The Sun.
London, England, 1851-10-08 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
FROM THE MOANING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
TIMES.—The lamentable exhibition made last
week by Mr. Ramshay, Judge of the County Court
of Liverpoo:, imperatively calls for immediate action
on the part of Lord Carlisle, as well for the sake of
the unfortunate gentleman himself as of the public.
We are not now about to reason with Mr. Ramshay
as to the extent of his power, or as to the peculiar
merits of the case which he dragged before his court.
Such a mode of dealing, with the matter would prove
us to have misconceived the mischief with which the
Chancellor of the Duchy has to deal. The removal—
the immediate removal—of the learned person is of
absolute necessity, not because he has mistaken the
law, but because, from the peculiar state of his mind—
from the condition of morbid excitement in which he
now is—he appears utterly incapable of fulfilling the
duties of a judge. Unfortunately the late proceedings
which have occurred with respect to himself seem to
have taken so forcible a hold of his imagination us to
have entirely overturned his judgment. The idea
that he has been made the subject of a conspiracy,
and that he is in duty bound to undertake the special
mission of defending the administration of justice
from the machinations of interested opponents,
has reached with him that degree of in-
tensity which constitutes monomania, and his
whole conduct is affected by this prepossession.
His mental state is no longer that which is com-
monly described by the terms " bad temper," neither
does the word " anger " accurately depict it. Oce
notion has taken possession of his brain ;ind already an unfortu-
nate train of events operating upon a m
lowered by illness has exaggerated this notion into a
portentous magnitude ; all other considerations seem
to him utterly worthless and insignificant when com-
pared with this monster of his imagination ; and he
proceeded to deal with the every-day circumstances
of life as if they were really exponents of the things
which existed only in his own distorted conceptions.
Don Quixote and the windmill is an exact foresha-
dowing of what occurred the other day at Liverpool.
A County Court Judge ought certainly to be deemed
a very respectable person ; his functions are impor-
tant, and the qualifications for his office are
such as ought to belong to a man of a learned
profession and a gentleman, but there is nothing to
mark such a man out for persecution. There is
nothing in the duties of his office or his relative
position in society to make it the interest of any
powerful class to select him as the victim of a
conspiracy. Mr. Ramshay unhappily thought 11
otherwise. He went to Liverpool fully persuaded
that his predecessor had been destroyed by persecu-
tion, and he was resolved not like him to succumb or
yield to any such attacks. He had conjured up for
himself a band of moral assassins, whose every object
was to destroy an unright judge; and he fancied that
wonderful courage and ever-watchful vigilance were
required to resist their baneful machinations. His
manners were from the first not those of a man of the
world, but were abrupt, rude, and coarse. He was
easily excited to anger, and being so excited, he ex-
pressed himself in the first and least polished phrases
which the vernacular afforded. This peculiarity laid
him open to attack—in fact, invited it; and any one
who knew aught of the habits of Englishmen could
quickly have foretold that Mr. Ramshay would soon
lay himself open to imputation and assault. If a man
hesitated, he called him a fool ; if he gave an unin-
telligible answer, he asserted, without further inquiry,
that he was drunk. If Mr. Ramshay wished to state
that the Court entertained grave suspicions of
a particular person's honesty, he at once
stated that he was " a rogue," "a rascal ;"
and thus he went on from day to day
exciting himself as well as those he thus abused, till
at length the storm which every man of common
foresight must have known would come burst over
the angry judge, who was in consequence cited to
appear before his superiors. To what took place be-
fore the tribunal, if tribunal it can be called, before
which Mr. Ramshay appeared, we need not now re-
fer; enough was disclosed to show that Mr. Ramshay
ought never to have been appointed. There was
not, however, sufficient elicited to justify dismissal.
