Page:Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, Volume 1.djvu/412

 398 ///. THE COLONIAL PERIOD bail and liberty of person, registry, marriage, speedy justice, the use of the English language in laws and proceedings. The proceedings of the earliest courts were quite informal. We have some accounts of trials, before the coming of Penn, under the Duke's laws which provided for a jury of six or seven. The major part of this jury could give in a verdict. An informal statement of the matter at issue was made, and though the names of actions were used, there was no sharp discrimination and not even the distinctions between civil and criminal cases were clearly drawn. The administration of justice was rather founded upon the ideas of the magis- trates than on any rules of positive law.^ Lord Petersboro, during his visit to Pennsylvania, was astonished at the sim- plicity and fewness of laws, the absence of lawyers and the informality of judicial proceedings.^ County courts were instituted in the territory later called Pennsylvania in 1673. The procedure was informal, juries of six or seven were in use.^ Under the new regime, the jurisdiction of courts was defined by the laws of 1683, Chap. 70, and in 1684, courts were given jurisdiction in equity as well as in law.* The same court even reversed in equity its own judgment in law.'"* Against this method the assembly complained.® In a number of the courts, the names of English actions were used, but case was often substituted for ejectment. ^ The practice was very much like modern code practice ; the complaint was filed fourteen days before trial ; ten days before, the defendant had to be summoned, arrested or his goods attached. In court, he might answer in writing; the pleadings were to be in the English language; any defense, legal or equitable, might be interposed:^ Thus from 462; Memoirs of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, vol. VII; Dr. Geo. Smith's History of Delaware County. Reports, I, 229. «Ibid., 167. " Hastings vs. Yarrall, Records Chester County Court, 1686. 'Votes of the Assembly, I, 76. ' Sussex County Records, 1682, quoted in Pennsylvania Bar Associa- tion Reports, I, 362. • Laws of 1683, Chap. 66; Laws of 1684, Chap. 167.
 * See Pennsylvania Archives, vol. "VII, pp. 725-730; The Duke's Laws,
 * I Spencer's Anecdotes, 155, quoted in Pennsylvania Bar Association
 * Duke's Laws, 414.