date

26 Jan y 1808 Codification Jury Trial
26 Jan y 1808

Codification Jury Trial

Jury Trial

Cutting

For further illustration, and to take /find/ a case belonging to statute law, from civil judicature pass on to criminal and instead of sale and selling , let the words be cut and cutting. A law is made /created/, requiring of the Judge to put to death whosoever /every man that/ with certain evil intentions therein described, shall have been found guilty of cutting one[?] body of another: a law proposed and enacted doubtless in this view, that a man /men/ by whom but for this mischief of that description might have been perpetrated, may by the fear of the law be deterred from it. The men in whom this wicked habit[?] had been observed, which wicked habit it were the object /design/ of the law to put an end to, were habitual thieves /depredators/, a class composed of the most illiterate and ignorant among the people. What always has been and so long as the rule[?] of action in respect of cognisibility continues in its present state, always will be not only possible but altogether probable in that without having known of its existence, men may in any number come to be put to death for having offended against the law. What neither has been nor ever will be possible is, that by this or by any her law "men's conduct should be influenced any further than on the existence of a law to that effect as well as the import of that law has been brought within his knowledge.

/it had in any misconduct[?] any/
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  • Title: [26 Jan y 1808 Codification - Jury]
    Description: 26 Jan y 1808

    Codification - Jury Trial

    Jury Trial

    Cutting[?]

    Here then for the purpose of causing a man to be put to death, fr this purpose all men without distinction, the most ignorant included /not excluded are supposed not only to be apprized[?] of the existence of the law by which the being that dealt with is made the consequence of the act of cutting[?] accompanied with the bad intentions therein described - apprized of its existence , and to the effect in question approved of the meaning of the several words of which it is composed /by which it stands expressed/, the words cut and cutting among the rest. But when[?] for the purpose of sitting in judgment on an accusation charging a man with having committed the[?] forbidden act of this description, a man of a class superior /superior to the table[?] of the [...?]/ in point /respect/ of condition of life ad the portion of knowledge naturally attached to it, and on account of such [...?] superiority selected, is placed in the situation of a Judge, then it is that because not being he is not a professionally bred lawyer /Judge/, he is regarded by those who are professionally bred lawyers, as a man incapable of understanding ad not it to be treated [...?] what it is that cutting is /the word cut and cutting mean/. That the individual accused has been guilty of offending against the law by which a [...?] of death the act of cutting is [...?] accompanied with the evil [...?] in question made a capital offence is what they are indeed permitted to decide: but the act /word/ of cutting being one of the number of the words employed in the law, and the question concerning the import of it being accordingly a question of law and professionally bred lawyers the only persons capable /qualified/ of understanding /o decide in/ questions of law, and the Jury men[?] [...?] of them professionally bred lawyers shame it is that their having pronounced the accused guilty of the act of cutting accompanied with he evil instances in question is not a sufficient warrant for the declaring him guilty.
  • Title: [26 Jan y 1808 Codification - Jury]
    Description: 26 Jan y 1808

    Codification - Jury Trial

    Jury Trial after Cutting

    [...?] judges of law

    If indeed in the station of a Juryman, of the [...?] of temporary Judge so called, a man is not to be considered as capable of understanding the import of those laws, by which in the instance of any of them in case of is failing to understand it liable to be put to death is[?] rescued[?], then indeed s far as the exercise of the function of a Juryman is concerned, there is no use in putting the rule of action into the state of real law instead of having it in the state of sham law. But if such e the effect or rather no-effect given to a decision pronounced by a Jury, the results seem to be that instead of applying a check to /remedy against/ misdecision the Jury box intervention of a [...?] set of temporary Judges /assessors/ so [...?], will in Scotland as in England serve as an engine of arbitrary power, as an instrument for facilitating misdecision, as a service for it which producing and when[?] produced.

    Judging without a Jury, a Judge can not pronounce a wrong decision, without being in point of reputation[?] at least, and at the bar of public opinion responsible for it, punishable by los of reputation /[...?]/. Judging with a Jury, preserving the power in the way or other he eases /contrives/ himself of the yoke. For whatever justice, by [...?] /[...?]/ or misrepresentation he [?] [...?] certain to make them the instruments of, nobody is responsible for: not he, fr it is not his [...?]: not they, because they constitute so many services[?] to one another, and it is the characteristic property of the Jury-box that without exposing themselves to suffer in any shape, men may do in it what hey please.
  • Title: [26 Jan y 1808 Codification-Jury Trial]
    Description: 26 Jan y 1808

    Codification-Jury Trial

    Jury Trial

    Cutting

    continued

    guilty of so doing, and for dealing with him accordingly, forasmuch as for the reason aforesaid it is not be presumed /believed/ of the though upon their oaths they say do, hat they understand what cutting is. To understand what cutting is, it is necessary for a man to be a professionally bred Judge. Accordingly on this occasion what is meant by the word to cut is a question fit to be referred, and referred accordingly to the 10 great Judges.

    Though they were all taylors, as cabinet makers or cutters employed in cutting from childhood upwards, still they would not know any of them what cutting is the instant they were put /are shut/ into the Jury-box that knowledge has passed from /out of them/: for him to do[?] presume[?] whatever knowledge has experience may have helped him to [...?] the import of the word cutting a man's seat must be on the Bench.