Page:Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, Volume 1.djvu/761

 so. VEEDER: A CENTURY OF JUDICATURE 747 It is undeniable that this reputation was largely made by Parke (1834-55). " Baron Surrebutter," as he was iron- ically named, was a modern Coke, profoundly learned in the common law and indefatigably industrious in its administra- tion. He possessed the ability in grasping and fathoming a subject which is the supreme test of judicial power, and his extraordinary memory enabled him to draw at will upon his vast store of learning. It must be admitted that he was a man of high character and powerful intellect ; no smaller man could have accomplished so much. For more than twenty years he was the ruling power in Westminster Hall. Con- sidering the state of the law in his day and his fond adherence to its formalities and precedents, one's admiration for his undoubted ability gives way to surprise that he should have required such ascendency over his brethren. Even so great a lawyer as Willes said that " to him the law was under greater obligations than to any judge within legal memory." For more than twenty years he bent all the powers of his great intellect to foster the narrow technicalities and heighten the absurdities of the system of special pleading. The right was nothing, the mode of stating it everything. Conceive of a judge rejoicing at non-suiting a plaintiff in an undefended case, and reflecting only that those who drew loose declara- tions brought scandal on the law! Any attempt to change or ameliorate the law met with his uncompromising opposi- tion. " Think of the state of the record," was his invariable response to every effort to escape from the trammels of tech- nicality. He defeated the act of parliament allowing equi- table defences in common law actions by the exaction of all but impossible conditions, and expressed satisfaction in being able to do so. Broad-minded judges like Maule and Cress- well struggled in vain against his influence. " Well," Maule would say, " that seems a horror in morals and a monster in reasoning. Now give us the judgment of Baron Parke which lays it down as law." Parke stands at the head of the black- letter lawyers. It is related that once when one of his breth- ren was ill, Parke sent him a special demurrer. " It was so exquisitely drawn," he said, " that he felt sure it must cheer him to read it." " He loved the law," as Bramwell said, " and