C. Bradlaugh, Esq., M.P.
23, Circus Road, St. John’s Wood, London, N.W.,
March 7th, 1884.
To the Right Hon. Sir Stafford Northcote, Bart, M.P.
Sir,—In reply to your favor of the 4th instant, in which you say that the House held me to be incompetent to take the oath, will you permit me to answer: 1. That the question of competence or incompetence to take the oath is one of law, fit only for the decision of a judicial tribunal, to which tribunal I have always desired and endeavored to refer such question. 2. That if the “principle deliberately adopted” by a large majority of the members of the House of Commons had been that they desired to prevent “a profanation of the oath,” then they ought, during the sessions of 1882—1883, to have gladly facilitated the passage of the Affirmation Bill, which would have prevented the necessity for the fulfilling by me of that which you describe as profanation, but which I contend is the duty imposed on me by law.
In your very temperate historic narrative, you omit the fact that when the House passed its resolution of the 23rd June, 1880, it had before it my declaration, made three weeks earlier, in answer to question 102 of the second Select Committee:
“Any form that I went through, any oath that I took, I should regard as binding upon my conscience in the fullest degree. I would go through no form, I would take no oath, unless I meant it to be so binding.”
And as you refer to my letter of the 20th May, printed in the report of that committee, it is also fair to recall my answer thereon on the same day to question 197: