The Sun.
London, England, 1865-01-10 00:00:00

many of them, and enjoying all the facilities for tracking
them down which they possess, have detected and appre-
hended the party accused and lodged him in a place of de-
tention, should not the doors be opened and the prisoner be
permitted to depart, remaining atlarge until some suchbody
as our old constables, who were changdd year by year,
should be able to retake him? And why, when he has had

his trial, and when his guilt has been proved tot he satisfac-
tion of every auditor, is he not transferred to another judge
and another jury, that the ceremony may be repeated ?
Gentlemen, I cannot place the question in any light which
would relieve the appeal to a grand jury, in all ordinary

cases, of an absurdity bordering on the ludicrous. Yet
bearing in mind the repugnance which will be felt by large
numbers of our fellow countrymen to any sweeping change

in the venerable :institution under review I could for my
part be well content to adopt, by way of experiment, a

suggestion lately published by Mr. Sergeant Pulling,
gentleman of long experience in our courts, and who has
in his writings ably treated on various prajects for the

amendment of our laws, although on the present occasion

Ido not, at all points, concur in his views. " The grand
jury," says the learned sergeant, "has always formed an
important part of the whole system of trial by jury. To
abolish grand juries would be to introduce a very serious,
if not a very dangerous innovation. It may be that idnine

cases out of ten, the exercise of the functions of the grand

ary in criminal trials may be productive of nothing but

delay, that in some cases the ends of justice may be de-

feated by the grand jury neutralising in secret conclave,
and for reasons altogether suppressed, proceedings legally
taken in open court ; and it has been urged that in all cases
where a full preliminary investigation has already taken
place before a competent magistrate, the re-opening the
case in the grand jury room should be prohibited. But
even to this proposition there are objections. In England
we shall ever be reluctant to deprive a person accused of
crime of any just protection which the law can afford him,
and to drive him to stand at the bar of a criminal court on
the commitment of a single magistrate, when, by a more

careful investigation by the grand jury, the judgment of
the committing magistrate may be found altogether erro.

neous. Can no middle course be adopted ? If the option
were given to every person committed for trial by
a magistrate to have the accusation against him re-
opened by the grand jury, or be tried on the case
as presented by the committing magistrate, the result
would probably be that very few would demand such an
intermediate investigation. I would propose that when
the accused did not, on being committed for trial, expressly
demand that his case should be presented to the grand jury,
the case should proceed as if a true bill had been found,
but otherwise the proceedings to be as at present. Where,
however, in consequence of the demand of the accused, the
intervention of the grand jury should be required, the pro-

secutor and prisoner should be entitled to the assistance of
counsel and attorney in that as in every other stage of the
case." The learned serjeant, I presume, contemplates that

:he investigation shall be public, and that the accused shall

be allowed to call witnesses in his defence, and herein

should heartily agree with him. We know by experienee
that the very large majority of prisoners committed for trial
are guilty. The course of proceeding before magistrates
would be open to reproach instead of commendation, were
it otherwise. I agree, too, in believing. that few of the ac.

used would avail themselves of the privilege which the
serjeant would reserve to them. Because, as guilty persons
well know, repetitions of an open inquiry into the charges
against them produce fresh evidence. Slips are oftentimes
made in the conduct of the prosecution which, while they
might not be sufficient to induce a grand jury to throw
out the bill, and thereby put an end to investigation,
would, if the examinations were in public, remind- the
prosecutor or his legal adviser that some loophole which
had by inadvertence been left open must be closed prior
to the conclusive trial before the petit jury. Probably,
therefore, the demand for the intervention of the grand
jury would, in the course of time, be preferred only by
the innocent, 'and again only by such of that class as felt
the necessity of reiterated scrutiny into the evidence
against them. For as repeated investigation is dangerous
to the guilty, so by its tendency to elicit the truth is it a
safeguard to the innocent. Should, however, expectience
teach us that a large proportion of guilty prisoners will still
claim the intervention of the grand jury, it will be necessary
to resort to ulterior measures, for which, when the chamber
of the grand jury is thrown open to auditors,' the public
mind will gradually become prepared by observing what a
useless expenditure of time and labour these investigations
prove to be, except in a few extraordinary cases. But, as I
have said, the usual operations of the grand jury, as now
conducted, are not merely useless, but too often mischiev-
ous. To obtain more particular information on this topic,
I have examined the depositions in every ease occurring at
the three last sessions in which the bills were ignored by
the grand inquest. The aggregate number of prisoners
committed for trial was 298, and the number in favour of
whom the grand jury threw out the bills of indictment was
23. This latter number, gentlemen, may appear to you to
be a large proportion, considering that every case followed
by a commitment had been subjected to rigid scrutiny; but
I must confess my surprise to be that the proportion was
not much larger, impressed Cs I am with the many difficul-
ties under which grand juries labour. Of these 23 the de-
positions of the witnesses for the prosecution make out a
case of guilt as respects all but two, and of these two, one,
?erhaps both, so strengthened the case for the crown that
f the evidence against these two prisoners had been laid be-
'ore the grand jury exactly as it camo out before the em-
itting magistrate, and if the grand jury had been apprised

