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tions of the House of Lords, as it is to separate the corresponding functions of the Chancellor; and if the House of Lords could be made a satisfactory and effective Court of Justice there seems to be no reason why it should not be always open and accessible; and it would seem that the object might be effected with due regard to the prerogative of the Crown and the dignity of the House, by passing an Act to enable the Crown, on an address of the House, to appoint one or more Lord or Lords of Appeal in the House of Lords, and give them authority to hear and determine appeals during the sitting of Parliament, and notwithstanding the prorogation or dissolution of Parliament.

"From the foregoing observations and suggestions it appears that the incompatible offices of the Chancellor cannot be properly separated, nor the business of the Court of Chancery properly provided for, without the appointment of at least two new officers.

"1. An additional Judge in Chancery, having authority to hear and determine all those causes and matters of original jurisdiction, which have heretofore been heard and determined by the Chancellor in the Court of Chancery.

"2. A chairman of the House of Lords when sitting in its judicial capacity.

"The Chairman of the House of Lords, in its judicial capacity, might be made Chief Judge of Appeals, and with such a Judge the House of Lords might be made an efficient and satisfactory Court of Appeal, always accessible, and it might be reasonable to transfer to it the appellate business of the judicial Committee of the Privy Council.

"And the Chancellor, being relieved from his judicial business, might, as it is conceived, become an efficient Secretary of State for the affairs of justice and legislation, and secure to the country many incalculable benefits, which under the present arrangements cannot be obtained.

"The salary of the Chancellor is 10,000l. a year.

"The amount of his fees as Speaker of the House of Lords is variable; the highest of which there is any account was 7205l.; the average is said to be 4000l. a year. The two sums together form a fund more than sufficient to pay the additional Judge in Chancery and the Lord Chancellor, as he would remain after the proposed change.

1 This is now settled at 40007., and is paid under the Sessional Appropriation Act.-ED.

"The salary of the Chief Judge of Appeals in the House of Lords would have to be provided. And if it should be thought expedient to appoint assessors or co-ordinate Judges, the expense would be proportionably increased."

This is a clear and able statement. We will now give Lord John Russell's opinion on the subject, who looked at the whole matter not so much as a Law Reformer as a states

man.

This will be found in Hansard, third series, vol. 55., pp. 1326., et seq.

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He said, "He could not disguise his opinion that the present state of the Court of Chancery was unsatisfactory. It was impossible that the public could be satisfied so long as this Court was without Judges constantly bound to attend.

"With regard to the Bill introduced by the Lord Chancellor three or four years ago for disconnecting the civil and political functions of the Lord Chancellor and for the appointment of a permanent Judge, considering the immense importance of the functions of the Court of Chancery, the immense benefit which it rendered to persons possessed of property throughout this kingdom, the vast control which it exercised over the commercial interests of the country, it did appear to him to be the common sense of the subject that there should be, as in the Queen's Bench and Common Pleas, A PERMANENT JUDGE at its head. Let them take into consideration the high personal character of the present Lord Chancellor (Lord Cottenham), and remember how by the vote upon the Jamaica Question last year, they might have lost his high legal and judicial qualities for no reason whatever but the fact of a political change. He should say the same thing of a person of opposite politics, and he begged to ask whether this was not a misfortune and a fault in the Constitution. It was plain that no man could combine satisfactorily these two characters. He considered this to be a fault both legally and politically."

As there are many persons who will not think for themselves, but are guided wholly by authority, we have stated these two opinions on this subject. We can only add that since they were given, circumstances have tended to confirm

their correctness. That Lord Cottenham's displacement from the Court of Chancery on political reasons, would have been deeply regretted, is not more true than that the loss of Lord St. Leonard's, as Chief Judge in Equity, would be felt most severely. Whether these duties then are not sufficient for any one man is also open to little doubt; and we may say, we trust without offence, that it may not always be possible to add to great legal and judicial qualifications the mind and education necessary for a MINISTER OF JUSTICE.

ART. X. LORD ELDON.

CHANCERY JUDGES.

