But again it may be objected that there were special grounds of public policy for requiring those who disposed of public offices of profit to appoint persons "for whom they will answer at their peril," in the words of another similar statute as to clerks in the King's Courts.[1] It might be said with truth that the responsibility was greater than in the case of private servants, and it might be asked whether respondeat superior in its strict sense is not an independent principle which is rather to be deemed one of the causes of the modern law, than a branch from a common stem. It certainly has furnished us with one of the inadequate reasons which have been put forward for the law as it is,—that somebody must be held who is able to pay the damages.
The weight of the evidence seems to me to overcome these objections. I think it most probable that the liability for under-officers was a special application of conceptions drawn from the family and the power of the family head over his servants. Those conceptions were in existence, as I have shown. From a very early date, under-officers are called servants of their superior, as indeed it seems to be implied that they are, by the word "sovereign," or even "superior," in the statutes which have been cited. "Sovereign" is used as synonymous with master in Dyer.[2] In the Y. B., 11 Edward IV. 1, pl. 1, it is said, "If I make a deputy, I am always officer, and he performs the office in my right and as my servant;" and from that day to this, not only has the same language been repeated,[3] but, as I shall show, one of the chosen fields for the express use of the fiction of identity is the relation of superior and under-officer.
Under Edward III. it was held that if an abbot has a wardship, and a co-canon commits waste, the abbot shall be charged by it, "for that is adjudged the deed of the abbot."[4] This expression appears to me not only to apply the rule respondeat superior beyond the case of public officers, but to adopt the fiction of identity as a mode of explaining the rule.
- ↑ St. 2 H. VI., c. 10.
- ↑ Alford v. Eglisfield, Dyer, 230 b, pl. 56. The passage will be cited later in dealing with factors. See also Y. B. 27 H. VIII. 24, pl. 3.
- ↑ Parkes v. Mosse, Cro. Eliz. 181 (E. 32 Eliz.); Wheteley v. Stone, 2 Roll. Abr. 556, pl. 14; s. c. Hobart, 180; 1 Bl. Comm. 345, 346.
- ↑ Y. B. 49 Ed. III. 25, 26, pl. 3.
formam statuti, etc. ita quod in defectu ejusdem coronatoris totus comitatus ut elector et superior, etc. (tenetur), habeant regi respondere, praecip (praeceptum fuit) nunc vic' quod de terris et tenementis (hominum) hujusmodi totius comitatus in balliva sua fieri fac." etc. See the other references in 4 Inst. 114, and further Y. B. 49 Ed. III. 25, 26, pl. 3.
