Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/356

Rh 340 POLICE Connected with the last-mentioned Act, and in conse quence of it, has been the exercise for eighteen years by the metropolitan police of the powers of the Contagious Diseases Act, I860, and the medical examination of women under it, a much debated and warmly contested power. The refusal in 1883 by the House of Commons to provide money for the expenses of the Act led to the discontinu ance of action by the metropolitan police under it. The Metropolitan Streets Act, 1867, for regulating the traffic in the metropolis, and for making provision for the greater security of persons passing through the streets and for other purposes, gives great discretionary power to the commissioner of police whether of the metropolis or of the City of London, in relation to prescribing special limits, with the approval of a secretary of state, within which regulations to prevent obstructions in the streets (without interfering with other powers) may be made and enforced. Apart from the special limits, general regulations are pre scribed as to hackney carriages, stray dogs, and various other matters. As already observed, the Acts noticed as to the metro politan police district did not apply to the City of London, which was and is left as an island surrounded by the metropolis. The nightly watch and &quot; bedels &quot; within the City were regulated, and rates imposed for the purpose, in the reign of George II. In 1839, on the same day that the Act of Parliament passed with respect to the metro politan police, a corresponding Act was passed for the City of London and a salaried commissioner of the police for the City and its liberties appointed by the common council. The power to make regulations relative to the general government of the police is vested in the commissioner, subject to the approbation of the mayor and aldermen and a secretary of state. In case of emergency the secretary of state may, at the request of the lord mayor, authorize the metropolitan police to act within the City of London under the command of their own officers, and on the other hand the lord mayor may, at the request of the secretary of state, in the like emergency, authorize the City police to act under their own officers within the metropolitan police district. The Act gives various special powers as to offences cor responding with the Metropolitan Police Act of 1839. It provides for a police rate, and the corporation is required to pay out of its revenues a fourth part of the expenses of the police force. No rated person is liable to any watch or ward by virtue of the Statute of Winchester (13 Edw. I.), and the ancient custom of electing ward constables is sus pended. In the article LONDON (vol. xiii. p. 834) some statistics are given as to the police courts of the metropolis, and the state of crime and the proportion of police to the popula tion under the last census. In considering the introduction of the police system into the rest of England, it is to be borne in mind that in many towns and places an organized system of watching by paid officers, whether constables, watchmen, or police, was established by local Acts of Parliament, at various dates, but especially in the early part of the present century. An attempt at a paid county force was made in 1829 (in the same year with the Metropolitan Police Act), but not on corresponding lines, by a local Act to enable the magistrates of the county palatine of Chester to appoint special high constables and assistant petty constables (10 Geo. IV. c. 97). In 1830, and again three years later, provision was made to facilitate voluntary lighting and watching parishes throughout England and Wales. In 1835 the regulation of municipal corporations included power (since renewed) to appoint, by a watch committee, constables called &quot; watchmen &quot; paid by a watch rate. Great facilities having been given by the legislature for the appointment of special constables (an auxiliary else where noticed), provision was made in 1839 for the appointment of county paid constables where the ordinary officers for preserving the peace were insufficient for that purpose and for the protection of the inhabitants and for the security of property within the county. The number recommended (not exceeding one man for every thousand of the inhabitants, after deducting corporate boroughs already provided for, a restriction in after years removed from the statute book) and the rates of payment were required to be reported to the secretary of state, who made and laid before parliament rules for the government, pay, clothing, accoutrements, and necessaries of such constables ; and thereupon the justices appointed, subject to the approval of the secretary of state, a chief constable, who had the appointment, control, and disposition (subject to the approval of the justices) of the other constables, and a deputy and superintendent to be at the head of the con stables in each division of the county. On these constables were conferred all the powers and duties of constables by the common law or statute. At first the salaries and allowances and expenses of the Act were paid out of the county rate (2 & 3 Viet. c. 93), but in the following year (1840) the Act was amended and extended, and a separate police rate levied in the county. Provision was at the same time made for a superannuation fund and for &quot; station houses and strong rooms,&quot; and for consolidating the police of a borough with the county ; and on the other hand, as the number of con stables needed may be different in different parts of the same county, it might be divided into police districts, each district paying for its own constables. Power is given to the chief constable to appoint (with the approval of the justices) additional constables at the cost of individuals, but subject to the orders of the chief constable. In 1842 an important statute was passed enacting that for the future no appointment of a petty constable, head- borough, borsholder, tithing man, or peace officer of the like description should be made for any parish at any court leet, except for purposes unconnected with the pre servation of the peace, and providing, as a means of increasing the security of persons and property, for the appointment by justices of the peace in divisional petty sessions of fit persons or their substitutes to act as con stables in the several parishes of England, and giving vestries an optional power of providing paid constables. The justices in quarter sessions were empowered to provide lock-up houses for the confinement of persons taken into custody by any constable and not yet committed for trial, or in execution of any sentence, or instead to appropriate for that purpose existing lock-up houses, strong rooms, or cages belonging to any parish (5 &, 6 Viet. c. 109). Con stables appointed under this Act were made subject to the authority of the chief constable or superintendent, if any, appointed under the Act of 1839. Under the Acts of 1839 and 1840 the establishment of a paid county police force was optional with the justices. After a further interval of fifteen years it was found expedient, for the more effectual prevention and detection of crime, suppression of vagrancy, and maintenance of good order, that further provision should be made for securing an efficient police force throughout England and Wales, and the previous optional power became compulsory (the Police Act, 1856). In every county in which a con stabulary had not been already established under the previous Acts &quot;for the whole of the county, the justices in quarter sessions were required to proceed to establish a sufficient police force for the whole of the county and to consolidate divisions so as to form one general county