Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1883-08-15
THE LORD CHIEF JUSTICE.
An Office to be Traced Back to the DAYS
of William the Conqueror.

@<SseNyft = correspondence boston HeFQLQ.
The visit of the Lord Chief Justice of
England to the United States. accompa-
nleds as Is probable, by some of his more
lstlngulshed professional brethren, prom
lses TO be an event of unusual interest in
legal annals. This will not be the first
occasion on which a Judge of his distinc-
ton has left England to take part in the
proceedings Of a congress of lawyers of a
foreign state; but Lord COleridge will be
the first Lord Chief Justice who has ever
DraYed the terrOrs of the Atlantic passage.
Like many another great office and
hereditary distinction in England. that of
Lord Chief Justice may be traced back to
the days of William the Condueror. by
whom it was imported from his native
Normandy. a Chief Justice whence the
present title) sUperintended the adminis-
tration OF justice over the whole Norman
EarldOm; and, according to the manners
OF the age both military and cipic powers
OF great magnitude were conferred uDOn
him. Williams plan, after he had as
sumeG the sovereign power. was to have a
grand central tribunal in England for the
whole realm, which should be not only
court Of appeal, but in which all causes
OF Importance should originate and be
finally decided. This tribunal was after
ward called Curia Regis, and sometimes
Aula Regis, because it assembled in the
hall of the Kings palace. The great off
GERS of State-that is to say, the COnsta-
bic, the Mareschal, the Seneschal, the
Chamberlain, and the Treasurer-were
the Judges, and over them presided the
Chief Justinian. When the King was be-
yOnd seas he governed his kingdom like a
Nlceroy. In rank he had precedence over
all the nobility, and his power was greater
than of all other magistrates.
Fer two centuries the Aula Regis was
preserved. Edward 1. sometimes called
the English Justinian, abolished it, and
not only systematiZed and reformed the
public principles of English iurispru-
dence, but finally framed the courts for
the administration of justice as they sub
sisted IN England for more than six cen
turieS-till, in fact, the formation of a
modern Supreme Court of Judicature
within the last five years. Edward con-
stituted the Court of our Lord the King
before the King himself" or ''COurt of
Kings Bench" Here the King was sup
posed personally to preside, as
sisted by the First COmmOn-Law
Judge, who took the title and dig
nifty of Lord Chief Justice. And so it hap
pened that when Queen Victoria opened
in December, 1882, the present royal
courts of justice IN London, she revived
that ancient tradition in her own person.
When ali had been done as appointed, the
courts opened, and the greater ceremony
Of the day completed, the Attorney Gen
eral, advancing from the ranks of the
Queens counsel below the dais, came to
the steps OF the Queens chair and said:
May it please your Majesty, on
behalf of the bar Of England, /
come to pray that your Majesty will
be pleased to direct that the proceed
ing of this day shall be entered on
the records of the Supreme Court" The
Lord Chancellor, on behalf of the Queen,
to this request made answer: Her Maj
esty has been pleased to direct that this
shall be done as prayed" And after this
fashion Queen Victoria revived the COM
mon practice of her ancestors of the
House Of Plantagenet of the thirteenth
century. She presided in her own court.
i'm the midst of the Judges, with the chief
representatives of the bar before her,
though counsel learned i'm the law were
hardly in vogue, it need scarcely be said,
i'm the earlier days of the 'COurt of our
I Lord the King holden before himself