The Elizabethan Parish in its Ecclesiastical and Financial Aspects | Page 9

Fifty years later
we find this vestry ordaining the same procedure to be followed against
parish debtors, and referring to its former order.[126]
It seems, in fact, to have been the well-understood thing that just as
parish rates to defray the costs of those matters of parish administration,
falling within the province of the ecclesiastical courts, were to be
assessed by the authority, and under the direction, of those courts, so,
too, the recovery of these rates was to be had before the same tribunals.
It is not denied that recourse may occasionally have been made in these
matters to the courts of common law, but it is believed that the proper
remedy was at ecclesiastical law.[127] Furthermore, we believe that the
means at the disposal of the ecclesiastical courts for putting their
judgments into effect were quite sufficient and in practice effective.
What these means were will be taken up and discussed a little further
on. Returning to the matter of suing parish debtors in courts Christian,
it is interesting to find that in the language of the period a suit "at law"
did not always mean at common law. An order of the vestry of Stepney,
London, in February, 1605-6, after determining the manner in which
£50 should be raised to pay off parish debts due to the bell founder,

adds that persons refusing to pay their shares, or neglecting to do so,
should not find themselves aggrieved "if the same be recouered against
them by Lawe." And the meaning of this term is fully explained by
these subsequent words in the same order, that the churchwardens shall
"at the chardg of the p[ar]ish appointe and entertayne one doctor and a
proctor to sue and recouer the same by lawe of any p[er]son [etc.]."[128]
Now doctors and proctors practiced before ecclesiastical tribunals
only.[129]
That presentment to the ordinary was the common and usual way, not
only of recovering church rates, but any thing of value that belonged to
the parish and was unjustly detained, the act-books and other
documents of the time plentifully show. Thus in Archbishop Parker's
Visitation Articles for the diocese of Canterbury in the year 1569, he
requires all churchwardens to report to their ordinaries "whether there
be any money or stoke, appertaininge to any paryshe churche, in anye
manne's handes, that refuse or differeth to paye the same [etc.]."[130]
The wardens of Melton Mowbray record under the year 1602 an item
for charges at the court at Leicester against a parishioner "for not
payinge his levi for the churche."[131] Those of Ashburton, Devon,
itemize in 1568-1569 two shillings "for a zytation to those that wold
nott pay to the power."[132] As the wardens of East Tilbury were going
about among the parishioners demanding money of each one according
to the rating inscribed on an assessment roll which they carried with
them, one Garrett, a constable, discontented that he himself should be
rated as high as four shillings, seized the roll and refused to produce it.
This, of course, put an end to further collections. For this he was
presented by the vicar before the consistory court at Stratford Bow
Chapel. Here he alleged that the rating "was very unequally made." But
the judge warned Garrett to appear in court the following Tuesday to
answer for his contempt. Further he was to pay his four shillings to the
wardens and bring to the judge the wardens' certificate that he had done
so. On the day appointed Garrett was present in court with the vicar and
wardens. The decree of the court is headed: "_Negotiu[m]
reparac[i]o[n]is eccl[esi]e de_ East Tilburie," and is so characteristic of
the thoroughgoing and searching manner in which ordinaries
supervised the administration of parish affairs that we cannot forbear to
quote a large part of it in full. "Touchinge the same Wm Garrett," the

registrar inscribes in the act-book, "the churchwardens do here testifie
that he hathe payd his iiij s. w[hi]ch he was rated at...& they saye they
have receyved it. Towching the churchwardens & the repayre [of] the
church," the scribe continues, "the Judge doth order that the minister,
Mr Howdsworth, [and seven others named, including wardens, sidemen
and constables]...p[ro]cure workmen of all trad[es], & then sett downe
under their hand in writing what chardg it will be to repayer the church
sufficiently in all thing[s] wharein it is decayd, as namely, tyling,
paving, masonns worke, carpenters worke & glasing...and when they
have under the workmens hand founde what will repayer the churche in
every p[ar]ticuler, then shall they all nyne assemple themselves in the
church [on a day named]...and make a rate to that proportion w[hi]ch
shall remayne above the rate already allowed of...and they shall certify
in Stratford bowe Chappell bothe of the vew making by the workmen,
of the