London Legal Letter.
191
LONDON LEGAL LETTER. London, March 5, 1899.
IT would startle the bar of any of the American courts to find a nisi prius judge sitting some morning in an appeal court to supply the place of an absent member of the latter body, or to find a supreme court judge on the bench of the circuit court ready to take the docket and to hear motions and try jury cases. It would be still more remarkable if a judge who had retired from office should from time to time reappear, without special warrant of appointment for that purpose, and sit with his former brethren of the appellate or supreme court and hear arguments and render judgment. And yet so great is the elasticity of the English judicial system that such occurrences happen here and excite no comment. The Court of Appeal is composed of six lord justices of appeal and sits in two di visions, one to hear appeals from the Chan cery side of the High Court and the other from the Queen's Bench or common law di vision. As in all cases where the subject matter of an appeal is a final decree or judg ment the arguments must be heard before not less than three judges sitting together, it is necessary that there be six judges con stantly available. The lamentable and sud den death of Lord Justice Chitty a fortnight ago reduced the number to five and this force was further reduced by the illness of Lord Justice Vaughan Williams to four. As the work could not be interrupted, the Lord Chief Justice, who was engaged in trying special juries, left that duty to one of the other nisi prius justices, and completed the re quisite number in one of the Appeal Courts, while the Lord Chancellor, figuratively speaking, descended from the woolsack and filled out on the other. Had Lord Herschell, whose sudden death in Washington startled and distressed the
profession here, been at home, he would, al though now no longer in office, have been available to sit in either of the courts, as the statutes constituting the Court of Appeal make every person who has held the office of Lord Chancellor an ex offieio judge of that court. The president of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty division (Sir Francis Jeune) is also an ex offieio judge of the Court of Appeal and has from time to time taken his place in it. So, on the other hand, the lords justices have not thought it beneath their dignity to sit in the nisi prius courts, when their services are not required in their own courts, to help on occasions when the press of work was likely to cause delay. In addition to these ex offieio judges, who are at all times available in the Court of Appeal, the Judicature Act of 1875 provides that the Lord Chancellor may request the attend ance at any time, except during the time of the spring or summer circuits, of an additional judge for the Queen's Bench Division at the sittings of the Court of Appeal and he shall attend accordingly. It is unnecessary to say that this arrange ment works admirably and enables the Court of Appeal to keep well up with its work. In fact it is so well abreast of it that in the great majority of instances a cause is argued and finally decided in that court within two or three months after it has been originally heard at nisi prius. Another cause which contributes even more largely to this rapid despatch of busi ness is the simplicity of practice in the Court of Appeal, in which respect also it is widely different from the custom in the appellate courts of the United States. The appellant serves upon the respondent a very brief but comprehensive notice of appeal, simply noti fying him when he proposes to move in the appeal court, and the grounds of his mo-
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