to indictment. To enable the reader to judge for himself, I shall state, in due order, the several statutes relative to bail in criminal cases, or as much of them as may be material to the point in question, omitting superfluous words. If I misrepresent, or do not quote with fidelity, it will not be difficult to detect me.
[1]The statute of Westminster the first, in 1275, sets forth, that "Forasmuch as sheriffs and others, who have taken and kept in prison persons detected of felony and incontinent, have let out by replevin such as were not replevisable, because they would gain of the one party, and grieve the other; and forasmuch as, before this time, it was not determined which persons were replevisable, and which not; it is provided, and by the King commanded, that such prisoners, &c. as be taken with the maner, &c. or for manifest offences, shall be in no wise replevisable by the common writ, nor without writ."[2] Lord Coke,
- ↑ "Videtur que le statute de mainprize n'est que le rehersai del comen ley."Bro. Mainp. 61.
- ↑ "There are three points to be considered in the construction of all remedial statutes;—the old law, the mischief, and the remedy;—that is, how the common law stood at the making of the act; what the mischief was for which the common law did not provide; and what remedy the parliament hath provided to cure this mischief. It is the business of the judges so to construe the act, as to suppress the mischief, and advance the remedy."Blackstone. i. 37.
