confined as usual to the poor, i.e. the great majority of the community, who have none to speak for them, is scarcely complained of by the rich. Yet, were all law-taxes taken off, and the amount thrown upon conveyances and agreements, this—even this—would in reality be an indulgence.
Whether the oppression be more or less grievous, is never worth a thought. Will it be submitted to?—This is the only question. Charity is kicked out of doors. Hope is fled—faith and piety remain, and atone for everything.
For a list of about twenty-eight other sources of factitious delay, vexation, and expense, and thence of denial of justice, produced by the judges of former times, for the augmentation of lawyers' profit, their own included,—together with a list and summary account of the devices by which these burthens have been imposed, and by which technical stands distinguished from natural procedure,—See by the same author, Scotch Reform, &c. printed for Ridgway, Piccadilly. [Vol. V.]
ADDITION by a LEARNED FRIEND.
In the Court of Chancery, two cases have recently occurred, which may serve as an illustration of the extent in which the taxes upon law-proccedings may operate as a denial of justice. In one case, Roe v. Gudgeon, the defendant, in his answer to the plaintiff's bill, submitted that he ought not to be compelled to set out certain accounts which had been required by the bill, as the expense of taking what is called an office copy of them,—a necessary preliminary to any further proceeding on the part of the plaintiff in the cause,—would amount to the sum of £29,000: an expense almost wholly arising from the stamps on the paper, on which the office copy of the answer s compulsorily made in this case the court determined, that it was not necessary these accounts should be set out: but in coming to this conclusion, how far the court was determined by the nature of the particular case, or by the magnitude of the expense that would thus be occasioned;—or whether if, without any such objection, the defendant had actually set out these accounts, the plaintiff could have been relieved from pursuing the regular mode of procuring a copy of them, and thus incurring the above expense;—or whether, if the expense had been instead of £29,000, only 28 or 27 thousand pounds, such an objection would have been listened to;—it is extremely difficult to say.
The other case alluded to is one in which, from peculiar circumstances, it is not thought proper to mention the names of the parties. It is optional with a man to be a plaintiff in a cause,—it is not altogether so optional with him to be a defendant. The preceding case shows that it is not always safe for a man to become a plaintiff, without £28,000, at least in his pocket to begin with, over and above what is necessary for his maintenance.—The following case shows that a man may not be always able to resist a demand, however unjust it may be, without being able to support an outlay of at least £800. In the case in question, the writer of this has been assured,—and from authority, which he has peculiar reason for relying upon,—that the expense of merely putting in an answer by one of the defendants to a bill in equity, amounted to the above sum of £800: what part of this expense was occasioned by the tax on law-proceedings cannot be accurately ascertained, but it assuredly constituted a very considerable proportion of that sum.
