corporation," and 
 ask the Legislature to set so perilous a precedent. 
 
 The means they have consented to employ arc worse, if 
 possible, than the end they seek to attain. It is a dangerous 
 novelty for the Legislature of this State to undertake the deci- 
 
5 
 
 sion of questions, whether one school of theological opinion or 
 another be the authorized creed of a particular church, — and 
 whether one parish church or another is the better entitled to 
 aid and bounty from Episcopalians. It is quite as alarming to 
 find a Committee of the Legislature appointed to enquire into 
 a question of private right sitting with closed doors, taking e.r- 
 parte evidence " of opinion " from the very men who have 
 constituted themselves, or been constituted by others, a M com- 
 mittee " to attack those rights, refusing even a copy of the 
 testimony thus taken to the parties interested in upholding 
 them, and then suddenly putting on record, without notice or 
 opportunity of defence to the party assailed, a report like that 
 of last January, in which even the worst insinuations embodi- 
 ed in the vague hear-say s thus collected are adopted and exag- 
 gerated. 
 
 Perhaps I may trouble you with some further suggestions on 
 this subject. It deserves attention. The rights of the ancient 
 Corporation now assailed, are of some dignity and of some im- 
 portance — but they are insignificant when compared with the 
 general security of private property, the stability of private 
 right, and the honor of the State of New York; and these are 
 in equal jeopardy. 
 
 March 21st, 1S57. U. 
 

 
 TRINITY CHURCH. 
 
 To the Editors of the "N. Y. Express : 
 
 I lifted up my voice, a day or two since, in humble protest 
 against certain singular liberties which the Legislature is invited 
 to take with my rights and property in a certain church to which 
 I belong. I then expressed my firm and unalterable conviction 
 that the grounds on which that proceeding is commonly defended, 
 to wit — that my church is a rich corporation — that my vestry 
 gives away its surplus income injudiciously — and that its leaser- 
 hold property is*not so well improved by its tenants as it might 
 be if they owned the same in fee — are not (if true in tact) conclu- 
 sive against me in law or logic ; and that it would be more to the 
 purpose to establish, as the lirst step of the argument, that the 
 rights and property in question do not legally belong to me, but 
 do legally belong to the Hon. Mark Spencer and Messrs. Grrin- 
 nell and Minturn, and the other estimable gentlemen who are 
 trying to get them away from me, or to somebody else. When 
 this point is settled, one way or the other, these minor questions 
 may safely be left open as historic doubts for the discussion of 
 antiquarians yet unborn. 
 
 But whether it is thought worth while to discuss them now 
 or hereafter, I distinctly except to the report, or adjudication 
 thereon, lately made to the Senate by the Hon. Mark Spencer 
 and his two colleagues of the "Committee of Inquiry, " and 
 protest against its conclusions as absolutely without weight, 
 wherever they are unfavorable to me and to my rights, which 
 is equivalent to a protest against all of them. 
 
 For, in the first place, the able and excellent Chairman of 
 that Comniitte is unfit to be a judge, because he is a party. He 
 is one of the "Episcopalian inhabitants of the city not belong- 
 ing to the congregations of Trinity Church," to whom he de- 
 clares that the rights and property of myself and others who do 
 belong to those congregations ought to be transferred. Human 
 nature is lamentably weak, and prone to err. When a Judge 
 or a Senator undertakes to decide whether he ought or ought 
 not to have a share iu controlling property, he considers (though 
 
7 
 
 erroneously) to be worth several millions of dollars, there is a 
 certain possibility of some secret unconscious bias that may in- 
 sensiblv affect the even balance of his judicial mind. It may 
 be only a remote possibility, but it is sufficient, in the common 
 Opinion of mankind, to convert his decision into waste paper, 
 particularly if he decide in his own favor, a< Mr. Spencer has 
 decided in this ease. 
 
 But the same gentleman is also reported to he an earnest- 
 minded and zealous leader and counsellor of the clique <>r party 
 of wealthy Episcopalians who are paying the bills and telegraph- 
 ing instructions to the lobby in this very campaign against me 
 and my church, and one of the instigators and prosecutors of 
 this very movement, in the progress of which he has been de- 
 ciding (and will again be called on to decide by his final vote), 
 on my rights and my property. 
 
