MARRIAGE LAWS

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 157, 23 September 1927, Page 13

MARRIAGE LAWS

BILL PASSES COUNCIL MR. ISITT’S FINAL PROTEST (THE SUN'S Parliament an'y Reporter) WELLINGTON, Thursday. In spite of further opposition in the Legislative Council by the Hon. L. M. Isitt, the Marriage Amendment Bill, which gives religious bodies who have no priests the power to nominate one of their number to perform marriages, has been finally passed. When the Bill was in the committee stage in the Council this afternoon, the Leader of the Council, the Right Hon. Sir Francis Bell, said that he did not see any reason why the civil ceremony should not be regarded as the legal ceremony. Members (warmly): Hear! Hear! “I hope.” Sir Francis added, “that the committee will not be misled into the Idea that what we are proposing is an innovation which will allow one of a body of persons who are objectionable to become a minister. There is absolutely nothing in the Bill which is not in the present law, except that the existing .law has omitted the one case where the religious body has not got a pulpit.” , , The Hon. L. M, Isitt asked what was the necessity for the Bill. He suggested that the provisions of the Bill should be confined this year to the Plymouth Brethren, who desired it, and next year the whole position could be reviewed. The Council agreed to an amendment proposed by Sir Francis Bell, providing that nominees must be of good character, and the Bill was put through the remaining stages and passed.