Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/273

Rh COURTS OF LAW.] E N G L A N 1) 201 [ember.- fthe lovera- leut. he law inrts of nglaiul. Judi- ire being in 1876, under the premiership of Mr Disraeli, just previous to his elevation to the peerage under the title of earl of Beaconstield. All Cabinets yet formed included the following nine members of the administration : the prime minister, the lord chancellor, the lord president of the council, the chancellor of the exchequer, and the secretaries of state presiding over the departments of foreign affairs, war, India, the colonies, and home affairs. To these nine members there are usually added various others, most frequently the first lord of the Admiralty, the postmaster- general, the chief secretary for Ireland, and the president of the Board of Trade. (See also the article CABINET ) The Cabinet does not constitute more than about one- fourth part of the executive, or what is generally called the Government. With every change of administration, necessitated by the expressed will of the House of Com mons, from forty to fifty political heads of department have to quit their places, to make room for men belonging to the party which can claim a parliamentary majority. Besides the departments already mentioned, whose heads are generally, or sometimes, included in the Cabinet, there are others of great importance, such as the Committee of Council on Education, the Local Government Board, the Office of Works and Public Buildings, and the various departments for the collection of the national revenue, con sidered to form part of the Government, or, more correctly, the administration. The chief officers of all these branches of the administration change with the Cabinet, with the exception of the heads of the departments of the customs, excise, stamps, and taxes, who hold permanent appoint ments. Subject to political changes likewise are the great law officers of the crown, the lord chancellor, attorney- general, solicitor-general, and judge-advocate-general of England, the lord-advocate and solicitor-general of Scotland, and the lord chancellor, attorney-general, and solicitor- general for Ireland. These, as all the other members of the political administration, hold office &quot;durante bene placito,&quot; instead of, as the administrators of the law, or judges, &quot; quamdiu bene se gesserint.&quot; In closest contact with the constitution and government of England, and similar to them in nearly every respect, are its laws and their administration. Unlike most other countries, England has no code of laws; nor would codifica tion be easily possible, seeing that the principles which govern the national jurisprudence are, like those which lie at the basis of the constitution, as much &quot; unwritten,&quot; ;is &quot;written.&quot; Broadly, the whole body of laws may be divided into two classes, namely, first, those springing from immemorial usage, sanctified by judicial decisions, and, secondly, those springing from parliamentary enactments. The former, in their nature, take far deeper root in the na tional life than in the latter. This is expressed by the fact that there were law exponents, or judges, long before there were law-makers, or legislators. The most ancient of Eng lish courts, that of King s or Queen s Bench in its correct legal title, &quot;the Court of the King before the King him self,&quot; coram ipso reye was far older than parliament itself, for it can be traced back clearly, both in character and the essence of its jurisdiction, to the reign of King Alfred. Not much less ancient than &quot; the Court of the King before the King&quot; was the Court of Chancery, which acted for ages as the fountain of justice, the officina justitift, forming the origin of the courts of common law. The independence of the Courts of King s Bench and of Chancery was destroyed by the Judicature Act of 1871, exactly 1000 years after the accession of Alfred. The Judicature Act of 1871, amended and enlarged in 1873, and in operation from the 1st of November 1875, made very important alterations in the administration of justice in England. By its provisions, aiming centrally at a fusion of the judicature for the better distribution of judicial force, there was formed a single court, called the &quot;High Court,&quot; divided into five departments, called respec tively the Queen s Bench, the Chaucer), the Common Pleas, the Exchequer, and the Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty divisions. It is in these divisions that is vested the admin istration of the law, while the &quot; High Court,&quot; or, more fully, the &quot; High Court of Justice,&quot; as such, can scarcely be said to have any existence. It is, as one of the judges described it soon after the passing of the Judicature Act, an ens rafionis, that is, it exists only in theory, or in contempla tion of law. At the head of the judicial administration of the kingdom, General as at present constituted, stands the Lord High Chancellor of courts of Great Britain, a political officer changing with the Cabinet, !*&quot;? aml presiding over the supreme Court of Judicature, and form- jm ing part also of the judicial committee of the Privy Council, sitting as a court of appeal. There are annually about 100 cases heard and determined before the judicial committee of the Privy Council, and seldom less than 300 cases &quot; re maining for hearing &quot; or in arrears, the number tending to increase. All the judges of the divisions of the High Court form part of the judicial committee of the Privy Council, which has besides four special paid judges. President of the first of the five divisions of the High Court of Justice, the Queen s Bench, is the lord chief justice of England, under whom are four &quot; puisne justices,&quot; while the second division, the Chancery, is presided over by the Master of the Rolls, who has at. his side three vice-chancellors administering law in the vice-chancellor s covirts. Within the Chancery division are the great seal patent office, and office of the commissioners of patents for inventions, the designs registry, and the trade marks registry. In the thirc^ of the divisions of the High Court, the Common Pleas, the president has the title of lord chief justice, and in the fourth, the Exchequer, that of lord chief baron, the former having under him four &quot; puisne justices/ and the latter four &quot; puisne barons.&quot; Finally, in the fifth division, that of Prubate, Divorce, and Admiralty cases, there is one president and one judge, with an admiralty advocate, queen s proctor, and an admiralty proctor. (See also COUKT, vol. vi., p. 516.) Besides the great courts of law, which, like the fore- Circuits going, have jurisdiction all over the kingdom, there are a of courts number of courts exercising local jurisdiction within coun- of assize - ties, boroughs, and other defined districts. Foremost among the courts of local jurisdiction are those of assize. The great inconvenience of resort by suitors from distant parts to the seat of the central courts of law led, from a very early period, to the appointment of justices &quot; in eyre,&quot; or itinerant judges, authorized to hear civil and criminal causes within a prescribed circuit. These circuits of assize, altered at various times, are at present seven in number, denominated respectively the South-Eastern or Home, the Midland, the Northern, the Oxford, the Western, the North Wales and Chester, and the South Wales circuits. The South-Eastern or Home circuit embraces the counties of Herts, Essex, Hunts, Cam bridge, Suffolk, Norfolk, Kent, Sussex, and Surrey, the assizes being held at Hertford, Chelmsford, Huntingdon, Cambridge, Ipswich, Bury St Edmunds, Norwich, Maid- stone, Lewes, and Kingston; the Midland, the counties of Bedford, Bucks, Derby, Leicester, Lincoln, Notts, North ampton, Rutland, and &quot;Warwick, with assizes at Bedford, Aylesbury, Derby, Leicester, Lincoln, Nottingham, North ampton, Oakham, and Warwick; the Northern, the coun ties of Cumberland, Westmoreland, Lancashire, Durham, Northumberland, and York, the assizes being held at Car lisle. Appleby, Lancaster, Manchester, Liverpool, Durham, Newcastle, York, and Leeds; the Oxford circuit, the couu-