 And however this may be, it is plain on the face of his own 
 printed report of the proceedings of his own Committee, that 
 he has sought to combine the somewhat inconsistent offices of 
 prosecutor, counsel for the prosecution, party, juryman, and 
 judge; and that in the performance of these complex duties, he 
 has seldom forgotten that he was a plaintiff and a partisan, and 
 has frequently forgotten that he was anything else. 
 
 And I object to this gentleman's judgment that my property 
 shall be taken away and given to somebody else (whether that 
 somebody want it for his own private ends, or in order to build 
 Free Churches for the Fifth avenue), because he is compelled 
 (by the pressure of his manifold duties as a legislator), to decide 
 complex questions of fact, and examine voluminous testimony 
 so hurriedly that he mis-states what witnesses have sworn on 
 material points, and emotes them as saying exactly the reverse 
 of what they said according to the printed testimony annexed 
 to his own report. Thus, when Mr. Gillian C. Verplanck 
 swears that the Vestry of Trinity Church imposed a certain 
 condition on the letting of pews in their new Chapel in order to 
 prevent persons getting possession of them who " had no sym- 
 pathies with us or with any Church, n Mr. Spencer reports to 
 the Senate that, according to Mr. Yerplanck. the object was to 
 exclude such persons as " had no sympathy with the Vestry." 
 A single blunder like this, on any point however insignificant 
 
8 
 
 or collateral, destroys the credit and value of any report or 
 decision. But this is only a specimen of many blunders ; and 
 this point was held by the committee neither insignificant nor 
 collateral. It had been a special subject of ignorant misrepre- 
 sentation. It stands prominent among the charges of miscon- 
 duct, on which the committee considered themselves to be 
 passing judicially. Yet they certify to the Senate and to the 
 community, in substance, that one of our most eminent and 
 widely-known citizens stated, of his own knowledge, that the 
 measure in question was a device to shield the vestry of Trinity 
 Church from the interference of any but their own allies and 
 confederates, when he actually stated (if the committee printed 
 his evidence correctly), that it was meant to " guard against the 
 intrusion of a body of pew holders who had no sympathies with 
 us or any other church," or, in other words, speculators, buying 
 pews to sell them at a profit. 
 
 Again : another charge, (equally prominent, and, so far as I 
 can learn, equally unfounded) is, that my agents, rhe Yestry of 
 Trinity Church, are in a state of chronic torpor and paralysis, 
 which is commonly attributed to their financial plethora ; that 
 they are so absorbed in the beatific vision of their own corpor- 
 ate assets, as to ignore all their corporate duties ; that they have 
 virtually resigned all their corporate functions to two or three 
 of their number called a " Standing Committee," and exist only 
 to register the decrees of that Committee, without presuming to 
 question their propriety. Mr. Verplanck's printed evidence on 
 this point (in " Senate Document Xo. 95,") is explicit and con- 
 clusive ; for lie swears (of his own knowledge) that the Vestry 
 sometimes adopt the recommendations of this "Standing Com- 
 mittee," and "sometimes, and in important matters," reject 
 them. It would seem as if a high order of judicial intellect 
 was not required to grasp this statement or to report it cor- 
 rectly, lint Judges and Senators may be so wrapt in the con- 
 templation of schemes of Church extension and expansive 
 benevolence, as to forget the common-place duty of accuracy 
 and caution in dealing with questions affecting the rights of 
 others — particularly rights to property which they yearn to get 
 within their own control, that they may therewith promote their 
 own orthodox faith and put down somebody else's orthodox 
 
9 
 
 faith. What disturbed the judicial accuracy of this "Select 
 Committee of the Senate," it is impossible to say ; but it is cer- 
 tain that something disturbed it most effectually, for they per- 
 vert Mr. Verplanck' matter-of-fact statement into the precise 
 opposite of what he said — and report that "as Mr. Verplanck 
 quietly observes,' , the Vestry sometimes overrules its standing 
 committee in " unimportant matters." 
 
 It is hardly worth while to spend any more time in pointing 
 out particular mis-statements in the two reports made by this 
 u Select Committee." These are sufficient to show that their 
 conclusions are not reliable, and that if my rights depend at all 
 on these questions of fact, T ought to be tried before some more 
 trustworthy tribunal . 
 
