The King's Justices
group · 2 works · 6 mentions · 17 anchored passages
justices · King's justices · justices of eyre · the King's justices · itinerant justices · justices on circuit · justiciars · king's justices · the justices · the king's justices
spoken of as
1 expressionKing's Justices2 mentions
An Essay on the Trial by Jury (English) · Magna Carta: A Commentary on the Great Charter of King John (English)
The justices who were assigned in the name of the sovereign, and whose powers were revocable at his pleasure, derived their authority merely from their grant.
in the texts
Magna Carta: A Commentary on the Great Charter of King John
The King's judges, sent on periodic circuits (eyres), who alone held the formal power to try pleas of the Crown.
Sheriffs, while still free to punish petty offenders in their half–yearly tourns or circuits, allowed the coroners to “keep” royal pleas, and the justices to “try” them.
An interval had always to elapse between the commission of grave crimes and the formal trial of the accused, for the coming of the itinerant justices took place only at intervals of about seven years.
The elaborate instructions issued in 1194 to the justices, whom Archbishop Hubert Walter was despatching through the counties, contain provisions intended to keep the pretensions of sheriffs within bounds:
An Essay on the Trial by Jury
Officers appointed by the crown to hold certain civil assizes, whose authority to preside over criminal trials is disputed.
But previous to Magna Carta, the kings had adopted the practice of sending officers of their own appointment, called justices, into the counties, to hold jury trials in some cases;
It is entirely incredible that Magna Carta, which makes such careful provision in regard to the king’s justices sitting in civil actions, should make no provision whatever as to their sitting in criminal trials, if they were to be allowed to sit in them at all.
The foregoing interpretation of the chapter of Magna Carta now under discussion, is corroborated by another chapter of [166] Magna Carta, which specially provides that the king’s justices shall “go through every county” to “take the assizes” (hold jury trials) in three kinds of civil actions, to wit, “novel disseisin, mort de ancestor, and darrein presentment;