Page:William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (3rd ed, 1768, vol I).djvu/100

84 The more minute conideration of thee will fall properly under that part of thee commentaries which treats of the juridiction of courts. It will uffice at preent to remark a few particulars relative to them all, which may erve to inculcate more trongly the doctrine laid down concerning them.

1.&ensp;, firt, the courts of common law have the uperintendency over thee courts; to keep them within their juridictions, to determine wherein they exceed them, to retrain and prohibit uch exces, and (in cae of contumacy) to punih the officer who executes, and in ome caes the judge who enforces, the entence o declared to be illegal.

2.&ensp; common law has reerved to itelf the expoition of all uch acts of parliament, as concern either the extent of thee courts or the matters depending before them. And therefore if thee courts either refue to allow thee acts of parliament, or will expound them in any other ene than what the common law puts upon them, the king’s courts at Wetminter will grant prohibitions to retrain and control them.

3.&ensp; appeal lies from all thee courts to the king, in the lat reort; which proves that the juridiction exercied in them is derived from the crown of England, and not from any foreign potentate, or intrinic authority of their own.—And, from thee three trong marks and enigns of uperiority, it appears beyond a doubt that the civil and canon laws, though admitted in ome caes by cutom in ome courts, are only ubordinate and ; and that, thus admitted, retrained, altered, new-modelled, and amended, they are by no means with us a ditinct independent pecies of laws, but are inferior branches of the cutomary or unwritten laws of England, properly called, the king’s eccleiatical, the king’s military, the king’s maritime, or the king’s academical, laws.