date

3 Jan y 1807 Scotch Reform │ │ To
3 Jan y 1807

Scotch Reform │ │ To L d Grenville

Facienda

Causes mostly short

From the number of causes actually gone through each in a fragment of a day viz: in 1/│ │ th of a day in the Birmingham Court as may learn the quantity of time really necessary every where for the completion of a cause in suits of the description as those which are permitted to come before that one of the │ │ Courts of Conscience, or as in Scotland they are termed Small Debt Courts.

By comparing that part of the proportion of England 2,...,... to which enjoys the benefit of those Courts is imported[?] with the remainder 6,...,... to which it is denied, we may learn, within a comparatively inconsiderable distance of the truth, the number representing the degree in which for want of those Courts of Justice is denied, and its proportion to the number representing the cases in which it is not denied but administered.

In the number of Writs annually issued out of these Courts, meaning[?] the sort of Writs /the Writ/ from each of which a cause takes its commencement, we may see the number of instances (in which denial of justice does not take place) in which no such evil takes place as that which comes exactly /strictly/ under the description of a denial of justice.
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  • Title: [11 Feb y 1807 Letter IV Resolut]
    Description: 11 Feb y 1807

    Letter IV

    Resolut 6.7.8.9

    of expence in the article but a pest[?] [...?]

    III Denial of Justice.

    To Estimate the price paid for the benefits of Jury-trial in the article of denial of justice - (for jury trial considered as all along in the character of a substitute to Natural procedure,-) the only course I know of /the most appropriate course seems to be/, is to what part of the population the benefit of the Courts of Conscience for the moving of debts under 40', has been extended, and to what part it has not been extended: with the number of causes of that description annually decided in these parts of the country to which justice in that shape is not denied. assuming what is beyond doubt, that for a debt under that sum, not to speak of debts above that sum to a scarce ascertainable extent, Jury trial in the ordinary Courts affords no remedy: costs out of pocket in case of success amounting to 2,3,4,5; or two times the sum, and so on without any certain limit.

    1 N' o of Inhabitants in Birmingham [...?]

    A o 180 as per Parliamentary Elections .......... 73,670

    2 N o of causes per day in the Court of Conscience

    there[?] (Hutton p. │ │) 130, per day: i.e.

    per week, the Court sitting once a week:

    viz. on Friday: thence per year (A o 1787)

    130 x 52: say making allowance for Good Friday

    &c x 50 = 6,600

    3 Other Districts having Courts of Conscience,

    as per[?] bills of the Arts for that erection,

    42 │: N o of Inhabitants in those Districts

    taken together .............................. 2,193,299

    4 As 73,670 - the number of inhabitants in the

    Birmingham District is to 6,600 the number of

    causes (under 40') so may 2,193,299 the number

    /aggregate/ of inhabitants in the other Court

    of Conscience Districts be supposed to be the

    annual aggregate number of causes of the same

    value actually decided in all those Courts taken

    together

    6,600 x 2,193,299  73,670 = 193,429
  • Title: [3 Jan y 1807 Scotch Reform To L d]
    Description: 3 Jan y 1807

    Scotch Reform To L d Grenville

    Facienda

    After Oath

    Causes mostly short

    For the more correct estimation of the comparative importance of the different ends of justice (as compared with another) as well as for placing the importance of the natural system, as above sketched out, and the artifices of the technical system in the clearest point of view, there is one very simple consideration for which I would particularly beg your Lordship's attention: and that is the vast superiority of number on the part of those causes which for their conclusion and commencement taken together require each of them no more than a small fragment of a day, and consequently present no sort of demand for science /learning/ in comparison of those which requiring greater a length of time constitute the whole of that mass in which are to be /[...?] to be/ sought /found/ the part consisting of those for the due conduct and formula[?] which, in the present state of the law, learning /science/, and, in every state of it, appropriate skill and intelligence, may with propriety be considered as requisite.

    For ascertaining this proportion, if not to a degree in itself approaching to correctness, yet to a degree of correctness abundantly sufficient for the present purpose, two main sources of information are open to us: - 1. One[?] is[?] the number of causes determined in a year in those Courts which afford the most extensive example of the application of the natural system of procedure to civil (non-criminal) suits, (I speak of the Courts of Conscience. The other which concerns regular i.e. technical procedure is the proportion between the aggregate number of Writs annually taken out (that is, causes commenced) in the several superior Courts of Westminster, and the number of causes brought to trial in those Courts.
  • Title: [11 Feb y 1807 Letter IV Resolut]
    Description: 11 Feb y 1807

    Letter IV

    Resolut 6.7.8.9

    Juries

    3. Denial of justice

    Assuming the value of justice to be the same in one district as in another, if the whole number of inhabitants in England and Wales had Courts of Conscience to resort to the number of causes of 40' value and under in this would bear the same proportion to the number of inhabitants districts which have not the benefit of the Courts of Conscience as those which have.

    Say there are 2,193,299 + 73,670 = 2,266,969 the number of inhabitants in the districts to which civil justice is granted to any extent is to 193,429 = 200,029 annual number of cases that may be supposed to be actually decided in these districts, so is 6,607,011 │ the number of inhabitants to whom it is not granted to this extent to the number of causes of that description that would have had place in these same years had justice to this extent been granted to them

    193,429 x 6,607,011  │ │ = 583,338

    Which gives the number of instances in which in the course of a year, in England and Wales denial of justice takes place, so far as concerns causes of debt to a value of under 40'.

    Lawyer - But the Westminster Hall Courts being open for causes down to any the smallest value, and 1' being no uncommon quantum for the amount of damages given by a verdict, an allowance must be made on that score, and a deduction made from your number of 583,338 denials of justice on the causes under 40'.

    Non Lawyer. If the whole number of the causes of all values tried or from these Courts Sittings and Assizes included viz. 3 or 4,000 or so were to be comprized in the deduction it would be hardly worth regarding. But as often as a verdict for not more than 40' is obtained in any of these Courts, though the result is not strictly speaking denial of justice, it is a great worse[?]: it is depredation, and to a great amount on pretence of justice. The Plff[?] supposing him to turn a verdict for 40' and with costs, pays for that verdict no costs out of pocket and not allowed something which is never so little as 40' but rises to ,5, ,10, ,20 an so on without any certain limit: which the defendant procure for the Plff this means ,3, ,7, ,17 or ,17 + χ │ defendant is made to pay a sum of which, (as above) ,60 is the minimum, maximum without limit.