1280 LAWS OF MARYLAND [CH. 462

WHEREAS, the original Act and the several amendments
thereto have not heretofore been included in the Maryland
Code of Public General Law but nevertheless have con-
tinued to be in force and effect (see Bartlett v. Hipkins,
76 Md. 5; Brayshaw v. Ridout, 79 Md. 454; Stubbs v.
Vestry, 96 Md. 267, and the Act of 1892, Chapter 702, re-
pealed by the Act of 1900, Chapter 450); and

WHEREAS, the purpose of the present Act is to include
therein the provisions of the original Act and its several
amendments with certain further amendments which ex-
perience has shown to he desirable for the administration
of their duties by the Vestries of the several Protestant
Episcopal Churches owing to changes in practical condi-
tions during the last 150 years, but without impairing the
historic continuity or materially changing in basic prin-
ciple the nature, powers, duties and functions of the
Vestries of the several churches, and

WHEREAS, (a) the Convention of the Protestant Episco-
pal Church of the Diocese of Maryland, as hereinafter re-
ferred to, was incorporated by Chapter 67 of the Acts of
1840 and amended by Chapter 17 of the Acts of 1856 and
Chapter 87 of the Acts of 1937, and by Chapter 403 of the
Acts of 1878; and by authority of the Convention in 1867,
the Maryland Diocese, which originally included all of the
Protestant Episcopal Churches in the State was divided
by creation of a new Diocese known as the Diocese of
Easton, embracing therein all said Protestant Episcopal
Churches in nine Counties on the Eastern Shore of Mary-
land lying east of the Chesapeake Bay and of the Susque-
hanna River, and in 1896, by like authority of the Con-
vention, the Protestant Episcopal Churches within the
four Maryland Counties of Prince George's, St. Mary's,
Charles and Montgomery, were, together with the Episco-
pal church in the District of Columbia, organized into the
Diocese of Washington, and as to ecclesiastical matters
the said Episcopal Churches in the several Dioceses are
governed by the canons of their Diocese and of the Pro-
testant Episcopal Church in the United States of America,
but with respect solely to secular matters, the Vestries of
all of said Churches within the State of Maryland as cor-
porate bodies are subject to the laws of the State.

(b) The word "Parish" as originally used in the Vestry
Act referred particularly only to the territorial limits in
relation to the churches of the Parish respectively but by
common usage the term as now used, dependent upon the
context, sometimes refers to the Church Congregation