Nobody will, I hope,
assert this, because the direct consequence would be the entire
extinction of the difference between true and false judgments. For,
if the judgment makes the law, and not the law directs the judgment,
it is impossible there could be such a thing as an illegal judgment
given.
But, instead of standing upon this ground, they introduce another
question, wholly foreign to it, whether it ought not to be submitted
to as if it were law. And then the question is, By the Constitution
of this country, what degree of submission is due to the
authoritative acts of a limited power? This question of submission,
determine it how you please, has nothing to do in this discussion
and in this House. Here it is not how long the people are bound to
tolerate the illegality of our judgments, but whether we have a
right to substitute our occasional opinion in the place of law, so
as to deprive the citizen of his franchise.
SPEECH ON THE POWERS OF JURIES IN PROSECUTIONS FOR LIBELS
MARCH, 1771
I have always understood that a superintendence over the doctrines,
as well as the proceedings, of the courts of justice, was a
principal object of the constitution of this House; that you were to
watch at once over the lawyer and the law; that there should he an
orthodox faith as well as proper works: and I have always looked
with a degree of reverence and admiration on this mode of
superintendence.
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