Case Name: Overseers of the Poor of the township of Upper Dublin against Overseers of the Poor of the township of Germantown
Court: Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
Jurisdiction: Pennsylvania
Decision Date: 1793-04
Citations: 1 Yeates 250
Docket Number: 
Parties: Overseers of the Poor of the township of Upper Dublin against Overseers of the Poor of the township of Germantown.
Judges: 
Reporter: Reports of cases adjudged in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania (Yeates)
Volume: 1
Pages: 249–250

Head Matter:
Overseers of the Poor of the township of Upper Dublin against Overseers of the Poor of the township of Germantown.
S. C. 2 Dall. 213.
Justices of the peace cannot join in making an order of removal from their own township.
Certiorari to the sessions of Philadelphia county, to re move all orders relative to the removal of Rachel Peters, a pauper, from Germantown to Upper Dublin.
The township of Upper Dublin had appealed from the order of the two justices to the sessions, who on argument confirmed the order of removal. An exception was taken to the order, that one of the justices who signed it lived in Ger-mantown township, but the same was overruled. The exception and opinion of the court appeared on the return to the certiorari.
*Mr. Rawle now moved, that the orders should be r*pKi quashed on the authority of 2 Stra. 1173, more fully •- reported in Burr. Sett. Cas. No. 68. In Hob. 87, it is said, that even an act of Parliament cannot make one a judge in his own- cause. The mayor of Hereford was laid by the heels, for sitting in judgment in his own cause, though he, by the charter, was the sole judge of the court, x Salk. 396.
Mr. Ingersoll on the other side contended, that the act of assembly giving the power of removal of poor persons, directs “any two justices of the county” to sign the order without restriction; that the interest was extremely small, and could not be supposed to influence the justices. Besides an appeal lies from it, and the makers of the stat. of 16 Geo. 2, c. 18, § 1, empowering justices of the peace to act in their own parishes, shews clearly their idea, that the balance of convenience lies on that side.

Opinion:
By the court.
No man should be a judge in his own cause. The administration of justice should not even be suspected. The words of the law, "any two justices," must mean legal justices. It has been deemed necessary by the legislature, in the incorporation of boroughs, as Lancaster, York, Reading, &c. to add similar words to the stat. of 16 Geo. 2, c. 18; but they have confined it to the boroughs incorporated, and have not extended it to the counties at large. The uniform practice for these forty years past, has been to quash such orders, and the same must be done in the present instance.