 But one may safelv i>o a little further than this. It may con- 
 fidently be asserted, that even the estimable gentlemen who are 
 now trying to get the control of my church, without the formal- 
 ity of joining its congregation, will themselves confess a year or 
 two hence, when they shall have dismounted their present 
 hobby, that the whole course of this Committee, from first to 
 last, has not been that 'of a dignified semi-judicial body, can- 
 didly and impartially seeking the truth, but has been that of 
 eager prosecutors, rather over-zealous in hunting up evidence 
 * to convict, and rather unscrupulous in using it. 
 
 The Committee met last fall, in this city — and sitting with 
 closed doors, proceeded to take the testimony of certain wit- 
 nesses summoned before it. Thirty-three witnesses were ex- 
 amined. Nine testify, generally as experts in real estate, to 
 the estimated amount of the church property. Number ten is 
 a pewholder in Trinity Church, whose name suggests an ancient 
 controversy about the improvement of certain real estate to be 
 accomplished by carrying a street through Trinity Church-yard. 
 Number eleven is James Boorman, Esq., distinguished for his 
 share in the same controversy, and for sundry peppery publica- 
 tions denouncing woes against the vestry of that church for im- 
 piously and unpatriotically opposing that improvement. Then 
 there are three assistant ministers of Trinity Church (who had 
 been reported to be dissatisfied with some acts or omissions of 
 its vestry) selected out of nine clergy connected with that 
 parish — three vestrymen of Trinity Church, who were asked to 
 2 
 
10 
 
 say very little — the Rev. Dr. Antlion and the Rev. Dr. Tyng ? 
 both most excellent and respectable men, but both somewhat 
 conspicuous for open and consistent hostility to that church on 
 theological and party grounds, during the last fifteen years — 
 the Rev. Thomas H. Taylor, who is said to have proclaimed, in 
 a great speech at a late Diocesan Convention, that " we were 
 going to get away the property of Trinity Church, with law if 
 we could, without law if we must," — General James Watson 
 Webb — half a dozen clergymen, who had made applications to 
 Trinity Church for aid and been denied, and who were naturally 
 disgusted with that church, and necessarily of opinion that its 
 bounty was dispensed most injudiciously — and Messrs. Luther 
 Bradish, John I). Wolfe, Stephen Cambreleng, F. S. Win6ton, 
 R. B. Minturn and Stewart Brown, who are publishing cards in 
 the newspapers as the " Committee of Episcopalians " by whom 
 this prosecution is got up. These are all, except the Rev. Dr. 
 Muhlenberg, known like the rest as opposed to the policy of 
 Trinity Church, but whose testimony is given with candor and 
 with dignity. 
 
 On the evidence of the3e witnesses, (and marvellous evidence 
 much of it is,) the Committee made a long argumentative report 
 in January last, in which they endorsed every hear-say charge 
 and loose insinuation they could pick out of the testimony, and 
 wound up by declaring that although the Vestry of Trinity Church 
 was probably not actually guilty of swindling, it had undoubt- 
 edly acted as it would have done had it intended to swindle. 
 This report was referred back to them. The Church was then 
 for the first time heard, and it produced evidence disproving all 
 the charges seriatim; but the Committee, thus committed in favor 
 of the prosecution, could not change its mind, and made a second 
 report, (some features of which have been pointed out above,) 
 steadfastly maintaining its original position. 
 
 Now, I am anxious to know by what rule the Committee was 
 guided in selecting its own witnesses — and I humbly ask infor- 
 mation on that subject. It is a question of interest to all of 
 us — for if this novel institution of little travelling legislative 
 star-chambers is to form part of our judicial system, we ought 
 to know something about their code of practice. 
 
 Why did the Committee — appointed to enquire into the affairs 
 
11 
 
 of Trinity Church — summon so many witnesses who were no- 
 toriously ancient and bitter enemies of that church I 
 
 Why did it omit to summon as witnesses any of the clergy 
 of this city, and of the hundreds (or thousands) of respectable 
 and intelligent laymen of the city, who have no connection with 
 Trinity Church, but who are well known to regard, esteem and 
 support it as a venerable and beneficent institution, and its ad- 
 ministration as on the whole judicious, though not perfect or 
 infallible ? 
 
 Why did it summon so many clergymen who had applied to 
 Trinity Church for aid and had been refused, and why did it 
 summon none who had applied successfully i 
 
 Why did it ask all these avowed enemies of Trinity Church 
 the rather singular question : M Has that Church done its ut- 
 most to promote the cause of religion? " and why did they omit 
 to ask it of the two or three witnesses who alone could answer 
 it from positive knowledge of the affairs of the Church ( 
 
 Who paid for the elaborate appraisals of real estate laid be- 
 fore the Committee ? 
 