The position of Lord Carlisle was a difficult one, but
that difficulty was brought upon him by his own too
easy disposition, combined with a failing that belongs
to his party as well as himself, he and they being
always anxious to support and forward all those who
are related to their families, or connected with them
as clients and retainers. While the mischievous
effects of such a feeling are found resulting only
from appointments to inferior positions in the public
service, people shut their eyes, or indulge in a
little useless grumbling, their displeasure for the most
part evaporating in the expression. They treat the
proceedings as a foolish weakness, being unwilling to
look upon it as a serious evil. But when the same
spirit of family patronage affects the selection of men
for high judicial ofiloe—when such extraordinary
vagaries are practised as those of which we have
lately been wondering beholders, then the public in-
dignation is fairly roused, and punishment—we use
the word advisedly--must fall, not on the unhappy
person chosen, but upon his erring patron. Tne
person really to blame in this matter is, not Mra
Ramshay, but Lord Carlisle. Lord Carlisle was bound
to be particularly careful in this case. A great expe-
riment was being tried in our judicial system. The
success of the new arrangements necessarily depended
upon the fitness of the judges appointed to administer
justice in the newly-framed County Courts, end a
failure in any one instance would be likely to excite
doubts, and check our advance in cur lately adopted
career of legal reform. We know, indeed, that the
Administration of which Lord Carlisle forms a part
are not, and have not even affected to be, law re-
formers. But we suppose that, with some exceptions,
they are not opposed to improvement in our judicial
system, and we cannot suspect any one of them of a
desire to throw discredit upon the new plan by means
of an incompetent judge, and among the last of those
to whom we should attribute such an unworthy mo-
tive is the Noble Lord himself. His intentions, we
have no boubt, were pure, but he certainly was care-
less; he thought little of the importance of the se-
lection he was bound by his office to make, and under
the influence of this want of consideration, and a
wish to forward the son of an old client of his family,
he risked, with his eyes open, the mischief that was sure
to follow an injudicious appointment. By inquiry, if
inquiry had been needed, Lord Carlisle might have
ascertained the habits and the character of the
learned gentleman, and ho would have at once dis-
covered therefrom that however estimable in other re-
spects Mr. Ramshay might be, ho was totally unfit
for the office of a judge. This want of precaution on
the part of Lord Carlisle, and his unfortunate selec-
tion, resulting from the mixed motives we have de-
scribed, deserve, and doubtless will receive, severe re-
prehension. Still, even from this most painful occur-
rence we may derive a salutary lesson. We are by
it driven to ask, why is the duty of appionting a judge
left to the discretion of the Chancellor of the Duchy
of Lancaster ? The office is one now purely poli-
tical; it is held by persons of importance to an Ad-
ministration merely, and is not conferred with any
reference to legal knowledge or peculiar ability. Lord
Carlisle is an important person in the Whig party,
endowed with many amiable qualities, but he knows
nothing of law, and must judge of legal attainments
and of a man's aptitude for the performance of judicial
duties upon hearsay, and by the opinions of others.
We have thus one man responsible, and possessing
the power of appointment, and we have another
really deciding and selecting, who, though the actu-
ally efficient person in the proceeding, is unknown
and irresponsible. Such a system ought to be altered.
One person, and one alone, ought to have the appoint-
ment of the judges of the county courts, and that
person should be the Lord Chancellor. He is, or
ought to be, a lawyer ; he has passed his life in the prac-
tice of his profession ; he must, in some degree, be
acquainted with the characters and capacities of most
men practising at the bar; and ho is thus from his
position able to make the right choice, an d responsible
if he make an improper one.
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footlhie shDpurcivhiyleg oe t
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nonca
We hope, then, that
hereafter this mischievous anomaly with respect to
this important
subject—thisba idle
or and
belonging
gsl be immediately done away with, and
tothe
Lancaster—will bs
that the power and duty of selection throughout the
kingdom will at ouce be imposed on the Lord Chan-
cellor, who we also hope will not, like Lord Carlisle
in the case of Mr. Ramshay, be induced by favour or
paleiroswo npa feelings
prejudice
ejudo
ea to
and
forego
partial
affections for
privateto u
seunrdps , t
ho
er
place of duty and of reason.
DAILY NE
WS.—To those who have watched the
course of public affairs in France, there is nothing so
surprising, and so mortifying to behold, as the simi-
larity, almost the sameness, indeed, of all Administra-
tions in that country. Whether the monarch reigns
by what is called legitimatist right, whether he seeks
to enforce that right with zeal, or render it palateable
by conciliation—whether the occupier of the throne
be a king elected by the choice of politicians and the
sanction of the people, or whether in fine the Govern-
ment be a republic based on universal suffrage, and
proclaiming universal rights—it all comes to the samel
point; the Administration is found proceeding in the
self same path. Fear of the people, p
the press, the grossest infraction of individual ulibertytion
thof
ersec
and of every law guaranteeing it, proscription of r
it•higehmtsioadndofprtahco Fr
practice of
French
Jesuits, and the mind of French manhood under the
ncahss youthnniatinin n , endeavour
d keepingavou to place
the of l
the
ace
dread of the gaoler, the police officer, end the Atter-
uey-Genaral—these are the characteristics of every
Administration that Franco bas seen during half a
century. No matter how liberal the statesmen who
take office—no matter how absolutist, the principle
of administration becomes the same. You may
execrate Polignac and Peyronnet, you may rejoice
at the accession to power of men so liberal and
so honest as Barrot and Faucher, yet you find the
former eager to bolster up the Pope's despotism by
the bayonets of French soldiers, and you find a severe
persecution of the press mark-the Government of the