Page images
PDF
EPUB

it relates to the administration of maritime law in one of the colonial courts, is nevertheless printed and published in London, and will prove of use to the English lawyer practising in our Admiralty

courts.

Since the court was established (which it was after the treaty of Paris, 1763), the increase of commerce on the water of the St. Lawrence has been enormous. The yearly tonnage, it is said, has increased from 5000 to 600,000 tons; thus explaining how the importance of the court above referred to has been augumented.

A Hand-book of the Practice of Election Committees, with an Appendix of Statutes, Forms, and Precedents. By P. Burrowes Sharkey, Solicitor and Parliamentary Agent. London: Butterworths, 1859.

THE Compiler of this little volume has brought together the matter which relates to the practice of Election Committees, in a form sufficiently compendious for those whose duty obliges them to learn the general outline of the ordinary procedure of these tribunals. There are many solicitors who will find the information now collected in this small five-shillings book just enough for their purpose.

A Letter to the Earl of Shaftesbury, on the Laws which regulate Private Lunatic Asylums, with a Comparative View of the Process "De Lunatico Inquirendo" in England, and the Law of " Interdiction" in France. By Edward J. Seymour, M.D., &c., late Senior Physician to St. George's Hospital, London: Longman & Co., 1859. THE subject which Dr. Seymour here writes about is of great importance. However, he has treated it in a very rambling and unintelligible fashion. The construction of the learned physician's sentences is so ungrammatical and illogical, that we can hardly understand how the pages before us were ever allowed to be printed and circulated. They read like the production of an illiterate person, and cannot possibly carry any weight. The preface, and the concluding sentence of the "Letter," are ludicrous examples of the writer's inability to express very simple ideas. He runs his topics into each other, and shuffles about after Mrs. Nickleby's style, in utter helplessness. This is much to be regretted if Dr. Seymour has any valuable suggestions of a practical kind to make, and if he be (as is probably the case) entitled to be heard on the matter he attempts to discuss.

Dr. Seymour draws attention to the French system, in relation to inquiries with respect to lunacy, and compares it with the English.1 The following is the author's statement of the French system.

1 The practice under the English law will be found well expounded in Mr. C. P. Phillips' recent work on the subject.

We place in a parallel column the English system, that our readers may compare their respective merits :

French Code.

"1. Any one who, having obtained his majority, is in an habitual state of imbecility or dementia or furious madness, ought to be interdicted, even when lucid intervals occur.

"2. Any relation is admissible to promote the interdiction of a relation, and the same of husband against wife, or wife against husband.

"3. In case of furious madness, if the interdiction be not demanded either by the husband or the wife, or the relations, the Procureur Impérial, in case of imbecility or dementia, may also set it on foot against any one who has neither husband, nor wife, nor known relatives.

"4. Every application for interdiction shall be carried before the Tribunal (de Première Instance).

"5. The facts of imbecility, madness, or furious madness, shall be detailed in writing.

[ocr errors]

6. Those who carry on the interdiction shall produce the proofs and witnesses.

[blocks in formation]

English Law.

"1. If the well-being and happiness of a person possessed of property demands that he should be the subject of an inquisition, the L. C. will direct it; otherwise not. See 1 V. & B., 59; 1 M. & Gor., 132. (Phillips, pp. 247, 248.) As to dangerous lunatics (Id. 64, 65), and see Campbell, C. J., in Fletcher v. Fletcher, as to lunatics wandering abroad, 7 W. R., 187. See also Phillips, pp. 171,

[blocks in formation]

ever, the husband, or wife, or the children of the person sought to be interdicted, may be admitted without vote or deliberation.

"9. After having received the opinion of the Family Council,' the court will examine the defendant in the Council Chamber, and, if he is unable to be present, he shall be interrogated at his own house by one of the judges appointed, assisted by the Registrar. In every case the Procureur Impérial shall be present when he is interrogated.

"10. After the first interrogatory, the Tribunal will appoint, if it be necessary, an administrator provisionally, to take charge of the person and property of the defendant.

