for making reports of their proceedings.1 Probably if the court of Star Chamber had not ceased to exist in 1641 a series of Starchamber reports, as bulky and as numerous as the reports of the court of Chancery, would be an essential part of every law library. As we shall see, the earliest printed reports of this court are fuller than the earliest printed reports of the court of Chancery.2 Probably the publication of some of these reports, which still exist in MS., would tell us a good deal more about the law administered by the court than the publication of an equal bulk of the surviving records-just as the publication of Year Books serves a far more useful purpose than the publication of the formal plea rolls. The most complete set of Star Chamber reports, which have yet been published, are those made by J. Hawarde, which run from January 25th, 1593, to February 14th, 1609. This collection, which has been edited by Leadam, comprises a few cases in other courts in which the author was interested, but consists in the main of cases heard before the court of Star Chamber. Probably, Leadam thinks, the cases were written up from rough notes taken in court.5 The earlier part of the book shows signs of careful editing; but the latter part, when it can be checked from other sources, is somewhat careless and inaccurate-notably the account of the judgments in Calvin's Case. It is, however, the fullest report we possess of the doings of the court; and both the arguments and the judgments give us a valuable account of the way in which the business was conducted, and of the principles which the court applied. The book shows us that the court was truly a judicial court, and a court of criminal equity. The cases were regularly and publicly heard; and the parties were represented by counsel. The law applied was based upon the common law; but the procedure of the court enabled it to disregard many of those technical common law rules which 7 1 D'Ewes, Autobiography i 220 tells us that in Michaelmas term 1622 he began "to go to the Court of Star Chamber on Wednesday and Friday in the forenoon, and to take notes of such cases as I heard there adjudged "; we may safely conjecture that other law students did the like. 2 Below 276-277. 3 Les Reportes del Cases in Camera Stellata; the book is hard to get as it was privately printed; it is so valuable as an account of the actual work of the Star Chamber, and as an authority upon the actual administration of the public law of the period, that it would be well worth reprinting as a volume of the Selden Society. 4 Introd. viii; pp. 139-143, 168, 230-232, 338-341, 349 seqq. 5 Introd. vii. See e.g. pp. 2, 14, 38, 46. 7 See pp. 24-25-rules are laid down by the Chief Justices as to bail and arrest ; 27-a plea to the jurisdiction is referred to the Chief Justices; 63-a case is referred to the common law; 128-129-counsel is rebuked for citing common law cases which do not apply; 154-a case is remitted to a trial at common law; 261-legal argument as to the power of the crown to grant the forfeiture of penal laws; 325a lecture on serving process by the Lord Chief Justice. rendered the administration of the criminal law ineffective.1 The judges of the court did not hesitate to develop and expand the principles of the criminal law in a way in which no common law judge would have dared to attempt.2 The only other separate collection of reports which we possess are a series of cases printed by Rushworth which are taken from the years 1625-1637;3 and a set of reports for the year 1631-1632, which have been printed by the Camden Society. There are also a few cases heard in the court of Star Chamber reported in Dyer, Coke, Plowden, and one or two of the other common law reporters.5 The importance of the court induced lawyers not only to report its proceedings but also to write books about its constitution, procedure, and jurisdiction. Of these books by far the most important is the treatise of William Hudson. Hudson was a barrister and bencher of Gray's Inn, whose practice was chiefly in the court of Star Chamber. His active career lies between 1605,6 when he was called to the bar, and 1635 when he died. As we might expect, he was identified with the lawyers who supported the prerogative. He subscribed the information against Eliot and others for riot in the House of Commons in 1629, and he opened the case against Prynne for publishing his Histrio-mastix in 1632-1633. His fame rests entirely on his book, which gives an impartial and scholarly survey of the history constitution jurisdiction and procedure of the court, based upon its records and upon his own observations. It is a survey which is the more valuable because the author had access to records 1 On occasion they would disregard even their own rules of practice; thus at p. 149 the Lord Keeper said they could make an order " Even if it be not the course of the court; for in such great cases, in which there was great mischief, and it was so necessary for the public good, a precedent was not necessary to direct them, but they could make an order according to the necessity and nature of the thing itself " cf. p. 103, where they dealt with a case of riot because the country would not find it; at p. 292 the Lord Chancellor says, "exorbitante offences are not subjecte to an ordinarye course of lawe." 2 Illustrations may be seen in the way in which they dealt with officials who had misbehaved or neglected their duties, vol. iv 77-80; or with informations for the breach of proclamations, pp. 79, 318, 319, 328; or with such offences as riot, conspiracy, libel, and various forms of fraud, below 197-213. 