date

28 Oct r 1807 L d Eldon's Bill
28 Oct r 1807

L d Eldon's Bill

'.14

Interim possession

To delineate the power in these general terms, was to give to it all the /the utmost/ latitude it was susceptible of: to state /stating/ just the object, the end in view to which the exercise of this power was directed, would have been to limit it /limited it/: the President's learned Draughtsman has given no intimation of any such end /said nothing about the end/.

Be this as it may the clearest and most convenient order course[?] in point of order the clearest and most convenient course would have been, as above, to begin with stating the power meant to be conferred: this being done would have served as a guide to whatsoever should come to be provided touching the /any/ /on the subject of/ particular steps to be taken for the purpose of calling that power into exercise. This course he has not taken: but what he has done, and properly done in consideration of the general description that was immediately to be given of the power - is the giving a due generality to the description of the proceedings that were to be directed to that end: having with perfect propriety the adjustment of these details to the Court below by which the power was to be exercised.

This generality this clear and apposite simplicity is as usual insufficient to the anxious and superintending eye of Lord Eldon's learned Draughtsman. Precision is the object at which in his own way he aims, and which so sure as he aims at it, so sure is he to miss, seizing and disseminating confusion and perplexity in the stead.
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  • Title: [20 Oct r 1807 L d Eldons Bill]
    Description: 20 Oct r 1807

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    Interim possessive

    '.14 (1) (When any appeal is lodged &c)

    In both Bills what this provision aims at, so far at least as that which is aimed at was /is/ fit to be aimed at, so that unless /except/ in so far as measures are taken to the contrary by the local judicatory, the effect of the Appeal to the Lords continuing to be as it is at present, the stop to execution, power shall be possessed by the local judicatory sufficient to enable it to prevent such stoppage from producing to the prejudice of the party claiming such execution any such damage as would be irreparable.

    On this occasion what presents itself as the natural and proper course is this - First to state in general terms the prevention of all such irreparable damage as might result from an unqualified stoppage of the execution of that judgment which the local judicatory had thought fit to pronounce - then in general terms to give to that judicatory such power of interim regulation as should be necessary and sufficient for that purpose - and lastly to prescribe if it were thought necessary to the party having interest in calling for the exercise of such discretionary power any such particular steps as might seem requisite.

    Of the end purpose[?] to be aimed at, as above, neither draughtsman /legislator/ appears to have had any clear conception. The President's had not; for if he had, he would have given expression to it, as above. At least for his probity's sake it is to be /let us/ hoped he had not. What at any rate he had a clear conception of was the power he wished to get into his hands - viz. power to do whatever he thought fit - "power ... to regulate all matters relative to interim

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  • Title: [29 Oct r 1807 L d Eldon's Bill]
    Description: 29 Oct r 1807

    L d Eldon's Bill

    '.14

    The Presiding Judge

    To collect what possible light may be to be thrown upon this darkness, we must resort once more to the Lord President's Bill. The draughtsman always knows what he is about: which is what the Lord Chancellor's scarce ever does.

    In the Lord President's Bill we shall indeed see symptoms of fissure and re-union, but that fissure /but the operation/ without an object is in the other case. Here as elsewhere whatsoever is /be to be/ done, nothing is to be done without the Lord President. If in the business of "regulating matters relative to interim possession, execution, and costs," it be agreable to the Lord President that any thing should be done, he attends, and it is done: if it be more agreable to him that nothing should be done, he forbears to attend, and nothing can be done. If "the Chamber in which from which the cause originally came" be the Chamber which has the Lord President for its presiding Judge /President/, so far so good /it is as well/, the Lord President has it that way: if it be the other Chamber, then it is to be laid not only before that Chamber, but in the first place before the Lord President - "before the Lord President, and the Chamber from which the cause originally came: and so the Lord President has it that way.

    In the Lord President's Bill the Lord Chancellor's draughtsman saw his groundwork and his instructions: but in /on/ this point as on so many others we see how he has floundered and blundered. In the hands of the Lord President's draughtsman the clause answered the Lord President's Draughtsman's purpose: in the hands of the Lord Chancellor's Draughtsman it answers no purpose at all. Instead of the Lord President and he /him/ alone, the Presiding Judge may be the Lord President or the Lord Justice Clerk, or any other Judge who by election "presides" "in the Division to which the case belongs," or "sits at the head of it."

    Here then, is the ambition of the Lord President's draughtsman defeated, and to all appearance by a blunder. But this being but one of his points, and to appearance one of the least important, leaving more loss than to gain by explanations, he leaves the matter to take its course.
  • Title: [27 Oct r 1807 L d Eldon's Bill]
    Description: 27 Oct r 1807

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    '.11

    assembled by President

    My conclusion is that it was desired on one side, and settled[?] by the learned draughtsman on both ends, that nothing should be done.

    But why then all this talk and bustle about enquiries and regulations? Why these commissions - these newly to be organised bodies of initiating legislators? The one commission proposed by the Lord President - that member so generally /liberally/ directed (by /on the part of/ the learned draughtsman) of the L d Chancellor?

    When a commission is established - established at the proposition[?] of Administration by the authority of Parliament, it may be for either of two purposes - to cause the business to be concluded in Parliament, or to prevent it from being begun there.

    In the present instance, without pretending to certainty /infallibility/, the opinion that appears to me the more probable is - that the latter (is the sort of termination that on both parts was looked to with most complacency,) was the real object of the learned exertions now bestowed, to which those /the present/ learned labours were really directed.

    Nor on these terms /this supposition/ would those labours be either without their suitable object or without fruit. Beside the composing of the public mind in Scotland, which is an object in all plans and at all times highly desirable, here are two funds - two new funds created for the reward of merit: I mean not of merit displayed in the business thus brought /put/ for forms sake into action /into a train/ - that being by the supposition destined to receive /repose/ its question - but to merit antecedently displayed in whatsoever other shape: merit remaining to be discovered by the discerning /penetrating/ and judicious eyes to whom under his Majesty, name and auspices the charge of the discovery is proposed to be committed.