Page:State v. Johnson.pdf/12

292  Rh   officer, on the demand of the king or the respondent. This statute was passed for the special purpose and to the end that his majesty's courts, at Westminister, might be provided with juries to try questions of fact. If this right existed before this time, it was certainly a work of supererogation on the part of parliament to enact the law, and the inference to be drawn from this fact is, that, prior to the date of the statute, the issues of fact were tried by the court, even in cases of informations in the nature of quo warranto, which, at best, is but little more than a summary proceeding to asoertain the right to an office.

As yet, this court is the only tribunal in the State having jurisdiction in quo warranto. Under the Constitution of 1826, the circuit courts were courts of original jurisdiction; they are not so now; the circuit courts are mere creatures of the Legislature, and without any constitutional jurisdiction. It is clear that the eighteenth section of the Civil Code, regulating the jurisdiction of the circuit courts, does not confer upon them the power to hear and determine the high prerogative writs used for the protection of the sovereignty of the State. It is not intended to intimate that the Legislature has no power to confer the jurisdiction, but that it has not conferred it.

We have already stated that, when the members of the convention framed and adopted the present Constitution, they were well aware that this court was not to have a jury, and that the jurisdiction in these writs was conferred with a full knowledge of this fact. The proceeding at law is not a criminal action, and yet, from the tearful and pathetic argument of the counsel, one would be led to suppose that the respondent was being tried for murder or treason, and the argument is based upon the false assumption that his client is to be hanged, without the intervention of a jury. The object of this proceeding is to require the respondent to come into court, and show the title to the office, the functions of which be has been exercising. If he has title, no harm can befall him; if he