APPROPRIATION, in English law, signifies the perpetual annexation of a benefice, originally furls divini, et in patrimonio nullius, to some spiritual corporation, either sole or aggregate, whom the law esteems equally capable of providing for the service of the church, as any single private clergyman.
This contrivance seems to have sprung from the po licy of the monastic orders, who have never been defi cient in subtile inventions for the increase of their own temporal power and emoluments. At the first institu tion of parochial clergy, the tithes of the parish were distributed in a fourfold division; one for the use of the bishop, another for maintaining the fabric of the church, a third for the poor, and the fourth to provide for the incumbent. When the sees of the bishops became otherwise amply endowed, they were prohibited from demanding their usual share of these tithes, and the division was in three parts only. And hence it was in ferred by the monasteries, that a small part ivas suffi cient for the officiating priest, and that the remainder might well be applied to the use of their own fraterni ties, (the endowment of which was considered as a work of the most exalted piety,) subject to the burthen of repairing the church, and providing for its constant sup ply. And, therefore, they begged and bought, for masses and orbits, and sometimes even for money, all the advowsons within their reach, and then appropriated the benefices to the use of their own corporation.
In order to make an appropriation, the king's license must be obtained in chancery, and also the consent of the ordinary, patron and incumbent, where the church is full ; and of the diocesan and patron, where the bene fice is void. (Plowd. 496. 15 R. II. e. 6.) When the appropriation is thus made, the appropriators and their successors are perpetual parsons of the church ; and must sue and be sued, in all matters concerning the rights of the church, by the name of parsons. (Hob. 307.) An appropriation cannot be assigned over, or surrendered to any one ; nor can it endure longer than the body spiritual to which it was at first appropriated : hut those t6 whom it is granted may make leases of the profits. (Plowd. 499.) The appropriation may be severed, and the church become disappropriate in two ways. 1. If the patron or appropriator presents a clerk, who is instituted and inducted to the parsonage. 2. If the corporation which has the appropriation be dissolved, the parsonage be comes disappropriate at common law. An appropria tion, once severed, can never he reunited again, unless by repetition of the same solemnities. (Co. Litt. 46.) For a more particular account of the progress of ap propriations, the reader may consult Blackstone, b. I. eh. II. See also the articles BENEFICE, PARSON, and VICAR. (1