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ADMIRALTY JURISDICTION 2 Will. IV. c. 51, 26 Viet. c. 24 already cited, and have been given, upon questions which would never have 30 and 31 Viet. c. 45. In 1890 the Colonial Courts arisen if the county courts had not a larger money area of Admiralty Act provided that, except in the colonies of jurisdiction in Admiralty cases than they have of New South Wales, Victoria, Saint Helena, and British in other matters (Reg. v. Judge of City of London Cif 11 jurisHonduras, Vice - Admiralty Courts should be abolished, Court, 1892, 1 Q.B. 273; The “Zeta,” 1893, °n’ and a substitution made of Colonial Courts of Admiralty. App. Cas. 468). But as regards the high courts, whether There is power, however, reserved to the Crown to erect in England, Scotland, or Ireland, it is not now necesthrough the Admiralty in any British possession any Vice- sary to distinguish their civil Admiralty jurisdiction Admiralty Court, except in India or any British possession from their ordinary civil jurisdiction, except for the purhaving a representative legislature. No Vice-Admiralty pose of seeing whether there can or cannot be process in Court so established can exercise any jurisdiction except for rem. Not that every Admiralty action can of right be some purpose relating to prize, the royal navy, the slave brought in rem, but that no process in rem lies at the suit trade, foreign enlistment, Pacific Islanders’ protection, and of a subject unless it be for a matter of Admiralty jurisquestions relating to treaties or conventions on inter- diction—one, for instance, that could in England have been national law. Vice-Admiralty Courts exercised all usual tried in the High Court of Admiralty. Now these matters Admiralty jurisdiction, and in addition a certain revenue of Admiralty jurisdiction with process in rem range themjurisdiction, and jurisdiction over matters of slave trade selves under four primary and four supplementary heads. and prize (royal navy) and under the Pacific Islanders’ The four primary are damage, salvage, bottomry, wages; Protection Act. The appeal from Vice-Admiralty Courts and the four supplementary are extensions due to one or used to lie to the High Court of Admiralty of England, other of the statutes 3 and 4 Viet. c. 65, and 24 Viet, but has been transferred to the King in Council. c. 10. They are damage to cargo carried in a ship, necesModern statutes have given Admiralty jurisdiction to saries supplied to a ship, mortgage of ship, and master’s the county courts in the following matters:—Salvage, claim for wages and disbursements on account of a ship. where the value of the salved property does not In all these cases, primary and secondary, the process of Courts. exceed <£1000, or the claim for reward £300; which a plaintiff can avail himself for redress, may be towage, necessaries, and wages, where the claim either in personam as in other civil suits, or by arrest of the does not exceed £150; claims for damage to cargo, or ship, and, in cases of salvage and bottomry, the cargo. by collision, up to £300 (and for sums above these Whenever, also, the ship can be arrested, any freight due prescribed limits by agreement between the parties); can also be attached, by arrest of the cargo to the extent and claims arising out of breaches of charter parties and only of the freight which it has to pay. For the purpose other contracts for carriages of goods in foreign ships, or of ascertaining whether or not process in rem would lie, torts in respect thereof up to £300. This jurisdiction is there have been distinctions as nice, and the line of Adrestricted to subjects over which jurisdiction was possessed miralty jurisdiction has been drawn as carefully, as in by the High Court of Admiralty at the time when the first the cases of the Admiralty jurisdiction of the county of these Acts was passed, except as regards the last branch courts (The “Theta,” 1894, Prob. 280; The “Gas Float of it (The “Aline,” 1880, 5 Ex. Div. 227; Hecf. v. Judge Whitton,” 1897, App. Cas. 337). There have been of City of London Court, 1892, 1 Q.B. 272). In analogy similar questions raised in the United States, from De with the county court Admiralty jurisdiction created in Lovio v. Bait (1815, 2 Gallison, 398), and Ramsay v. England, a limited Admiralty jurisdiction has been given Allegre (1827, 12 Wheaton, 611), down to the quite modern in Ireland to the recorders of certain boroughs and the cases which will be found quoted in the arguments and chairmen of certain Quarter Sessions ; and in salvage cases, judgments in the “ Float Whitton.” where a county court in England would have jurisdiction, The disciplinary jurisdiction at one time exercised by the magistrates, recorders, and chairmen of Quarter Sessions Admiralty Court, over both the royal navy and merchant may have jurisdiction as official arbitrators (57 and 58 vessels, may be said to be obsolete in time of Viet. c. 60, § 547). In Scotland, Admiralty suits in cases peace, the last remnant of it being suits against Disc'PIinnot exceeding the value of £25 are exclusively tried in the merchantmen for flying flags appropriate to men- ary' Sheriff’s Court; while over that limit the Sheriff’s Court of-war (The “Minerva,” 1800, 3 C. Rob. 34), a matter and the Court of Session have concurrent jurisdiction. now more effectively provided against by the Merchant By the Act 1 and 2 Geo. IV. c. 76, an arbitral jurisdic- Shipping Act, 1894. In time of war, however, it wTas tion in cases of salvage was given to certain commissioners exercised in some instances as long as the Admiralty Court of the Cinque Ports. lasted, and is now in consequence exercisable by the High The appeal from county courts and commissioners Court of Justice (see Prize below). It was, perhaps, is to the High Court of Justice, and is exercised by a in consequence of its ancient disciplinary jurisdiction that Appeals. court of the Probate, Divorce, and the Admiralty Court was made, and the High Court of Admiralty Division. In cases arising within the Justice now is, the court to enforce certain portions of the Cinque Ports there is an optional appeal to the Admiralty Foreign Enlistment Act, 1870. Court of the Cinque Ports. The appeal from the High Finally, appeals from decisions of courts of enquiry, Court of Justice is in ordinary Admiralty matters, as in under the Merchant Shipping Act, cancelling or suspendothers, to the Court of Appeal, and from thence to the ing the certificates of officers in the merchant service, may House of Lords. But it is specially provided by the be made to the Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty Division Judicature Act 1891, as it was by the Prize Act 1864, of the High Court of Justice. that the appeal in prize cases shall be to the Sovereign in The Admiralty jurisdiction in criminal matters extends Council. over all crimes committed on board British ships on sea or The unfortunate provisions of the Legislature, giving tidal waters, even though such tidal waters be to the jurisdiction of county courts different money limits well within foreign territory (Reg. v. Anderson, Criminal in Admiralty, Equity, and Common Law cases, make the 1868, L.R. 1 C.C.R. 161), but not over crimes cases’ distinction between cases coming under the Admiralty committed on board foreign vessels upon the high seas jurisdiction and other civil cases of practical moment in (Reg. v. Serva, 1845, 1 Denison C.C., 104). Whether those courts. Arguments full of learning and research it extended over crimes committed on foreign ships within have been addressed to the courts, and weighty decisions territorial waters of the United Kingdom, and whether a
