date

10 June 1804 Procedure (4)
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.
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    My Lord, when a lawyer attempts to prove /is considered enough to //is ill enough advised/ his system to be any thing better than a system of legalized pillage, this is what he is reduced to: he has nothing else.

    Formalities of technical judicature the safeguards of justice! My Lord, under the name of devices Your Lordship has seen a list of the contrivances that constitute the characters /constituting the principal/ of the technical, the existing system formalities included, whatever was meant by formalities. My Lord - it has been shewn of them one by one - there is not a single one of them, by which the chance of misdecision is not encreased, the chance of good justice lessened.
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    Of these Courts of Natural procedure the authority is every [...?] of it no more than has been given to them by the legislators, given to them time after time, and upon experience of the good fruits by the King in Parliament,

    Of the Courts of Technical procedure the authority is in great part of it so much made or rather snatched /purloined by fraud or lawless force/ in the way of fraud or robbery /rapine[?]/ or both, in dispute of the legislation; stolen from the supreme authority and from one another[?], during the infancy or the [...?] of Parliament:

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    Of the suits /causes[?]/ heard and [...?] under the system of Natural /technical/ Procedure, by the Courts of Natural /technical/ Procedure, great, deplorably great, as is the absolute number, still the relative number, relation being had to the number of suits heard and determined under the system of natural procedure, by the Courts of Natural Procedure, is but small. According to natural justice, on pursuit of and in exact conformity to the ends of justice, the causes heard in this kingdom - in all three kingdoms, heard and determined
  • Title: [10 June 1804 Procedure (20]
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    Procedure (20

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    ' 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.