date

24 Dec r 1806 Scotch Reform To L d
24 Dec r 1806

Scotch Reform To L d Grenville

Resolut. 10

Advocation Suspension

On a closer examination denial of justice will be found resolvable, either into misdecision or into delay: if /is it/ the result of any positive act on the part of the Court, the propriety of the term misdecision /it comes under misdecision clearly/ if applied to it is indisputable: is it the result of a negative act, a continued[?] act, the /to the/ character of which there are no assignbale limits, it comes under delay: delay to proceed with the cause of already entertained delay - delay to entertain it, if not yet entertained. Denial of justice therefore /then/, if by a negative act, merely is neither more nor less than delay: and i conversio[?] all delay that might be avoided without preponderant inconvenience /mischief/ in some other shape (vexation expence of[?] misdecison) is denial of justice while it lasts.

Of misdecision the mischief belongs not more to one side than to the other: of the mischief of delay, the greater part of the mischief attaches itself exclusively to the plaintiff's side. Whether it be or be not [...?] of the defendant to be compelled to comply with the /a compliance with the/ demand, it is matter of inconveniences /matter of vexation/ to time[?] to be kept in a state of apprehension in respect of the being thus compellable /subjected to the burthen of the demand/. But the inconvenience thus attached to the Defendant's side has its counterpart attached to the Plaintiff's side. There remains the main[?] inconvenience of /from/ delay, which is the not being in possession of the good /desirable object/ the benefit which is the subject of the demand: and the inconvenience this article in the catalogue of the mischiefs of delay is exclusively attach itself exclusively to the plaintiff's side, having /and has/ nothing that corresponds to it on the defendant's side.
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    Letter V

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    2. Denial of justice. This mischief, as already observed, coincides in the main with that of misdecision, so far as it operates to the prejudice of the plaintiff's side. The wrong which in consequence is left without redress is susceptible of all the various modifications alluded to above.

    But in the case of misdecision, to this wrong, be it what it may, has been added the wrong done by whatever vexation in the shape of expence or any other shape has been imposed on any person or persons in the interval between the commencement of the suit and the termination which, from the supposed wrongful decision, it has received. In the case of simple denial of justice this aggravation of the main wrong has no place.

    Denial of justice may be the work and thence the fault, either of the system, (the system of procedure) or of the Judge.

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    So far as it is the work of the Judge, the denial may be positive or negative, or say expressed or implied. If expressed, it is in effect misdecision, a wrongful decision differing from misdecision at large, no otherwise than by being pronounced at the very outset of the cause. The Judge refuses to take cognizance of the plaintiffs demand: and in the refusal thus made consists the wrong.

    {When the denial is of the negative kind, it is effected by non-decision. If the duration of this negative act of non-decision has any bounds, the evil coincides with that of delay. No refusal is declared: but during the length of time consumed by the delay, cognizance is not taken of the cause. In this case the evil consists of the simple denial of justice, as above, with the evil of delay (which see further on superadded.}
  • Title: [7 Aug st 1807 /7 March 1808/ Letter]
    Description: 7 Aug st 1807 /7 March 1808/

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    1. Misdecision; when to the prejudice of the plaintiff's side of the cause.

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    Description: 7 March 1807

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