"11. Judgment on a demand for interdiction can only be given in public, the parties heard or sent for. (?)

"12. In rejecting a demand for interdiction, the Tribunal may nevertheless, if circumstances require it, order that the defendant shall not hereafter plead, compromise, borrow, receive personal property, purchase or give receipts, alienate or mortgage his property without the assistance of a council, who shall be appointed at the same

time.

"13. In case of appeal against the judgment of the Tribunal (première instance), the Court of Appeal shall, if it thinks it proper, interrogate again the defendant, or cause him to be interrogated by a person commissioned by them.

"14. Every order or judgment, carrying either interdiction or nomination of a council, shall be, by the care of the plaintiffs, signified to the parties, and inscribed within ten days on the tablets,

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

which must be hung up in the hall of audience, and in the studies of the notaries of the arrondissement.

"15. The interdiction or nomination of a council shall take effect the day the judgment is delivered. All acts committed and concluded after the interdict or appointment of a council shall be null and void. "16. The acts committed previously to the interdiction may be annulled, if the cause for interdiction notoriously existed previous to the period when these acts were affected.

"17. After the decease of an individual, the acts done by him cannot be attacked or abrogated on account of madness, except inasmuch as the interdiction has been pronounced or set on foot before his decease, unless the proof of madness itself results from the act sought to be invalidated.

"18. If there is no appeal from the judgment of the Tribunal (of première instance), or if it be confirmed on appeal, the court shall proceed to the nomination of a guardian, or a surrogate guardian, of the interdicted, according to the rules in the law De la Minorité, &c.; the provisional administrator shall then cease his functions, and render all account to the guardian, unless he be himself appointed guardian.

"He himself shall be examined at his own residence, by one of the judges deputed for the purpose, assisted by the registrar.

"19. The husband is of right the guardian of his wife when interdicted.

"20. The wife may be named guardian of her husband, in which case the Family Council' will regulate the forms and conditions of the administration of the guardianship, having recourse to the

[blocks in formation]

tribunals on the part of the wife, should she think herself injured by the resolution of the 'Family Council.'

"21. No one, with the exception of the husband or wife, or the relations in the ascending or descending line, shall be obliged to keep the guardianship of an interdicted person beyond ten years. At the expiration of such a time, the guardian may ask, and ought to obtain, a substitute.

22. The interdicted person is similar to a minor. The laws which regulate the guardianship of minors equally apply to the interdicted.

"23. The revenues of an interdicted person ought essentially to be employed to soften his afflicted condition, and to hasten the cure. The Family Council' may resolve (according to the character of the malady and the state of the fortune) that he shall be treated at home, or placed in a private hospital, maison de santé, or even in a public hospital.

"24. When the question shall arise for the marriage of the child of an interdicted person, the dowry or portion of the inheritance to be advanced, and the matrimonial agreement shall be regulated by the Family Council,' allowed by the Court on the conclusions of the Procureur Impérial.

[ocr errors]

"25. The interdiction ceases with the causes which determined it, nevertheless the (main levée) replevy cannot be pronounced without those forms be gone through which were necessary in pursuing the interdiction. The interdicted person cannot resume his rights until the replevy shall

be pronounced.

[ocr errors]

"21. No such absurd rulethe most fit person being chosen, is removed when he has no inclination to remain, or becomes unfit. (Phillips, pp. 278, 353.)

"22. So in England.

"23. So in England-the allowance for the maintenance of the lunatic, and the management of his estate is based on the same doctrine; the committees of the person and estate, are in lieu of the ' Family Council.' They are generally the nearest relations or connections of the lunatic, and are under strict supervision by the court. (Phillips, p. 303.)

"24. The L. C., acting as a good paterfamilias, may so deal with a lunatic's property, if he be found so by inquisition. (Phillips, pp. 332, 333, 334.)

35. So in England-there must be a supersedeas. (Phillips, pp. 359, 360.)

So translated in all works of authority." (An absurd translation, whether common or no.)

VOL. VII. NO. XIV.

2 G

« PreviousContinue »