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 Contrasts in English Criminal Law.

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CONTRASTS IN ENGLISH CRIMINAL LAW. I. By Hampton L. Carson. /^NE of the most singular facts in the benign and gentle sway, humanely admin ^-^ history of the criminal law of England istered. The glories of the Great Charter, is the sad contrast betw^n the theory and with its essential clauses for the protection of personal liberty and the property of free the actual administration of the law. men from ar For more bitrary impristhan six hun onment and dred years the arbitrary spo following max liation, were ims have been dwelt upon so familiar: " Ev constantly and ery man's strenuously as house is his to dazzle the castle"; "No eyes of men freeman can be and to blind deprived of them to the life, liberty, or truth that the property save law as actually by the judg administered ment of his was full of bru peers and the tality, avarice, law of the superstition, fa land "; " The naticism, hat presumption of red, and fear; the law is in a truth boldly favor of inno cence"; "The spoken by Beccaria.when judge is coun he said : "The sel for the prislaws are al oner"; "To ways several no one will we ages behind sell, deny, or the actual im delay either provement of justice or the nation right." GEORGE, LORD JEFFREYS. which they Lawyers and govern." But his voice was as one cry judges, statesmen and historians have ech oed and re-echoed these striking phrases ing in the wilderness. Lord Coke, in his until the general impression prevails that, detailed commentary on the famous 39th with the exception of five or six instances and 40th chapters of Magna Charta, ob of shocking barbarity on the part of a served : " As the gold finer will not out of the dust, shreds, or shreds of gold, let passe Jeffreys, a Scroggs, or a Wright, the peo ple of England were governed by laws of the least crum, in respect of the excellency