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274 The Leader and Saturday Analyst. | M...
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PRINCIPLE OR PRESUMPTION ? LEADING/journ...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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New Bankruptcy Code. H Ealttl-Lt As The ...
elusive of schedules , consists of five hundred arid thirty-thre . e distinct clauses , and exclusive of the index fills one hundred and fifty pages- We doubt whether the ArTd ^ iJEY ^ GENEKAL him - self is quite prepared to say what -will be even the probable operation of this immense mass of legislation . We must content ourselves with saying that the Bill is plainly and carefully drawn , but is much too voluminous , complicated , and detailed to be readily analyzed and easily comprehended . . . """ We are glad to see , though the Act does not extend to Scotland and Ireland , that the courts and authorities there are required to act as auxiliaries in giving effect to the decisions and processes of the English Court of Bankruptcy . A provision , \
too , is expressly introduced to prevent English bankrupts who have , within three months , ordinarily resided and traded in England , from having recourse to the bankrupt laws of Scotland , and to empower the English Bankruptcy Court to summon such bankrupts to show cause why the petition against them should not be prosecuted in the English courts . We see , too * with satisfaction , while many facilities are given for carrying cases into the Bankruptcy Courts , that no obstacles are thrown in the way of those arrangements between debtors and creditors which have latterly become so common . On the contrary , care is taken to prescribe measures by which they are legalised . As the new
court will be empowered arid required to prosecute for all misdemeanours it discovers in the conduct of bankrupts , and such misdemeanours are to be punished with not more than two years' imprisonment , the criminal jurisdiction of the court , which consisted in withholding certificates or giving certificates of different descriptions , is done away . It is made imperative on the court to appoint , within a limited time , a day for the final examination of the bankrupt , when , if his accounts be filed , and the court do not , for good reasons , otherwise determine , his compleWdischarge , with his exoneration from all his previous
pecuniary obligations , follows ; This is an improvement on the old practice .. Care , too * is taken to provide : that the courts shall sit every day in the year 3 except Sundays and the usual holidays . In order that this may be done without inconvenience , the Lord Chancellor , is authorized at vacation , time to appoint temporary judges to administer the Bankruptcy law . The professed desire to unite humanity with diligence , to inflict the least possible suffering , and cause the least possible delay in satisfying the creditors and relieving the debtors , is extremely creditable to the Attokney-Genekal , and we should gladly
believe that it may be successful . . We miss , however , in this great measure that deference to tha mercantile classics -which on this subject they claim and is their due , and the Bill is founded on that ¦ supreme confidence in the legal classes ' - of-which they have long complained . The Bankruptcy Court is to do for them very minutely what they require legal authority to do for themselves / At the same time , the Bill does not distinguish with accuracy between the laws required for their guidance arid the mode of administering them , It establishes at once a new code and a new court . It is much
more a detailed means of administering the surrendered property of debtors , for . the behoof of creditors , than , admeasure to . check undue confidence , extravagance , and resulting insolvency . If any improvement be expected in trade morality from an altered method of distributing debtors' property , there will be disappointment . Even as a mere measure of administering property it is defective , by the largo extent of each bankruptcy district , which will cause waste of time and money . It leaves the , English system in this respect much less convenient than the Scotch . By continuing Sheriffs' Courts , formerly common to both countries , the northern part of the empire lias a civil as well as a criminal tribunal in every county . Under its direction , bankrupt
property is appropriated , sequestrated , and distributed amongst creditors at a cost of 1 . 2 or 13 per cent . That we lack such a civil tribunal , and were obliged not long ago to establish- county courts , while we retained very numerous local criminal tribunals in our Justices , was one of the consequences of our having left an old feudal jurisdiction in the hands of the landed gentry . They clung to it to punish poachers , ' but they declined to be the unpaid instruments for settling contentions between debtors and creditors . This is one of the disadvantages of our peculiar squiredom , to which , according to Mr . Pishaeh's lately acquirod
wisdom , the nation is indebted for its liberties . " Till he stated this on Monday we had no- doubt , whatever may be- the vices of town folk and traders , that to their zeal in the oanse of freedom and their enlightenment , aU modern political improvement is due , We think so still j and therefore we think also that the Attorn by-Genehal wpulcl have done the work expected of him betjtor had lie simplified the Bankruptcy code , mid placed the power of administering it in the bonds of men . chosen by the mercantile body , instead of creating a , grand new court to administer the property of insolvents .