of what the prisoners had chosen to urge in their defence
which could not be done according to law, true bills migh
justifiably have been sent in against the whole 23. But the
probabilities are that the cases were seriously mutilated
when the witnesses spoke under the protection of
secrecy. In the interval between the commitment and the
assembling of the grand jury; there is time for tampering
with witnesses ; sometimes by very base expedients, even
to open bribery ; oftener, I am inclined to believe, by
working on their sympathies. Then again many witnesses
cannot present the jury with a complete and connected
narrative of their evidence, while the foreman, not being
instructed in the facts of the case, is unable to examine
them so effectually as the counsel does who has the aid of
his brief. Another source of error lies in the number of
legal points arising in the course of their labours. These
would, for the most part, present little difficulty to persons
conversant with the criminal law, but they may readily
mislead the moat intelligent, if their pursuits have not been
such as to furnish them with a legal training. lam sure
you will not for one moment suppose that I am reflecting
on grand jurymen, but I do not wonder that they them-
selves feel very keenly their false position ; and that, with
no reluctance to fulfil their share of public duty, they much
desire to be relieved from the unenviable task now thrust
upon them. In certain of the 23 cases which came under
my review, I found that hardened offenders had been let
loose upon society. One prisoner, a woman, not appearing
in court for the first time, had, with malice prepense,
stabbed another woman in the forehead, severing an im-
portant artery. Another prisoner, when before the magi-
strates, had volunteered an admission of his guilt. Gen-
tlemen, although I would not place the two considerations
which I am about to lay before you in the first rank of im-
portance, yet you will not deem it unworthy of notice that
the pecuniary cost to the public, attendant upon these mis-
carriages, is no trifle ; nor again, that while we are con-
stantly stimulating the zeal and watchfulness of our police,
and reproaching the force, perhaps a little too often, on the
frequent impunity with which offences are committed, it
must tend very much to relax their exertions when they
find that all their toil is thrown away. Let me detain you
a few moments longer, while I advert to the relief
which, in addition to their exemption from -at-
tendance on grand juries, would be afforded to
prosecutors and witnesses should the legislature
grant the emancipation which I have contem-
plated. In that event there would be no difficulty in so
arranging the business of the sessions that no witness
would need to be detained very long prior to his being
called upon for his testimony. The clerk of the peace
would draw out lists of prisoners for each court, and for
each day ; and the order in which the accused would be
taken would be rarely dfsturbed. The prisoners, too, would
partake of the general benefit. They would be brought
here from the prison in smaller numbers than according to
present arrangements. Consequently there would be less
danger of interfering with the wholesome discipline of the
prison by crowding them together in the places of deten-
tion behind the court, which must undo to some extent
any good which may be accomplished by the separation
observed in the gaol. But what prisoners would deem a
much greater advantage remains to be mentioned. Our
English criminal procedure is still under the disgrace, in
which it lies almost alone, of making no pecuniary provi-
sion for enabling the accused to bring his witnesses into
court, and for paying their necessary expenses while there.
Consequently, it but too often happens that, unable to re-
main in unproductive idleness for any lengthened period,
they depart, and are found absent when called upon to
enter the box. The arrangements which I have just de-
scribed would greatly alleviate the inconvenience, now sus-
tained by this class of witnesses, and their absence, I trust,
would seldom occur. Much more might be urged in favour
of the change which it has been the object of this charge
to advocate ; but I will intrude no longer on your valuable
time."

THE MIDLAND COUNTIES STRIKE.—TIe Observer
gives the following as the present position of the strike in
the Midland Counties against the discharge note which the
master builders have introduced :—ln Birmingham about
800 carpenters are on strike, in Coventry about 400 men
comprising all branches, in Walsall about 40 ditto, in Not-
tingham about 700 ditto, in Malvern about 100 ditto, and
about 1,000 in the other Town .

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