disestablishment

The downgrading or dissolution of something that had been established.

The downgrading or dissolution of something that had been established.

Disestablishment of the church would deprive the gentry of another property right – the right of presentation to a living, a right for which they or their ancestors had paid hard cash and which gave them useful opportunities of providing for a younger son or a poor relation.

As evangelicals defect in one direction and traditionalists in the other, and disestablishment beckons with the reform of the House of Lords […].