Judges in the Olden Time.
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JUDGES IN THE OLDEN TIME. LORD Campbell in his " Lives of the Chief Justices " of England brought to light much that is odd and interesting. From this work we propose to glean as many curiosities as will interest the reader for half an hour, if he will favor us, or, as we might put it, favor himself with reading what, for his amusement, we are about to write. Lord Campbell's lives commence with the Norman Conquest, for the Chief Justiceship was a Norman, and not an Anglo-Saxon in stitution—indeed, an attempt on the part of the King to centralize the administration of justice in a Supreme Judge, as he aimed at centralizing the administration of govern ment in his own supreme majesty. It did not succeed, however, if it was ever intended, as a destroyer of already existing institu tions. In course of time this, with all Nor man innovations, cordially compromised the matter with what was more democratic in the use and wont of law or government, and the whole has come down to us as one ven erable unity. From the reign of William, the long se ries of Chief Justices consisted of nobles and baron bishops, who were usually men of mark under the crown, and whom it was necessary to conciliate with the possession of power. In the reign of Henry III., this dangerous order of Judges fell into disloy alty, and a good excuse was furnished for restricting their duties to matters of mere administration. The line of baronial jus tices, however, closed, it is considered, with the best on the list, a man of genius and humble origin, who, in the confusion of the time, slipped into office for a year or two. This was Henry de Bracton, whom Lord Campbell calls one of the greatest jurists of any age or country. Curiously enough, the first of the mere Judges, the first Chief Jus tice, "at the King's pleasure," was not a ci vilian, as had been determined, but a baron, a
son of the sword, a Bruce—the grandfather of "the Bruce of Bannockburn." He had learned the law in England, and continued there until the accession of Edward I., when on the death of the Maid of Norway, he re turned to Scotland, and threw himself into the tumult of the Scottish succession. One Chief Justice was hanged at Tyburn, in 1 389, by the barons, who were then at variance with Richard II., and who saw in the Judge their great enemy. Shortly afterward, sev eral of the Judges were tried by the House of Commons, for having given the King false advice at Nottingham, with the view of pre venting a convocation of the barons. They were transported to Ireland. In the biography of Sir William Gascoigne, Lord Campbell contends, in spite of those who would throw historic doubt over the matter, that this Chief Justice did really commit Prince Henry to the Bench Prison, for interfering violently in behalf of one of his servants, indicted at the bar of the court. The successor .of Sir William was Sir W. Hankford, of whose life nothing is so mem orable as his mode of leaving it. He wished to die, but shrank from suicide, seeing that the self-slayer's goods were usually forfeited and he himself buried in a cross-road, with a stake through his body. Several of his deer having been stolen, he set a keeper to watch in the park at night, with orders to shoot any intruder who would not answer when challenged. One dark night, the keeper met such a man, and shot him dead; that man was his master. The story is well au thenticated. In a succession of Chief Justices, we find no remarkable men till Queen Elizabeth's time; they were mostly subservient to the powers that were, particularly in the time of Henry VIII., who, reigning after the fall of the barons and before the rise of the com mons, enjoyed the Golden Age of English