274 The Leader And Saturday Analyst. | M...
274 The Leader and Saturday Analyst . | March 24 , 186 a ,
Principle Or Presumption ? Leading/Journ...
PRINCIPLE OR PRESUMPTION ? LEADING / journalist has stated very seriously and solemnl y * J \ . " It . will be well for this country , and well for the progressof political knowledge , when statesmen have been induced' to receive as an axiom , that measures ought to be considered , not with reference to metaphysical aiid abstract considerations , but to well-ascertained and practical results . " " That which we require to know , and without which we know nothing , is , what effects the proposed change will produce , beyond the establishment of an equality between county and borough voters . " This is apparently plausible ; but , used as an argument against an extension of the suffrage , by making that in counties correspond to that in towrts , is plausible only , and stands refuted the instant the meaning of the proposition is clearly understood .
Practical results are put in opposition to abstract considerations ; and the effects which a legislative measure is expected to produce are described as safer guides for framing it than principle . But these words , " practical results , " cannot apply to any measure in progress ; they can . only mean the effects of similar or analogous measures , previously enacted . The practical results of the new Reform . Bill will only come into existence after the " measure" has become law : and , however well guessed at , cannot possibly be known beforehand . What are called practical results by this * writer are the consequences of some other laws ,
or they are merely his inferences . They are-presumptions , the suggestions pf imagination ; and , contrasted with the " metaphysical considerations " set at nought , are the deductions of one iriirid , while these are the embodiment and expression of general experience . To suppose that vre can infer the " practical results " of any proposed measure , from the results of similar measures inpast times , or in other countries , is unwarranted . If it could be done , the blunders continually committed by every succession of legislators would be at once most unreasonable and unjustifiable . They are only , excused , because , as circumstances change , the meanino-of the terms used in old laws and former measures
change , and we do not perceive it . Enactments , in consequence , lle ^ ltetly worded like p re-enactments , or supposed to be framed Office them , are never followed by the same , nor even by similar effects . Thus , the " practical results of measures" continually flisapppint legislators , and are extremely different from their presumptions . " . Acting with a view to " practical results , " or what the legislator presumed would be the consequences of his measures , through the greater part of the eighteenth century , he disregarded the " abstract metaphysical considerations" of the right to life , and the moral principle which teaches us to respect it—presumed that to hang men was sure to prevent forgery , burglary , sheepstealing ,: petty : larceny , cutting down young trees , destroying bleaching webs , etc ., etc . ; and-he decreed death for these and a great nurtiber of other similar offences . The Statute book
became crowded with bloody lawsj and annual butcheries at every assize town disgraced England in . the eyes of the civilized world . In the same manner , thinking only of the " practical results " encouraging agriculture and promoting commerce , the legislator in the last and in . this century placed innumerable restrictions on trade . The consequence , however , was the destruction of public welfare to a degree wholly inconceivable , till after the abolition of such legislation hod enabled this old nation to start forward at a pace quite equal to the newest-peopled countries of the world . At present , we may describe Free trade as one pf the " metaphysical abstract considerations " to which legislators do homage with their tongues , and public writers with their pens , and at the same time hope for " practical results " by continually disregarding them . The Chancellor of the Exciif / quisr . maybe quoted as an example . He expected ' ^ practical results" or
public advantage from his proposed warehousing and other new imposts ; but though he delighted the House of Commons by his eloquence , he has lost the confidence and approbation of the mercantile classes . The solemn statement of our contemporary opens up-the large question , whether practical men or philosophers , whether mole-eyed workers at ledgers and calicoes , or observing inquirers into the effects of institutions past and present . —whether tho bureaucracy or the democracy , a class or les
the whole public—the presumptions of n few , or the princip deduqod from universal experience— -are most to be relied on in making laws . We think that general principles , called by our contonipor , ary abstract metaphysical considerations , more- reliable than his or any pther individual ' s presumptions . The especial inetnphysioal and abstract consideration derided by tho Times is , " the equality of voters in towns aud counties , Which in its turn depends on the abstract principle that every man subject to the law has a right to a voice in making
it-For one man to assume that he is authorised tp inake Inw » or another , is to olnim inspiration , or assert masterdom , utterly at variance with the theory of the Constitution , and with prw-
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 24, 1860, page 6, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_24031860/page/6/
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