The Sun.
London, England, 1830-05-03 00:00:00

Goulburn would treat with indignation t rn-
oose] to make him the strolling Chancellor of the
Exchequer; yet he would give us hawkers of
beer. Seriously it would be less preposterous to
make the Chancellor of the Exchequer wait upon
all the persons with Whom he may have to transact
business than to force the sellers of beer to be in
constant pursuit of their customers ? But this is
not the worst part of the " clause" --announced by
the Courier. Mr. Goulburn knoWs very well that
there can he no tetadt in beer unless the buyer may
consume the commodity "on the premises." The
" dense" is not to affect those who now possess the
monopoly of the beer trade; it is to apply only to
those who may endeavour to compete with the
monopolists. It is then, in point of fact, a declara-
tion that the monopoly shall not be touched. Mr.
Goulburn has been threatened by the great brewers,
his fears have conquered his wish to obtain some
little popularity. Thus vanish his grand promises.
All the rejoicings with which the repeal of the beer
tax was received will be converted into angry dis-
appointment. But what matters the public feeling
when set against the votes of the great brewers?
The brewing interest will support Mr. Goulburn,
and the public will be sacrificed; but then we may
console ourselves by constantly exclaiming—was
there ever " so independent and vigorous" a Mi-
nistry !—Morning Journal.
In Blackwood's Magazine for May, there is an
attempt to account for the horror in which the
Scotch hold Jury trials. " The fault of the Ene-
fish system," says the writer, "is, that it is a sys-
tem of humbug, and frequently of perjury. The
Jury are set apart in a box, and told that they are
Judges. The Pleaders address them as Judges.—
The Judge addresses them as Judges. To be sure
he tells them flatly that they must not meddle with •
the law, and that they must take it from his mouth ;
but he tells them also that they are Judges of the
fact, although he and his brethren at the next
Term may probably annul their verdict, because
they have misjudged the fact. This mode of treat-
ing them as Judges flatters their vanity, and flatters
the vanity of the populace, who are told they are
judged by their country—meaning thereby, that
they are judged by each other; whereas, in reality,
their transactions are judged of according to law,
as expounded by professional lawyers. Some Jury-
men, thinking themselves Judges, occasionally try
to judge for themselves, but oppressed by the law
of unanimity, and their own want of experience in
business, they are compelled to yield, after an in-
effectual struggle, and to give way to the majority
of their brethren, who usually obey the direction
of the Judge." Farther on the writer observes—
" Hence chicane and dexterity have been re-
commended to us. A plaintiff tries to leave out
some bit of evidence necessary to his antagonist, to
force him to lead evidence, while -the other is
tempted to hazard the want of proof on his part to
avoid the effect on an ignorant Jury of the persua-
sion of his opponent's Counsel. This dexterity end
stratagem are substituted for the grave and deli-
berate investigation of truth. The minds both of
practitioners and litigants are corrupted. All these
and other absurdities stared Scoichmen in the face
when the Jury Court appeared among them. They
gazed with wonder and disappointment on the far-
famed English Trial by Jury in civil causes. Like''
travellers in a strange country, they perceived a
thousand absurdities in the procedure to which the
natives, by habit and familiarity, had become insen-
sible." However, as Mr. Brougham's Courts are
for England, in which the people are used to them,
it is proper there should be an option. But it does
not require the gift of prophecy to foretell that
Juries will seldom be wished for. We observe that
on Friday night some allusion was made in the House
to the Lord AdvocateN Bill. We shall conclude
these observations with the following letter from
the author of the Pamphlet on the Lord Advocate's
Bill, which we noticed some days ago. It is in
answer to some strictures on the Pamphlet in an
article ill the Chronicle, made by an Edinburgh
newspaper. Our readers will see from it what the
Court is which the Lord Advocate wishes to super-
sede :

London, 30th April, 1830.

have just perused an article by the Editor of an
Edinburgh paper, entitled the North Briton, comment.
ing on your Review of the Pamphlet upon that part of
the Lord Alvocate's Bill which relates to the Scotch Com-
missary or Consistorial Court. The article meets none of
the arguments in either the Patnplilet or your Review;
but substitutes sweeping averments, which can impose only
cn the uninforrned.

