Public Religion in the English Colonies

It has become almost a commonplace of textbooks that English public ecclesiastical law has no application to the colonies. Halsbury states this baldly and without qualification, relying chiefly on the judgment of the Privy Council in Re Lord Bishop of Natal, a case of unquestioned significance for the development of the family of churches in the English Prayer Book tradition. But both from historical interest and with an eye to those colonies still in being, the issue is one which deserves a second glance. This article will argue that whether or not the Natal decision was right on its facts, the Judicial Committee in that case made an important distinction which later textbook generalisations—and indeed the Crown's advisers at the time—appear to have overlooked; and that other decisions, relied upon in support of such generalisations, can be supported neither from principle nor from earlier practice.