Oct 1805

Evidence

Appropriate

The cause /origin/ of the questions as subjects of debate themselves is one thing: the cause /origin/ of the importance that belongs to them is another. The questions themselves spring as we have seen out of one species of abuse: the /their/ importance that belongs to them out of another species of abuse.

Under the natural system, if, for want of due notice, or by any other accident, a party happens not to be prepared on this or that day with this or that article of necessary evidence, the evidence being by the supposition in his power /at his command/, he brings it with him the next day. But in the English technical system, in which the denial of justice is the ordinary state of things, and justice is not so much as pretended to be administered but after a short period separated from each other by distant intervals the next day does not come till six months after and /or/ in some places perhaps twelve months: and when another day for the production of the omitted evidence does come, it is not to be obtained but upon the terms of the second plunderage, performing once again for the benefit of the man of law all those useless ceremonies /preliminaries/ which never ought to have been performed at all. Under the care of English Judges a /every/ law suit is thus the very stem of [...?]: when a pretence has been found for preventing it from gaining the top of the hill, if it be destined to take a second chance it is not allowed to keep the ground that it has gained, but it is in the first [...?] /rolled back/ into the bottom, before a second chance is allowed it, of getting /being forced up/ up to the top.
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  • Title: [24 June 1805 Evidence Introd]
    Description: 24 June 1805

    Evidence

    Introd

    Ch. Non-Notoriety &c

    ''.1. Connection

    Again. I wish to make a disposition of my property to take effect after my death. Ignorant as I am, and blamelessly ignorant (for what has ever been done by government to remove /inform/ my ignorance?) Ignorant as I am of the state of the laws in general I know this much from every days observation, that men are allowed to make such dispositions, though on what terms I know not. I borrow a right of the statute at large, and by turning /looking/ over index /over the index/ I am conducted to a Statute of which it has happened to me to hear mention /spoken of/ under the name of the Statute of frauds. Of fraud there is indeed no want in it: of intelligibility no small want. I see that there are certain species of property can not be disposed of in this way unless three or four persons in the character of witnesses for this uncertain is the expression be present to attest such any will: but what these species of property are and whether the property I have belongs to any of them is matter of supreme uncertainty to me. From any thing that goes by the name of human reason I find it impossible to derive some, the least assistance: if in the [...?] of protection against forgery such formalities are necessary to property to the amount of ,100 in one shape, why should it be less necessary to property to the same amount in another shape. Conscious of my own inability to understand what the law has required me to do in order to avail myself of the power which it professes to have given me, I betake myself to a lawyer who at least professes /takes upon him/ to understand it
  • Title: [23 Mar. 1805 Evidence Securities]
    Description: 23 Mar. 1805

    Evidence

    Securities

    Ch. Procedure Technical

    Though in the character of defendant, or rather /to speak/ strictly of a person prepared to become defendant, injury where the state of the law /legal arrangements/ is as /still more/ easily and securely operated thence /and that for the purpose /in the view/ of oppression/ in the character of plaintiff, it is not in any such /that precise/ view it is not by men occupying any such commanding station of an oppressor, that under a system of procedure favourable to injustice, mischief unjust defense is produced in greatest and most deplorable abundance. Of the mischief /injuries/ then[?] in this character, not overbearing opulence but its opposite poverty is by much the most frequent cause. To stem /put/ off as far as possible the evil day, to prepare for chance /flight/ of place, and in the mean time to remove out of the reach of justice that portion of the matter of wealth that ought to be /should be/ employed in satisfying the demands of justice, these /such/ are the natural objects /aims/ of the improbity, the too natural accompaniment but too naturally associated with falling fortune /fortunes/. In this state of things, whatever means of procrastination are afforded by the weakness of the law /defects of the legal system/, natural or fictitious, are purchased of course at the price set upon them by the vendors: and stock /means of payment/ /assets/ which should have gone into the pocket of the plaintiff /to the plaintiff/ to satisfy his demands, is shared by /between/ the dishonest defendant and the men of law: between the weak author of the inequity /unjust/ the various classes of its protectors.

    Such is the tyranny that takes place of course wheresoever this characteristic feature /essential arrangement/ of the natural mode of procedure is departed from and dispensed with: the tyranny of the rich over the poor /indigent/. Such is the short description of it, but by this short /so short a/ description it is not as yet placed in the darkest[?] which is at the same time the justest point of view. A tyranny of class over class would be bad enough: but the tyranny thus established is the tyranny of individual over individual in each class. Comparing class with class, it is of advantage that superiority of power is professed by one class over another should be professed by the [...?] - Why? not because in opulence /superior/ taken by itself there is any [...?], in inferior any domestic but because between superiority of wealth on one hand and superiority in probity as well as understanding on the other there is a natural connection. Superiority in both respects is the work of education and comparing class with class the means of education are abundant in proportion to the degree of opulence. But in the tyranny here in question the oppressed being unlikely to be of the same /equal/ rank (not to speak of superior) with the oppressor, the subjection thus established is unmixed /purely/ evil, uncompensated /unaccompanied/ by the least particle of advantage.
  • Title: [1820 Aug. 26 Emancipation Spanish]
    Description: 1820 Aug. 26

    Emancipation Spanish

    '. 10. Amendment impossible

    Either then there must be a seond Cortes having existence at the same time with the

    first, or no second Cortes can have existence till near 8 months after the expiration

    of the present one viz. till 9 July 1823 or the present one must continue in

    existence near eitht months beyong /over and above/ the time allowed to it by the

    unchangabel /unalterable/ Constitution: or in the ultramarian provinces the election

    of the deputies for the next Cortes must commence befor the dissolution of the

    existing Cortes. This accordingly is what I suppose was and is intended. If as in the

    case of most other represetative bodies the intention were that the deputies in a

    /each/ preceding shouldd be eligible in each succeeding assembly, ther would be an

    incongruity in instituting an Election of succeeding deputies, before the conduct of

    the preceding one had been subjected to observation. But as [...?] a deputy who has

    served in one Cortes is not allowed to serve in the next, the incongruity in question

    is got rid of, though by means of an arrangement to which, /against/ as it should

    have evil without reason a still greater incongruity might be objected. /imputed./

    In the ultramarian provinces Art. 37 the only day on which the first of the four

    election meetings can be held is the day which is exactly 15 months before the day of

    the meeting of the ortes which as above is in the case of the next Cortes to be the

    1 st of March 1822, or else the 9 th of July

    1821 or else the 9 th of July 1822, let him who can say which. But

    by that same Article 37 it must it must also be the first Sunday in December: so that

    by the terms of this unalterable Constitution if the 1 st of this month

    of December in the proper year whatever it is happens not to be a Sunday, there

    can not in any ultramarian province be any commencement of the system of Election

    to the Cortes nor consequently from every one of these provinces any deputation at

    all.

    Entered with amendments under

    Creole deputation none)

    This is yet but a small part of the difficulty /cloud/ which hangs

    over the subject. Until the number of the inhabitants in the ultramarian provinces

    have been ascertained and reported reported doubtless to the existing or some

    futre Cortes the number of deputies which these provinces are to depute to the

    Cortes can not be ascertained. For by Art. 28 29 and 31 the number of the deputies

    to the Cortes and ultra as well ultramarian as Spanish is to be "one for every

    70,000 souls": so that in the Cortes until men know how many souls there are in

    the ultramarian provinces, they /men/ can not know how many deputies from there

    there are to be.