date

18 June 1803 Evidence Written
18 June 1803

Evidence

Written

In the case of those[?] offences, which in respect of the individual who is the subject of the mischief of the first order - the subject of a special injury[?] would be capable of securing satisfaction if the law would give it him, in case of this class of cases, if the real plaintiff, in virtue of the name /species/ of suit by which he calls upon the supposed wrongdoer to defend himself lays /prefixes/ a claim to satisfaction on that ground, the fate of the suit is subjected to all those casualties to which the life of the plaintiff is subjected. and The a The wrongdoer is complimented[?] by the law with all that chance /prospect/ of triumph which the contemplation of such casualties can not but afford, and with all that encouragement which is thereby afforded to the villain /villainous instrument of the law/ to [...?] and fill up by slow[?] and, thence unpunishable murder the measure of his villainy. The offence, when satisfaction is thus demanded for it become a tort: the action by which it is so demanded is a personal action: and actio personalis[?] meritur[?] [...?] personâ. the existence /life/ of the remedy is bound up as naturally and reasonably with that of one /the fate of this one/ of the parties injured as the life /existence/ of the wife is bound up with that of the husband by the ties of Indian justice. In the case in question then - the case of an offence exhibiting /presenting/ an assignable individual for the principal subject of the injury can any such case present itself as according to the rule above laid down would open the door to let in this sort of written evidence? The answer is Yes /No/ and no. Not in the case of a prosecution called a criminal one, in which the King is said to be plaintiff /party as well as Judge/: because the plaintiff in that case never dies: Not in the case where the real plaintiff becomes so in name as well as in reality, because in this case, when the plaintiff dies, the action /[...?]/ /cause[?]/ dies with him and with it all possibility of satisfaction to the party injured, and of that species and degree of punishment which is attached to the burthen of affording such satisfaction is buried with him in the same grave.
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  • Title: [June 1807 (4) II. Lit.]
    Description: June 1807

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    2. Next comes the solvent malâ fide Defendant, combating for ultimate success, through intervening casualties; such as deposition of evidence, death of plaintiff, death of defendant himself in a word, in the view of taking the benefit of casualties, of whatever nature and in whatever number, to which the nature of things, as in the instance of deposition of evidence, as for this or any other purpose, Judge and C o, as in the instance of the death of the party injured, or of the wrongdoer himself, have found means to give the effect of destroying the title of the party injured.

    In this, as in the last preceding case, the main engine or instrument provided for the use of encouragement of the wrongdoer, and put into his hands, is the delay: and the quantity of delay being given, and the deleterious quality infused into the casualty in question as above, no such ulterior and all-comprehensive and unremitting case is necessary, as was necessary in the last preceding case, to preserve the wrongdoer from the obligation of yielding up or making satisfaction for mesne profits.

    In a word in the last preceding cases of malâ fide defendant was the malâ fide litigant taking in that quality the benefit of the certain mischiefs of delay; in the present case it is the malâ fide litigant taking the benefit of the contingent mischiefs of delay; as per Table II in both cases.
  • Title: [27 June 1804 Procedure Evils]
    Description: 27 June 1804

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    If in English law in all cases of personal /corporal/ injury the right to satisfaction has been denied to the co-injured /---ly injured/ /-----atively - injured/ and surviving relations, and in the most obvious cases even to the individual whose body has borne the burthen of the injury, it is because in this as well as /on this as well as other/ so many other instances /grounds/, English lawyers /the founders of the English law/, with /to/ the perfect contentment and ratification of their successors, have, by the dint of the viginti annorum lucubrationes, seconded by a most happy and imperturbable insensibility to the failings of humanity, contrived to sink themselves below the level of the Hotentots and New Zealanders /most barbarous of their progenitors/.

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  • Title: [4 July 1807 10 Letter V]
    Description: 4 July 1807

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    Never object to this: say it makes no difference: the more[?] of this [...?] the better the more injustice the more[?] capital punishments the better: it makes [...?] [...?] to learning[?] and to reasonable men[?] [...?].

    Referring to the party wronged, satisfaction for the intermediate damage, you thereby compliment the wrongdoer with correspondent intermediate profit /postium connetande[?]/. Do so to as great an extent as possible.

    2. In the article of certainty you may keep down satisfaction, that is the value of it, with less resource[?].

    Take any casualties choosing them of that sort which are sure to happen at some time or other, take of such casualties the more the better, and give to each of these the effect of putting an end to the plaintiff's right to satisfaction: death of the wrongdoer, and death of the party wronged may serve for example. The sort of persons fit for your purpose will note all these chances, calculate upon them, and committ the wrong as often as the calculation turns out favourable: the individuals marked out for victim will think no more of them, than hitherto the legislature has done. Burying the right to satisfaction for the wrong in the same grave with the author secures the profit of it to those who are most dear to them. When thinking whether to sue or no, the injured plaintiff will never suspect that his right may be thus killed; and his lawyers know better than to put any such notions into his head. Burying it in the same grave with the party wronged, and adds to the account of the murders not often suspected scarce ever discovered, never punished, and in the profit of which you enjoy your share, without any of the reproach.

    In deposition of necessary evidence, you have an event by which as often as it takes place, whatever right depended on it is destroyed of course and without any thing done by you to kill it. What you have to do is to throw obstructions in the way of the collection of the evidence, make it as uncertain as possible when the production of it can be enforced and when not. For every thing else so the directions for the production of uncertainty in general, and of delay in general:- the longer the definitive productive[?] of the evidence can be staved off, the longer the time given to it to die in.