3 Historical Collections, Pt. II. vol. ii App. 1-75. 4 Cases in the Courts of Star Chamber and High Commission; the cases in the former court are at pp. 1-180. 5 For these reports and the reporters of this period see below 355-374. 6 Pension Book of Gray's Inn 176; called to be of the grand company in 1622, ibid 246; chosen assistant reader in 1623, ibid 261, and reader in 1624, ibid 267; dean of the chapel in 1630, ibid 298. 7 It is stated in Collect. Jurid. ii p. 1 n. that the MS. of this treatise, contained in Harl. MSS. no. 1226, contains the following memorandum signed by Finch, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas and Lord Keeper in Charles I.'s reign :-" This treatise was compiled by William Hudson of Gray's Inn esq.; one very much practised, and of great experience in the Star Chamber, and my very affectionate friend. His son and heir Mr. Christopher Hudson (whose handwriting this book is), after his father's death, gave it to me 19 Dec. 1635." which are now lost to us. That he used these records with skill is clear from the fact that his view of the origin of the court is substantially endorsed by Leadam. 3 5 His account of the actual constitution, jurisdiction, and procedure of the court is no mere lifeless description. It is always enlivened and substantiated by the cases which he cites, either from the records or from his own practice and observation.1 He is a discriminating critic of developments of which he does not approve the neglect of the records, the length of the interrogatories administered to a defendant, the abuse of the procedure ore tenus.* But he has all the reverence of the Tudor lawyer for the greatness and dignity of a court which, because it administered the personal and direct justice of the king without the excessive technicality which impaired the usefulness of other courts, could be called "Schola Reipublicæ "-the controller both of "all the other courts of justice and ministers thereof, and of all the subjects of the kingdom.' At the same time he lets us see that in his day the court was beginning to excite a legal and a constitutional opposition which was almost unknown in the sixteenth century. In fact his consciousness of the growing opposition between the Star Chamber and the common law courts may have led him to gloss over some of its characteristics, and to suggest changes with a view to palliating a rivalry which was daily growing more acute. He entirely suppresses the fact that it used torture to extort confessions and information.8 He would like to limit the extraordinary powers which it sometimes assumed to really extraordinary cases; and the criticisms 1 See e.g. Hudson, op. cit. p. 123, cited vol. i 343 n. 7; ibid 51, cited vol. i 513. 2 Above 161. Hudson, op. cit. 169, cited vol. i 500-501. 4" Therein sometimes there is a dangerous excess. For whereas the delinquent confesseth the offence suo modo, the same is strained against him to his great disadvantage. Sometimes many circumstances are pressed and urged to aggravate the matters which are not confessed by the delinquent; which surely ought not to be urged, but what he did freely confess in the same manner,” Hudson, op. cit. 127-128. 5 Ibid 8, 9; cf. Lambard, Archeion 116, 117, 216, 217; similarly, as we have seen (vol. iv 261 n. 6), Bodin praised the good and speedy justice which the king could do personally in his own Council; cf. Esmein, Essays in Legal History (1913) 206. 6 Hudson, op. cit. 22-"Let this then suffice for the dignity of the court, that in the same, it matcheth with the highest that ever was in the world; in justice, it is, and hath been ever, free from the suspicion of injury and corruption; in the execution of justice, it is the true servant of the commonwealth, and whatsoever it takes in hand to reform, it bringeth to perfection. And therefore it is well called Schola Reipublica, the discipline whereof doth not only enter all other courts of justice and ministers thereof, but all the subjects of the kingdom." 7 Ibid 49, cited vol. i 513-514. 8 Below 185-187. 9 Hudson, op. cit. 127-128" This course of proceeding (the pressing of a confession against an accused person) is an exuberancy of prerogative, and therefore great reason to keep it within the circumference of its own orb" "This great and sovereign arm is not to be stretched out in all cases, for that would destroy order and course, but must be rarely used, and in great and weighty causes," ibid 214, 215. which he makes upon its procedure1 were perhaps animated by a desire to check practices which were making it unpopular. The picture which he drew of the court is not quite an accurate picture of its later years. But it is not the least valuable of its features that it is drawn at the close of the period when men generally thought of the court as "one of the sagest and noblest institutions of the country," and at the beginning of the period in which they were beginning to regard it as a court which attempted to maintain royal absolutism, and to overthrow the constitution, by the cruelty of the punishments which it inflicted. upon its political opponents. man. 4 5 3 Of the other treatises in which the court is described the most notable are those of Lambard