emoluments of the suspended canonries, etc., pass over to the commissioners, as well as the separate estates of those deaneries and canonries which are not suspended. Out of this fund the expenses of the commission are to be paid, and the residue is to be devoted to increasing the efficiency of the church by the augmentation of the smaller bishoprics and of poor livings, the endowment of new churches, and employment of additional ministers. The substitution of one central corporation for the many local and independent corporations of the church, so far at least as the management of property is concerned, was a constitutional change of great importance, and the effect of it undoubtedly was to correct the anomalous distribution of ecclesiastical revenues by equalising incomes and abolishing sinecures. At the same time it was regarded as having made a serious breach in the legal theory of ecclesiastical property. The important principle, says Cripps, on which the inviolability of the church establishment depends, that the church generally possesses no property as a corporation, or which is applicable to general purposes, but that such particular ecclesiastical corporation, whether aggregate or sole, has its property separate, distinct and inalienable, according to the intention of the original endowment, was given up without an effort to defend it. Legislation The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Acts 1840 to 1885 is the collective title of the following Acts: The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1840 (3 & 4 Vict c 113) The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1841 (4 & 5 Vict c 39) The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1850 (13 & 14 Vict c 94) The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1860 (23 & 24 Vict c 124) The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1866 (29 & 30 Vict c 111) The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1873 (36 & 37 Vict c 64) The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1875 (38 & 39 Vict c 71) The Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1885 (48 & 49 Vict c 31) References External links UK Statute Law Database Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1836 Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1840 Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1841 Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1850 Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1860 Ecclesiastical Commissioners Act 1866 Church of England Welsh laws English laws