The Editor referred to is a Scotch Advocate, practising
before the Court of Session—a circumstance which, no
doubt, sharpened his desire to get as many causes as he can
to that Court ; particularly as in the Consistorial Court
(where these Advocates may, the ugh they do not neces-
sarily fail to be employed), he has had little practice; for
he very simi ly admits he " never was personally con-
cerned in any Commissary case but one." Upon this
notable case, which is called M'Kenzie v. 11•Kenzie, his
main attack depends. He says it lasted four years. But
if he will examine in that case, we believe he will find
that intervals front three to six. and eight months, and
even for a longer period, occurred between the different
steps taken by the Pursuer. The defendant could have
hindered this if he had plea-ed, and the case might have
lain over and over, if both parties hid pleased.
Then as to the expence of that case, we shall only re-
quest him again to look to the record, and he will find
that his desire to monopolise all sorts of business for the
Court of Session, has led him into as great an error as it
has done in regard to the delay.
But it is idle to fix on any one case as affording a fair
specimen of the whole. If he shall attempt to do so with
the one in question, we will at once point out wherein it
differed from almost every other ; and how much its ex-
pence was increased by a peculiar line of defence adopted
on his side, for want of a better. In such special detaill,
however, the public can take no interest.
But the following facts, which are of general interest,
can never be impugned :
In a list which I have seen of twenty-three Scotch
Consistorial cases, finally decided within the last four
years or so, the expenses stood as follows: —ln three of
them the expences were under 101. In three under 12/.
In six under 15/. In severs under 201. In one under
211. In two under 231. ; and one only reached 26/.
In all of those cases a full proof was led, and judgment
was given only after deciding on that proof
. . .

The list to-which I refer was nut made up with a view
to show how long each of these cases remained in Court.
But it happens to show the following, viz., one case lasted
three months, one four months, one five months, one six
months, and two lasted seven months. Yet the Editor of
the North Briton sets forth that it is high time a Court
should be abolished whose " antiquated forms altogether
disqu,lify it for the expeditious and effective administra-
tion of justice"—•a Court where justice can bg got in a
few months, and for a few pounds—in order that the
litigants may be cent to the Court of Session, the vaca-
tions of which last for about seven months out of the
year ; and the expense of which is actually proverbial—
and all this on the strength of the'` one" case in which
we" (the said Editor) " were personally concerned"—
in utter forgetfulness, too, of what the Learned Gentle-
man might have learned from the " Pamphlet," and the
Lord Advocate's Bid proposes to remove these " antiquated
forms" without improvement to the Court of Si ssion.
The question of expense and delay being thus fairly set-
tled, let us see what more this Legal Editor can say against
ti,e Scotch Consistorial Court.
He says—l. (forgetting that justice speedily admi
nistered, often renders suits unnecessary), that the Consts-
torial causes are not numerous ; and in support of this (by
mistake, we are bound to presume), he gives the number of
one class of cases, as if it were the number of the whole.
But if he were right, could it be worth his while to make
so strenuous an effort to force these causes to the Court of
Session? To force the neglected and starving wife to sue
tin- her weekly aliment of b.. in the Court of Session? It
is not any saving to the public revenue which could
induce such in step ; for with one Judge the Court would
cost the country only 8001. a year, while the saving of this
8001. will occasion an annual expense of probably as many
thousands in another quarter.
2. A decree in absence, says the Editor, may be got
even cheaper in the Court of Session th in a decree in the
Commissary Court. This is comparing two things that
have no resemblance. To prevent collusive suits, no de-
cree, without sufficient evidence being led, is ever obtained
in the Consistorial Court. We challenge him to point out
any one case in the Court of Session► with its double em-
ployment of Counsel and agent, printing, and fee fund dues,
&C. where evidence has actually been led, where the ex-
Pence will net be at least three or four times greater than