 Did the Committee know that six of their witnesses were six 
 of the prosecutors at whose instance they had been appointed ? 
 Was or was not the Committee or its Chairman in constant con- 
 sultation with them on the subject-matter of their evidence and 
 their prosecution ? Did the Committee or its Chairman furnish 
 them from time to time with full information as to the evidence 
 in progress? Did the Committee receive an application for 
 that evidence from Trinitv Church ? was it refused ? and if so, 
 why ? 
 
 I shall be glad to hear these questions answered. Till they 
 are answered, I shall reluctantly believe that there has been a 
 confederacy between the parties who seek to get away my rights 
 as a member of Trinity Parish and the committee the Legisla- 
 ture appointed to investigate those rights — and if the brute 
 force of a Legislative ukase take them from me, without the 
 decent form of a judicial proceeding, I shall bear it as best I 
 may, and perhaps console myself by framing a historical pa- 
 rallel between the Committee of Inquiry and the Coroner who 
 sat on the late lamented Dr. Burdell — or an essay on improve- 
 ments in the existing law of conspiracy, or a lecture on the 
 
12 
 
 analogies between the philanthropists who began the French 
 Revolution and the conservative churchmen who first taught 
 the people of New York the luxury of confiscation. 
 
 But I hope and believe I shall not be driven to this. 
 
 In 1835, charges of misconduct were made in the Senate 
 against another corporate body — Columbia College — and there 
 was a Select Committee, an inquiry, and a report. I have just 
 picked out that report from a pile of pamphlets, and there is 
 consolation in its concluding pages. The able and impartial 
 Committee on that case seem to have found affirmatively that 
 the College might have erred more or less in the execution of 
 its corporte duties. Certain proposed amendments to its charter 
 had been laid before the Committee, as certain material amend- 
 ments to the charter of Trinity Church, so material as to enable 
 strangers, not of its congregation, to pull it down or turn it into 
 a depot for a Broadway Railroad whenever they like,) are now 
 submitted to the Legislature. The Committee dispose of this 
 question by saying :— ~ 
 
 " The Charter is a contract between the State and the Corpo- 
 " rators, and is not revocable without the consent of the Cor 
 " poration. Any alteration or amendment would be a violation 
 " of that part of the Constitution of the United States which 
 " prohibits State Legislatures from enacting laws to impair the 
 " obligations of contracts." The Legislature have the right, 
 " and they have often exercised it, to send out their Committees 
 " to investigate the alleged abuses and neglects of such Corpo- 
 " rations ; and if such charges are sustained by evidence, and it 
 " is made to appear that the Corporation have violated their 
 " Charter in any material part or parts, it becomes the duty of 
 " the Committee to report a Bill, authorizing and directing 
 k< judicial proceedings to be instituted, with a view to the for- 
 '* feiture of the Charter. The Legislature can only act efFect- 
 " ually against a Corporation through the judicial ti^unals f 
 " but they have the power, and it is their duty in proper cases, 
 M to direct judicial proceedings to be commenced, to restrain a 
 " Corporation within proper limits ; and in case of charitable 
 " institutions, to secure the regular administration and strict 
 " performance of the trust reposed in them." 
 
13 
 
 This is sound doctrine, whether it apply to High Church or 
 Low Church Corporations. If I can be permitted to keep my 
 rights, and my pew, and my share in selecting my clergyman, 
 till they are taken from me by judicial proceedings, before a 
 judicial tribunal, I am content. But I object to giving them 
 up by order of a Committee. O. 
 
 March 25, 1857. 
 
CLASSICS 
 
l£x ICtbrta 
 
 SEYMOUR DURST 
 
 ~t ' ~Tort ntemu d.mjlt.rckim' oj> Je MLanhatarus 
 
 FORT NEW AMSTERDAM. 
 
 IVhen you leave, please leave this book 
 
 Because it has been said 
 "Sver'thmcj comes t' him who waits 
 
 Except a loaned book." 
 
 Avf.ry Arc hitectural and Fine Arts LIBRARY 
 Gin or Si VMoi K B. DuRsrOi n York LIBRARY