Thunder and Small Beer.

Southland Times, Issue 9362, 30 October 1886, Page 2

Thunder and Small Beer.

(Evening Press.) It does not say much for the wisdom or propriety of Judge Richmond's recent jobation of the Wellington common jurors, that it needs ao frequent, laboured and iar-fetched defence. It is coming out rather strong to aay that it a judge does not occasionally scarify a jury, orime will njo unpunished and " the irresistible conaequenoe " will be a tendency to resort to Lynch law. A bank clerk bas got into a aerape, bat a jury have given him tho benefit of the douot. This is intolerable. Society wili not stand it. The jury system bas brokeQ down. We must have a Vigilance Committee, armed with bowie knives aud six-suootera, and all bank officials suspected of irregularity in their accounts must be hanged to the nearest lamp post Ttiis is tbe wild justice of an outraged community, and tnis is tho " irreaiatuble consequence " of the misconduct of those flagrant perjurers, tbe common jurymen of Wellington. But the criminals are to have one more chance of coming to grief in the regular way. Bofore Judge Lyuch aupercedea tho present learned oooupaota of tho S-iprerne Court Bench, Judge Richmond lias one more try to penetrate the depraved minds of Jha Wellington common jurors. He is not harsh with them — oh dear no. He treats them as Isaak Walton would have tbe angler treat the frog for bait — tenderly, as if he loved them. He begins by a courteous appeal to their sense of pride. He tells them they are a pack of fools, whom an ungentlemanly and unprofessional lawyer has bamboozled and befogged. Having thus got on pleasant terms with them, he gently soothes their self-respect. He tells them they have degraded the Court — deeply degraded it. This conciliates their sympathy and puts them in a favourable mood for the reception of a moral lesson ; and his Honour concludes by informing them that they have encouraged crime — in other worJs that they are precious little better than criminals themselves. He then discharges them with a cheering terseness, as much as to say, in the vulgar tongue, " Put that ia your pipe and smoke it !" This, we are assured, is the only remedy for wrongful verdicts, the only bulwark against 'he inroad of Lynch law. We cannot help noticing, however, that the leading morning journal whioh has undertaken the role of the Judge's champion, has an uncomfortable consciousness that this line of argument is not altogether convincing. It, therefore, does what has often been done in the world's affairs. Whan reasoning fails, it asserts authority. The Judge may be wrong. Personally ha may be as liable to err as the commonest of common jurors. He is only a man | dresaed up ia a wig and gown, Tba " Bench " ho sits on is only a chair called by another name. His words— that is th.B words of Cnristopher William Richmond — are not necessarily wiser, truer, or more forcible than the words of Thomas Stokes, Richard Noakes, or Henry Styles, butcher, baker, and candleslick maker, common jarors of Wellington. Bat just consider what be represents 1 Vyhon he has wig and his gown on and is seated on th« Bench, and when the Court hat) been, duly opened by the proper o^oef

he is no longer a man, a forked animal, he is a simulacnim] Tbiak of tbat now ! **Tboao wbo care to pursue the subject will find that a Judge, when on the Bench, is deemed to represent the Sovereign ! " (Drums and trumpets off the stage.) fio* down ye common jurors, aye, on your war row bones, every knave of yon, and imagine tbat high above you, yes, up in " that there chair," site not Christopher Wiliiam Richmond, who is one of ourselves, but Victoria, by the Grace of God, etcetera, etcetera ! Doob not that mak« you quake ? N<ry quake, as the American humourist hath it. The common juryman, being only a fool, a "chuckle-headed ass." cannot " pursue the subject " very far. He cannot explain why he "does'nt care a tupp>nny cuss," to nse hiaown coarse, winked phrase, whether the Judge is asimulacrutn or a Primitive Methodist, whether he represents the Sovereign or Te Aro, like George Fisher. But he knows instinctively that it is gammon, and ho ; ' ain't afeared " —•not ho. Why should be be ? The representation of the Sovereign by the Judge is the thinnest of fictions — the shadow of a tradition of the bad old days when the King was not only Judge, but jury, gaoler, and often executioner all in one. The last Sovereign who presumed to sit on the Bench was James the Firat, of anything but biesßed memory ; and it is a matter of history that the Judges would not put up with his nonsense, but compelled him to desist from & practice which was equally obsolete and menacing to tbe popular liberties. That was in England, nearly three hundred years ago. Yet now, here, in a free country, we are told that juries are to be overawed by the majestic idea of the Sovereign represented by the Judge ! It is too laughable: But, if we come to that, let us take the same ground. If the Judge represents the Sovereign, whom do the common jury represent ? They represent the people, the Sovereign People ! (More drums and trumpets here please). _ And " those who care to pursue the subject " will find tbat when it comes to a tussle between the Sovereign and tbe people, the people invariably get the best of it in the long run.