It is hardly necessary to remind the reader of the long and vehement warfare waged by all Law Reformers with Lord Eldon. That he greatly retarded the progress of improvement there can be no manner of doubt. That his judicial powers, too, in some respects of the highest order, were yet of much less avail, either to the administration of justice, or to his own renown, in consequence of the same weakness which made him shrink from any change in the legal system with which he was more thoroughly acquainted than any other lawyer in any age of our jurisprudence, is equally certain. Yet it is impossible to deny that great unfairness is shown towards his memory by those who, merely regarding the proceedings of his successors, and observing the dispatch with which they have conducted the business of the Courts where he presided, institute a comparison between the amount of work done and the time taken for it at the different periods, without considering also the difference in the judicial force which Lord Eldon and his successors wielded. It becomes the more necessary to do this great lawyer and gifted man justice, that he has left none of his family behind him who are in a position to make the truth of the case be duly considered. It is in a peculiar manner incumbent on those to perform this duty of common fairness, as well as

charity, who differ so widely from him in opinion upon all legislative questions touching our jurisprudence.

The two Courts over which he presided for so many years, above a quarter of a century, were the House of Lords and the Court of Chancery. In the Privy Council he only attended very rarely, upon some nine or ten special occasions during the whole period of his Chancellorships; and of the eighteen months that he sat in the Common Pleas it is unnecessary to speak, further than to note, what was well known to the profession, and admitted by all, that he there displayed all the capacity and all the learning for which he afterwards was celebrated, without any of the defects which so greatly impeded his application of them. The exigencies of jury trial and the presence of other Judges precluded all undue hesitation, and enforced the giving a close, sustained attention to the business in hand. But it is to the House of Lords and the Court of Chancery that we must direct our

attention.

The state of the business at different periods in the latter, the arrear that accumulated, or the numbers of causes heard and disposed of, we need not go into, further than to admit that in Lord Eldon's time great occasion of complaint was given. We shall take our examples rather from the state of the business in the House of Lords, because the returns are more full, and they are more easily analysed; and we shall here, as we have regarding the Court of Chancery, admit that much greater arrears were suffered to grow in his time than have since been known. But our best course will be to give a summary of the causes heard and disposed of during the periods of successive Chancellors, and then make our statement, in justice towards Lord Eldon, and indeed also to Lord Thurlow and Lord Loughborough, of the very different state of the judicial force in their times and in the times of succeeding Chancellors.

In Lord Thurlow's time, taking only his last two years, there were 37 causes heard and 34 decided. In Lord Loughborough's, from 1793 to 1800, or eight sessions, 109, and no arrear in decisions. In Lord Eldon's first chancellorship, 81 heard and 78 decided in five sessions. In Lord Erskine's VOL. XVII.

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26, and nearly all decided. In Lord Eldon's second chancellorship, from 1807 to 1813, seven sessions, and 70 causes heard and all decided. But a great increase had now taken place in the number of appeals presented. In seven sessions there were 568, whereas in seven sessions ending 1800, only 261 had been presented. The arrear accordingly grew exceedingly, and this, together with an arrear, but far less considerable, in the Court of Chancery, gave rise to the appointment of the first Vice-Chancellor. The effect was at once perceived. The average of the causes heard during the six preceding sessions was 10; the average during the next seven sessions was 48, there having been 288 heard. In 1820, though the session had begun in November, 1819, and lasted about twelve months, with the interval of the General Election, only 21 causes were heard; but then the Queen's case had occupied, and not very creditably occupied, the Lords as well as the Commons and the country, above half of the time. Then the number of appeals again increased more rapidly than before, no less than 262 being presented in three years ending 1823. An arrangement was thereupon made for Lord Gifford (Master of the Rolls) to sit in the House of Lords, and no less than 91 causes were heard in each of the two years, 1824 and 1825, being the greatest number ever heard in any session, except that of 1831, when 111 were heard. That session began under Lord Lyndhurst in Nov. 1830, and was continued under Lord Brougham to late in October, 1831. From 1821 to 1827, when Lord Eldon quitted the Great Seal, 350 causes were heard by Lord Gifford and him in six sessions. In Lord Lyndhurst's first chancellorship, of four sessions, 184 were heard, and 144 decided. In Lord Brougham's time, of four sessions, 225 were heard, and 219 decided. In 1835 the Great Seal was in Commission, and Lords Lyndhurst and Brougham took the appeals: 64 were heard, and all but 4 decided. In Lord Cottenham's first chancellorship, of four sessions, 152 were heard, and 140 decided. In Lord Lyndhurst's last chancellorship, of five sessions, 171 were heard; and in Lord Cottenham's last period, of three sessions, 90 were heard. In 1850 there was a Commission, and Lord Brougham

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