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Show 34 INTRODUCTION. trial by jury, enormous damage were given.* Legal "comity,, perhaps prevented any interference. Pre ~nLly, how-ever, t h e 1o ng P ar II.u '". 'ment met, .a. nd a sinOb 'le resolution of that boJy stopped forever this u .. urpa.tion. . .. But while a scrupulous adherence to technicahtle and to legal etiquette prevented the common law court ... , on the one hand, from doing justice in private ca e ' anu on the other from guarding the subject against official inju1~ie. a~d u su q~ations, they showed thcmselve , as the following bwgraplncs will prove, the ready and willing tools on all occa ion of every executive usurpation. If the people of Great Britain and America are not at this moment lave , most certainly, · as the following biographies will prove, it is not court' nor lawyers that they have to thank for it. How essential to liberty is the popular clement in the administration of criminal law- how ab ~ olutely nece -ary is the restraint of a jury in criminal ca ... e -was mo t abundantly proved by the proceedings of the l~n gli --h court of tar Chamber and Ilicor h Con1mis ion. The Court of Star Cham-ber, though of very ancient origin, <lerived its chief i1nportance from statutes of Ilenry ·vii. and IIenry VIII., by which it was investc<l with a discretional'y authority to fine and imprison in all cases not proviued for Ly exi ting laws, being thus erected, according to the boasts of Coke and Bacon, into a ''court of criminal equity." The Court of IIigh Comn1is ion, who e juri diction was mainly limited to clergymen, was created by a . tatuie of Elizabeth as the uepository of the eccle. iastical authority as head of the church a sumcd * Hyde, (afterwards Lord Clarendon,) himself a lawyer, by whom the usurpations of this court were brought to the notice of Parliament, stated that more damages had been given by the carl marshal in his days, for words of supposed defamation, of which the law took no notice, than by a1l the comts of \V cstminster Hall during a whole term. 1XTRODU TIO~. 35 after the reformation by the Engli h sovereigns. Both these court con ' isted of high ofHcer.~ of the crown, including judges and crown lawyer" ; an<l though not authorized to touch life or men1ber, they became ... uch in trumeni of iyrnnny a to lna]-e their abolition one of the flrst thing~ done after the meeting of the Long Parliament. The only American parallel to the, court" i to be found in the authority conferred by the fugitive act of 1 60, upon certain comini --. ioners of the CircuiL Court of the United State , to seize and deliver oYer to . lavery peaceable resident in their re pcctiYe sLates, without a jury, anJ without app8al. IIi. tory is philo.~opby teaching by example. Fron1 what judges have attempted and have clone in tirnc. past, anu in England, we 1nay draw orne pretty shrewd conc1usi n · as to what, if unchecked, they n1ay att mpt, and 1nay do, in tin1es pre ·en t, and in Atnerica. Nor let any man f'ay that the following page.· prcscn t a collection of judi ·ial portrait~ di."tot'Led nncl caricaLu rcu to . t~ n· an occa ion. TI1cy have lJ n Lorrowecl, word for won1, fr01n t lte Lives of tlt e C lt ief ,) us- 1 icc:; and of the Chancellor:; of' I~ ng land, by Lord Cmn pLell, him. elf' a lawyer and a judge, and though a lihcral-mi nJed and free-. poken mnn, Ly no 1ncans without qt~ite a snHicirnt share of the Psprit du.~ corps of' the profe.-sion. D(·ri v d fr01n . uch a sour ·c, not only may the faet. stateJ in Llt · following biographie~ be relied upon, but the exprcs:-liow~ of' opinion upon p)ints of law arc entille<l to all th · weight of ltigll prof<·ss ional authority. Kor let it be aiel that tl1ese biographies r('late to :ut~·iLnt time~, and can have no parallelism, OJ' lJut Ji!!l(•, to the present state of affairs among u::; l1cre jn Anl<'l'i('n~ 'L'h ' times whielt they include are tlu~ tjm ~ of llw till'ttgglo in Great Brit~ in between thf" jcl< ns of fr<'r gov< l'JtrnPnt nnd |