and Crompton. Lambard devotes a large part of his Archeion to the court of Star Chamber. Like Hudson he approaches it from point of view of the Tudor statesHe defends its antiquity, its wide jurisdiction, and its necessity to the well-being of the state." He gives us a little information about its procedure, and officials, speaking more favourably of the procedure ore tenus than Hudson. That the information which it contains is trustworthy is clear from the character of Lambard's other works, and from the fact that this part of his treatise probably owed a good deal to William Mills, the clerk of the court.9 Naturally his treatment is directed more to the political than to the strictly legal aspect of the court. Crompton's chapter on the Star Chamber in his book on the Jurisdiction of Courts 10 approaches the subject from a point of 2 Bacon, History of Henry VII. 1 Above 165. Archeion, or a commentary upon the High Courts of Justice in England 88-217; for this work see vol. iv 117-118; I have used the edition of 1635. There is also another short tract printed in Hearne's Curious Discourses ii 277-309 entitled "Camera Stellata, or an explanation of the most famous court of Star Chamber; together with an account of the offences there punishable; the fees payable, and the orders for proceedings therein"; Miss Scofield, in the App., pp. 81-82, to her book on the Star Chamber, gives some reason for thinking that, though stated in Hearne's print to be written by Mr. Tate, it was really written by Lambard, and was an early edition of the account in the Archeion; a MS. authority cited by her (Add. MSS. 4521 Art. 7) attributes the work to Lambard. 4 Pp. 110-176, 194-205. 6 Pp. 99-102, 138-143, 205-217. 5 Pp. 102-109. 7 Pp. 187-194. 8 Pp. 211-213-"So if either the necessity of the cause doe require, that the guilty party bee speedily committed or charged, or if hee bee deprehended in flagranti crimine .. or if the offence doe onely or chiefly concerne her Majesty, or if the circumstances thereof be such as may not seemly abide the blazing of a Bill, and then the offender shall, upon Examination, freely and without torture confess the body and substance of the crime that is verbally laid to his charge, surely neither he nor any for him can justly complaine of injustice in that he is sentenced without Bill and answere in writing.' 9 At p. 193-194 he speaks of him as "Mine ancient favourer," and a man 'by whose good labours and friendships I was the better enabled to write some part of this present discourse." 10 L'Authoritie et Jurisdiction des Courts (ed. 1592) ff. 29-41b; for this book see vol. iv 212. view which is quite different from that of either Hudson or Lambard. It is the book of a common lawyer to whom details as to the procedure and the jurisdiction of the court are more interesting than large questions as to its position in the state, or its legal title to exercise jurisdiction. Having just glanced at and rejected the view that the court owed its origin to, and that its jurisdiction was limited by, the Act of 1487, he at once plunges into a list of the statutes which affected it, and of the cases which showed the kind of matters which came before it. His work has none of the literary form which distinguishes Hudson's and Lambard's books. It is a useful collection of concrete facts and instances put together in somewhat haphazard fashion from statutes, abridgments, year books, law reports, books of entries, legal text books, chronicles, and his own experience.2 4 Of shorter accounts of the court I need only notice Smith's chapter in his book on the Republic of England,3 and Coke's chapter in his fourth Institute. Smith of course is concerned with the political aspect of the court, and it is interesting to note that, in his opinion, it gained the political position, which it occupied in his day, in the earlier part of Henry VIII.'s reign.5 Coke's account is a useful summary of the history, powers, and political position of the court put together without any attempt at literary arrangement. It is important, both because it embodies a good deal of the experience which Coke acquired as attorney-general and as a judge of the court, and because it illustrates the attitude which a typical common lawyer could adopt to the court, before the constitutional controversies of the seventeenth century had convinced many of the common lawyers of the illegality of the powers which it was exercising." (2) The influence of the work of the Star Chamber on the development of English law. Before the Star Chamber was abolished it had already begun to influence the development of the English criminal law, and certain of those branches of the law which lie on the border line between crime and tort. This influence was felt most strongly in the latter half of the seventeenth century, because the abolition of the court had made it necessary for the courts of common law to adopt a large number of the new rules of law which it had either originated or developed. Therefore a consideration of the 1 ff. 2gb, 30. 3 Bk. iii c. 4. 2 See ff. 32, 32b. 5" This court began long before, but took great augmentation and authoritie at that time that Cardinall Wolsey, Archbishop of Yorke was Chauncellor of Englande. Sith that time this court hath beene in more estimation and is continued to this day in manner as I have said before,” Bk. iii c. 4. 6 Fourth Instit. p. 65, cited vol. i 507-508. |