The principal provisions of 6 & 7 Wm. I V. c. 85, which was passed chiefly in favour of those who scrupled at joining in the services of the Established Church, are these :—Marriages may be solemnized on production of the registrar's certifi cate, under the provisions of that act, in like manner as after publication of banns (§ I ). In every case of marriage intended to be solemnized according to the rites of the Church of England. unless by licence or special licence, or after publication of banns, and in every case of marriage in tended to be solemnized according to the usages of the Quakers or Jews, or accord ing to any form authorized by that act, one of the parties is to give notice, ac cording to the form set out in the act, to the superintendent registrar of the dis trict or each of the districts within which the parties have dwelt for seven days then next preceding, stating the name and surname, and the profession or con dition, and the dwelling•place of each, and the time (not less than seven days) during which each has dwelt therein, and the church or building in which the mar riage is to be solemnized (§ 4).
After the expiration of seven days, if the marriage is to be solemnized by li cence (that is, from the surrogate, or officer of the ecclesiastical court), or of twenty-one days, if without licence, the superintendent registrar, upon request, is to issue a certificate, provided no lawful impediment be shown, stating the parti culars set forth in the notice, the day on which it was entered, that the full period of seven days or of twenty-one days has elapsed since the entry of such notice, and that the issue of such certificate has not been forbidden by any authorized person (§ 7). (This provision does not apply to marriages by licence celebrated according to the rites of the Church of England.) The like consent is required to a marriage solemnized by licence, as would have been required to marriages by licence before the passing of the act (that is, by 4 Geo. IV. c. 76, §§ 16, 17), and every person whose consent to a marriage by licence is required by law is authorized to forbid the issue of the superintendent registrar's certificate (§ 10). Every superintendent registrar may Frant licences for marriage in any build ing registered within any district under his superintendence, or in his office (§11). Before any licence for marriage can be granted by a superintendent registrar, one of the parties must appear personally before him, and must, in case the notice of the intended marriage has not been given to the same superintendent regis trar, deliver to him the certificate of the superintendent registrar or registrars to whom such notice has been given ; and such parties must make oath, affirmation, or declaration that he or she believes that there is not any impediment of kindred or alliance, or other lawful hindrance to the marriage, and that one of the parties has for fifteen days immediately before the day of the grant of the licence (or rather the day of the making of the oath, &c.), had his or her usual place of abode within the district in which such mar riage is to be solemnized ; and where either party, not being a widower or widow, is under twenty-one,-that the con sent of the person or persons whose con sent to such marriage is required by law has been obtained thereto, or that there is no person having authority to give such consent (§ 12). No marriage after
notice, unless by virtue of a licence by the superintendent registrar, is to be solemnized or registered until after the expiration of twenty-one days after entry of notice, and no marriage is to be so lemnized by the licence of any super intendent registrar, or registered, until after the expiration of seven days after the day of the entry of notice (§ 14). Whenever a marriage is not had within three calendar months after notice entered by the superintendent registrar, the no tice and certificate, and any licence granted thereupon, and all other pro ceedings, become utterly void ; and no person can proceed to solemnize the mar riage, nor can any registrar register the same, until new notice, entry, and certi ficate (§ 15). The certificate of the su perintendent or superintendents is to be delivered to the officiating minister, if the marriage is to be solemnized accord ing to the rites of the Church of Eng land; and such certificate or licence is to be delivered to the registering officer of Quakers for the place where the marriage is solemnized, if the same shall be so lemnized according to their usages ; or t9 the officer of a synagogue by whom the marriage is registered, if 'to be so lemnized according to the usages of per sons professing the Jewish rehgion; and in all other cases it is to be delivered to the registrar present at the marriage (§ 16).
Any proprietor or trustee of a separate building certified according to law as a place of religious worship may apply to the superintendent registrar, in order that such building may be registered for so lemnizing marriages therein; and in such cases he is to deliver to the superin tendent registrar a certificate signed in duplicate by twenty householders, that such building has been used by them during one year as their usual place of public religious worship, and that they are desirous that the place shall be regis tered ; each of which certificates is to be countersigned by the proprietor or trus tee by whom the same is to be delivered, and the superintendent registrar is to send both certificates to the registrar-general, who is to register such building accord ingly, and indorse on both certificates the date of the registry, and to keep one cer tificate with the other records of the ge neral register office, and to return the other certificate to the superintendent re gistrar, who is to keep the same with the other records of his office ; and the super intendent registrar is to enter the date of the registry of such building, and is to give a certificate of such registry under his hand, on parchment or vellum, to the proprietor or trustee by whom the certi ficates are countersigned, and is to give public notice of the registry thereof, by advertisement in some newspaper circu lating within the county and in the 'Lon don Gazette' (§ 18).