PYRAMID OF JUSTICE

Evening Post, Volume 50, Issue 50, 27 August 1926, Page 7

PYRAMID OF JUSTICE

ADMINISTERING THE LAW

ADDBESS BY SIE FBEDERICK

CHAPMAN.

"A pyramid is finished off with a point; but the true foundation is the base. The pyramid of the administration of justice is based on the Justices of the Peace, and unless the instruction is sound, tb pyramid will fail," said Sir Frederick Chapman, in an address to the Auckland Justices of the Peace Association recently.

"Laudatory expressions will be found in many English books. Sir William Blackstone said: "The legislature has from time to timo heaped upon the Justices such an infinite variety of business that the country is greatly obliged to any worthy Magistrate, who, without any sinister object of his own, will engage in this troublesome service. That view inculcated the idea that the office was not to be regarded as a mere personal or political honour. It was an honour with burdens —burdens which assisted business of the State."

Sir Frederick said that he had only recently been introduced to the fact that there was an organisation of Justices such as the association, and that they had been receiving addresses. The practice was a most commendable one. The administrators of justice should never finish learning their duties. Their education persisted throughout life and they were always engaged in the pursuit of knowledge. An institution of J.P.s, somewhat in the form which we know, sworn to administer justice within its jurisdiction, dated from Edward 111. From an unknown date there were institutions somewhat equivalent to the J.P.s Association. In an organised society, there must be some such sort of institution.

After making reference to the administration of justice in foreign countries, Sir Frederick said that one could scarcely pick up a book relating to social and domestic affairs in any period of English history, unless one found important public writers attaching importance to all those who administered justice. The essence of English justice was open administration. The courts were thrown open to the public and to the Press. That was one of the most essential points of justice, according to English ideas. "Let us be clear of being tyrannous, since we so openly proceed in justice," wrote Shakespeare. Sir Frederick drew a clever comparison between the British method, which, he said, was always being commended, and the methods adopted by some of the Continental countries.

The lecturer touched on tho career of the infamous Judge Jeffreys, who served the Crown in 1685, and who took upon himself to interrogate and browbeat accused people. The duty of tho justice was first to absorb the idea that he was a justice, said Sir Frederick. He must realise that he is a funetionery of the highest importance in the land, and that he is sworn to administer justice in several ways. And the law as administered by justices was growing in importance every day. "If I have added one drop to the spirit of the administration of justice, then my evening has been well spent," concluded Sir Frederick.