date

12 Jan y 1807 Facienda IV.
12 Jan y 1807

Facienda

IV. Inquirenda

Fees &c.

Thus much for England: - let us see now what obedience was paid to the authority of the Inquisitorial branch of the Legislature on the farther side of the Tweed.

In reply to the question concerning Judges fees, the Clerk to the Court of Session, by order of their whole Lordships returns Nulla bona - No benefits have we or any of us in that shape.

My Lord the fact is and was /was and is/ false: the falsity of it is notorious: it stands recorded in their Acts of Sederunt /it was known to every body and printed/. It is copied into their books of practice.

Why say thus, and thus in the teeth of truth - that they /they the Judges/ derived no benefit from fees? Was the question asked of them? No. But it was matter of notoriety, and matter of universal scandal and complaint - even among those who shared in the profit of it - that in that Court - in the Technical Courts into which it decomposes[?] itself in the first instance - denial of justice knows no bounds: and having it to say - at least I hope they had it to say without any direct lie without any such violation of the laws of sincerity as could directly and properly in strict propriety of speech come under the denomination of a lie that whatsoever might be the magnitude of the abuse, they in their own person did not derive any benefit from it, so they /it was/ said accordingly.
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  • Title: [Jan y 1806 Facienda IV. Inquirenda]
    Description: Jan y 1806

    Facienda

    IV. Inquirenda

    Fees

    My Lord on this head I observe a sort of contradiction which I am inclined to think will not be found altogether undeserving of your Lordship's notice.

    In the Report concerning the High Court of Session in Scotland (30 th Report of Committee in Finance Appendix A.1) dated at Edinburgh 10 th April 1798 signed "by order of the Court John Pringle one of the Principal Clerks of Session, I find a round assertion in the following words "Neither the President nor the other Judges have any Enducements, Perquisites or Benefits whatsoever, excepting their Salaries".

    In M r Russel's practice of the Court of Session 2 d edit. A o 1768 I find other words

    In the book of practice attributed to M r Larne[?] edit. A o 17 I find the same proposition in the same words │ │

    In the Appendix to the last mentioned book entitled A Table of Fees payable to the Clerks and Officers of the Court of Session I find in p. 382, 383 a list of "Fees payable to the Clerks of the Ordinary Lords". It /This list/ is taken from an Act of Sederunt dated the 1 st of August 1789. On turning to this Act of Sederunt I observe an Introduction in which after stating that a memorial had been presented praying augmentation of these fees for certain reasons neither memorial nor reasons given, the Lords enact and ordain that "the fees of the Clerks of the Ordinary Lords shall be paid agreable to the following Table. Then comes a list of 11 occasions in which fees are declared to be payable to these Clerks: in 7 of the instances the fee is 3': in one, 5' in two 6': in one 10'.6
  • Title: [12 Jan y 1807 Facienda IV.]
    Description: 12 Jan y 1807

    Facienda

    IV. Inquirenda

    Fees &c.

    The Bankrupt Perrit had his reasons: the Masters in Chancery /dispensers of Equity/ had theirs. In their mutilated[?] account, the highest mass of real emolument is set down at , │ │ the lowest, at , │ │. Was this the whole? By /From/ those who would not answer lightly, and whose name, were it proper for me to mention it would command your Lordships instant confidence, I am assured /hear a negative/. Meantime what is public is this. By the recent Act a half-pay is secured to those Judges when retiring on super-annuation: and this half-pay is ,1,500.
  • Title: [2 Jan y 1806 Facienda IV. Inquirenda]
    Description: 2 Jan y 1806

    Facienda

    IV. Inquirenda

    Fees

    Net[?] the[?] return of these fees which [...?] in benefit

    In regard to those Officers stiled private Clerks of the respective Judges in their capacity of Ordinary Lords to the question by whom are they appointed I find not any where any express answer: viz: neither in any of the Returns made to the Committee on Finance, nor in any of the Books of practice. Your Lordship I am inclined to think will not regard in any such express statement as necessary to inform us in whose hands the appointment actually is vested │ │ the indication given by the word " private" seems sufficiently conclusive /to leave little if any doubt │ │ is not that the known destination attached /annexed/ to the word private when applied to a Clerk a Secretary to any person in high office?

    Taking for granted that these private Clerks are appointed by their respective masters, I should be curious to hear it explained, by order of their whole Lordships, how it is that the constituting of an officer by whom all those fees in all the great variety and infinite repetition of occasions are to be received, constitutes no benefit to any /one/ of these honourable masters? whether on the appointment of any such Clerk it is out of the power of any one of these honourable masters to make any terms with him, to raise for example to a higher destination any portion of these /such/ his fees: whether on the supposition that no such fee ever rests in /passes on into/ any other pocket than that of the Clerk by whom it was received, whether in this case the power of appointing a Son, a Brother or a Nephew to receive without deduction all this mass of fees be incapable of being refused with propriety to the Chapter of " benefits".