1 Feb y 1808

II. Appeals

Appeal Acc t defective

In speaking of the Official Account of the Appeals presented to the House of Lords for and during the length of time therein comprized, I spoke of it as being incompleat. So accordingly the case stands. No fact can be more incontestable: - and here begins a separate Chapter in the book of Lawyercraft.

Of the Appeals presented to the House of Lords, sitting in its capacity of a superordinate judicatory, a certain class has received jargonice the denomination of Writs of Error. That they are Writs of Error is out of dispute: such being the name that has been affixed to them by competent authority. That they are moreover Appeals is equally indisputable, having in every respect the nature and effect of those other Appeals which are known by no other name: at any rate in every feature that has any application to the present purpose: and in particular in respect of the draughts drawn by them upon the judicatory[?] part of the time of the House, and in being in their nature though certainly, as in the other case, not in customary language of the practically important and instructive division, expressed by the terms bonâ fide and malâ fide.

Of the species of Appeals thus denominated no mention whatever was made in any of the Official Tables above alluded to, and hereunto annext.
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    Question - Why continue the right of voting to the delegates? - why exclude the votes of all other members of the House of Lords?

    Answer 1. Lest by individual or party favour or enmity, Judges should be led in in fluctuating and uncertain numbers.

    2. Lest, worked[?] on by some such sinister interest, a Judge should pronounce his decision without having heard the whole of the arguments, perhaps without having heard any but one side.

    3. Lest the sense of individual responsibility should be extinguished, and the advantages of[?] few-seated in comparison of many-seated judicature be thereby foregone. (See Scotch Reform Letter 1.)

    In the annext Tables stand expressed the amount of such of these Writ of Error Appeals as during these three portion[?] years were presented to the House of Lords: unfortunately, in the instance of such of them as were presented to that ultimately-appellate judicatory the distinction expressed by the words heard and not heard, or their synonyms argued and not argued, synonyms both of them (as above shewn) to bonâ fide and malâ fide, the information furnished by the House of Commons Report above referred to does not extend. Between the numbers of the two classes the proportion must in that instance be left to conjecture: to a conjecture, the grounds of which are furnished by the other Table (Table x) in which the proportions between the two classes are given in the instance of that mass of Appeals which in the course of the same three instructive years were presented to the several English Intermediate Courts of Appeal or Chambers of Review, and forming the grist brought to that part of the number of efficient mills, kept on going for the manufacturing of delay, and grinding the face[?] and substance of the poor and helpless, at the instance and for the benefit of respectable and open handed customers.

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  • Title: [2 May 1807 C1 1 Letter V]
    Description: 2 May 1807

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    Taking the same period of time, pursue the enquiry into the House of Lords, the proportions exhibit a very different appearance.

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    In the Lords Accounts of 11 March 1807, the Appeals commonly called by the name of Appeals - viz. the Equity Appeals not only are inserted, but exhibit the ear-marks by which the malâ fide may be distinguished from the bonâ fide ones: but the Common Law Appeals, the Appeals called Writs of Error, are, as already observed omitted altogether and their place is not to be found.

    On the other hand in the Finance Committee's Account A o 1798, the Appeals called Appeals are not inserted: while the Appeals called Writs of Error are. But here unfortunately, so it has happened, the distinction - the circumstance by the light of which the malâ fide was so easily distinguished from honest litigants, does not extend itself to the Writs of Error presented to the House of Lords.

    As little information in this same case does it give us concerning the terminous a quo; from what Court in each instance the Appeal last issued in its way to the House of Lords. This cause may have issued directly from the Westminster Hall Court of original jurisdiction: it may have previously made its way through one of the above intermediate Chambers of Review.
  • Title: [28 Jan y 1808 Appeals If, pending]
    Description: 28 Jan y 1808

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    If, pending and notwithstanding the Appeal made to the superordinate Judicatory, execution in the judgment appealed from, in judgment pronounced in the subordinate immediate judicatory, had been suffered to take place, the quantity of delay capable of being thus sold would have been cut short by every such judgment /have been cut short/, and the trade thus brought to an untimely end. Accordingly in the establishment of the above English Courts of Review, care was taken that the operation of Appeal should not be followed by any such inconvenient consequence: jurgonci, that of error was not in suposidias[?].

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    /In the ultimately superordinate rule[?] of Judicatory of the House of Lords/