date

10 June 1804 Procedure (20
10 June 1804

Procedure (20

Ch. Basis

' Turkish

The acknowledged defects of Turkish judicature have for more than half an age been the stronghold of the patrons of abuse /bad judicature/. There (they say) you have your judicature in the family /domestic/ state, and see what it is you get by it. The vexation, no expence, no delay, but the small matter /portion/ of [...?] that may happen to /is indispensable //[...?]// from enquiry, whichever may be the subject in the end/ be absolutely indispensable. No vexation expence and delay, or next to none: yet Turkish judicature is a proverb /proverbial/ for injustice.

Causes, concomitant but influencing circumstances - Co-effects and obstacles - all have their connection /are connected in one way or another/ with the effect. Shallow /weak or hasty/ men actually take - wicked and deceitful men pretend to take - not only co-effect, and uninfluencing circumstances - but even obstacles for causes.

The vexation, the expence the delay, even the dangers of "justice, are the price (says a French writer /says [...?]/) which each Citizen pays for his liberty." The observation in itself is true: and so true as in itself to be not worth making. But the conclusion which he designs /intends/ the reader should draw, and which but too many readers have been weak /hasty/ or wicked enough to draw - though he had not the face /courage/ to draw it himself - is - that these obstacles to good judicature are indispensable causes: [...?] quibus [...?] and that as according to the trite but uninstructive /familiar but more perplexing than instructive/ maxim effects are always proportioned to their causes - the greater the mass of vexation, expence and delay preceded your /any/ decision, the better the /your/ chance /security[?]/ it has of being conformable to direct justice. Examine (says he) the formalities of justice in respect of the trouble /hrams/ which it costs a citizen ti get /must be at/ his property restored to him, or to get satisfaction for any personal injury, you will doubtless find too many: regard the relation they [...?] to the liberty and security of individuals /citizens/, you will often find too few: and then comes the passage from whence you are to understand that the justice you buy is good, in proportion as the price you are made to pay for it is excessive.
Similar Items
  • Title: [10 June 1804 Procedure (4)]
    Description: 10 June 1804

    Procedure (4)

    Ch. Basis

    ' Turkish

    The loaf you have been making me pay a penny for (send a boy once to a baker) is not fit to cut: it is full of chalk and fish bones. Give me a shilling for it, replied the baker it will be the best you ever tasted.

    The fable is too absurd, to pass even for /as/ a fable. Yet putting only justice for bread, (and surely the story is not mended by it /the change/) thus silly is the story /apology //plea/ which passes for probity and superior wisdom among /reply which is taken or pretended to be taken for wisdom by/ men of law!

    The object is to make men cherish /hug //clasp// to their bosoms/ all these abuses which are the obstacles /obstructions/ to good judicature, under the notion of their being necessary to it so many courses necessary to its existence: to propagate an undiscriminating fondness /veneration/ for technical judicature /modes of procedure/ in all its forms /in whatever form it shows itself //they show themselves/ - and to turn with horror from the only just and natural one. Natural justice /judicature //procedure/ - judicature /procedure/ in which you have no more vexation, expence and delay than what is necessary, is the sort of procedure /justice/ they have in Turkey - and you see what they get by it. "An observation One hears continually" (says he) "is - that justice ought to be administered as it is in Turkey. The mmost ignirant of men [...?] (continues he) are the only men upon earth who have seen clearly into /daylight in/ the business of all businesses which it concerns man most to understand /go to the bottom of/.....In Turkey where very little regard is paid to either the property the life or the reputation of the subject, nothing of this sort if worth a thought. disputes of all kinds, are dispatched one way or other in a trice. how they are ended /[...?] nothing/ so they are ended. The [...?] who see through the business at glance /who understand every thing before a word is spoken/ gives plaintiff and defendant so many bastinadoes, and or sends each of them to his[?] home.
  • Title: [10 June 1804 Procedure (6)]
    Description: 10 June 1804

    Procedure (6)

    Ch. Basis

    Turkish

    The story /epigram/ about the bastinadoes is a wretched /miserable/ sophism. It would have been argument, had the adversaries he was combating /causes //opponents// of the abominations he was pleading for/ recommended this ceremony /operation/ as a substitute to the formalities they were complaining of, or if /had/ any necessary connection had been shown /pointed out/ between this accidental use of power on the one hand and the hearing of the best evidence, extracted in the best mode free from the injustice of unnecessary /useless/ expence and delay, and vexation on the other.

    The question is - if in any European state, the natural and summary system of procedure as above described were substituted throughout to that technical system which alone is recognised by lawyers /professional men/ under the name of regular - would the practice of giving a beating to both parties without cause, be a probable consequence - or say even more likely to happen than at present? To state the question it to answer it.

    Excepting the exclusions put upon the best evidence by any false science, in respect of the faculty of saving the suitor from unnecessary vexation expence and delay, the mode of judicature of the English Country Magistrate is exactly upon a footing with that of the Turkish Bash[...?]. In the compass of a twelvemonth how many bastinadoes are distributed among suitors by the aggregate body of the English Justices of the Peace?
  • Title: [16 May 1807 Judicial Injustice]
    Description: 16 May 1807

    Judicial Injustice

    Prevention of application for relief are

    1. General - common to all systems: 2. particular, viz. to English system.

    But on a closer inspection it will be seen, that cases are no where wanting in which injustice to any amount and in any of its shapes may be done in the way of judicature in the Courts below, applications made to the superintending judicature for the redress of such injustice can not reasonably be expected.

    The circumstances by which such application is capable of being prevented may be distinguished in the first place into natural or general obstacles to application, and particular or factitious obstacles: 1. general; viz: such as are common to all countries and all systems of procedure, the natural not excepted: 2. particular; viz. those which are peculiar to the technical system, and in particular to the English branch of it.

    Natural obstacles to application, are 1. the natural and avoidable vexation, 2. the natural and avoidable expence, whatever vexation and expence may, in the individual instance in question, happen to be naturally and unavoidably concomitant to the operations necessary to be performed for that purpose.

    2. the death or other physical disability of the party originally interested, in every instance in which such disability is not made up for by the ability coupled with adequate interest on the part of some other person in the character of his successor or representative.

    In addition to these natural obstacles, factitious obstacles unquestionably to a greater or less amount [may] be found in every mode of the technical system wheresoever established: and these too over and above the mass of factitious delay, vexation and expence which in a greater or lesser proportion is the unseparable concomitant of the technical system wheresoever established.

    The English branch of the technical system has obstacles that are peculiar to it. These are here mentioned in the mass pro summariâ[?]: further on a particular and distinct enumeration of them will be endeavoured to be made.