matter wherein it has authority to make an order for the payment of money.

In all cases brought before them it is competent to the court to award costs to either party, and, in the case of an information, to enforce payment of them or of any pecuniary penalty, by distress, and in default thereof by imprisonment for a limited period (e); or, (in the case of some offences) imprisonment may be awarded without the alternative of paying a sum of money. But should an order be made for money recoverable by complaint and not by information it is recoverable only as a civil debt, and can only (in default of distress or otherwise) be enforced by imprisonment after proof given that the party making default has the means to pay but neglects or refuses to do so (f); and then, the court of summary jurisdiction has the same power as a county court to enforce payment by the imprisonment authorized in such cases of contumacy by the Debtors Act, 1869 (g).

Power is also granted to the court, from time to time, to adjourn the proceedings as circumstances may require; and in the meantime either to allow the defendant to go at large, or to commit him to prison. Or, it may discharge him on entering into a recognizance, (either with or without sureties,) conditioned for his re-appearance at the adjournment day, which recognizance, if broken, is to be transmitted to the clerk of the peace to be proceeded upon (h).

Such is, in general, the method of summary proceedings before a justice or justices of the peace sitting as a court of summary jurisdiction. It is to be understood, however, that unless there be some enactment directing or permitting a prosecution in this summary manner, no offence is capable of being so dealt with; but the offender must be proceeded

(e) Vide sup. p. 333, n. (m).

(f) 42 & 43 Vict. c. 49, ss. 6, 35. (g) See 32 & 33 Vict. c. 62, et sup. vol. I. p. 292.

(4) 11 & 12 Vict. c. 43, ss. 16, 29. As to recognizances, vide sup. pp. 288, 292.

against either by indictment or information in the usual way. It also deserves notice, that a summary conviction is not in all cases conclusive; but is often subject to appeal, and, indeed, is always so (with the exception already noticed) where the sentence is imprisonment without the option of a fine (i). And in the greater number of the statutes which authorize this course of proceeding in particular instances, an appeal to the quarter sessions is specially authorized (j). And in such cases, and if a question of law be involved, the decision of the quarter sessions may, in its turn, be brought under the review of the Queen's Bench Division of the High Court ().

Moreover, by 42 & 43 Vict. c. 49, s. 33 (7), any person aggrieved who desires to question a conviction, order, determination or other proceeding of a court of summary jurisdiction on the ground that it is erroneous in point of law or is in excess of jurisdiction, may apply to the court to state a special case setting forth the facts of the case and the grounds on which the proceedings are questioned, and, if the court decline to state the case, may apply to such High Court for an order requiring the case to be stated. On the other hand, the justice or justices themselves were enabled by 35 & 36 Vict. c. 26, to file affidavits in the court before which such special case has been brought, free of any expense by way of fee or stamp duty,-in order to put the court in possession of the grounds of their decision, and of any facts which they may consider as having a material bearing on the question at issue; and this without the necessity of appearing by counsel.

III. [To this head of summary proceedings may also be properly referred the method immemorially used by the superior courts, of punishing contempts by attachment, and the subsequent proceedings thereupon.

The contempts which are thus punished, are either direct; which openly insult or resist the powers of the courts, or the persons of the judges who preside there. Or else are consequential: which, (without such gross insolence, or direct opposition,) plainly tend to create an universal disregard of their authority. The principal instances of either sort, that have been usually punished by attachment, are of the following kinds (m). 1. Those committed by inferior judges and magistrates: by acting unjustly, oppressively, or irregularly, in administering those portions of justice which are intrusted to their distribution; or by disobeying the royal writs issued out of the superior courts,-as by proceeding in a cause after it is put a stop to, or removed by writ of prohibition, certiorari, error, supersedeas, and the like. For as the superior courts have a general superintendence over all inferior jurisdictions,—any corrupt or iniquitous practices of subordinate judges are contempts of that superintending authority, whose duty it is to keep them within the bounds of justice. 2. Those committed by sheriffs, bailiffs, gaolers, and other officers of the court: by abusing the process of the law, or deceiving the parties, or by any acts of oppression, extortion, collusive behaviour, or culpable neglect of duty. 3. Those committed by solicitors, (who are also officers of the court,) by gross instances of fraud and corruption, injustice to their clients, or other dishonest practices. For the malpractice of the officers reflects some dishonour on their employers; and, if frequent or unpunished, creates among the people a disgust against the courts themselves. 4. Those committed by jurymen in collateral matters relating to the discharge of their

(m) Hawk. P. C. b. 2, c. 22.

[office: such as making default when summoned; refusing to be sworn, or to give any verdict; eating or drinking without the leave of the court, and especially at the cost of either party; and other misbehaviour or irregularities of a similar kind;-but not in the mere exercise of their judicial capacities, as by giving a false or erroneous verdict. 5. Those committed by witnesses: as by making default when summoned, refusing to be sworn or examined, or prevaricating in their evidence when sworn. 6. Those committed by parties to any action or proceeding before the court as by disobedience to any rule or order made in the progress of a cause, or by non-observance of an award duly made a rule of the court. However, the contempt in such cases as last mentioned, is in general consequential or constructive only; as it implies no actual disregard of authority, but may proceed from the poverty of the party. 7. Those committed by any persons: in the way of disobedience to the royal writs, or other disrespect to the court's authority. Some of these contempts may arise in the face of the court: as by rude and contumelious behaviour; by obstinacy, perverseness or prevarication; by breach of the peace, or any wilful disturbance whatever. Others in the absence of the party: as by disobeying or treating with disrespect the sovereign's writ, or the rules or process of the court; by perverting such writ or process to the purpose of private malice, extortion, or injustice; by speaking or writing contemptuously of the court, or judges acting in their judicial capacity; or by printing false accounts (nay, even true ones, if against the prohibition of the court), of causes then depending in judgment (o); and by anything, in short, that demonstrates a gross want of that regard and respect which, when once courts of justice are deprived of, their authority,

(0) See R. v. Clement, 4 B. & Ald. 218; In re Pollard, Law Rep., 2 P. C. Ca. 106; and the cases of

Onslow, Whalley and Skipworth, reported in Law Rep., 9 Q. B.

219.

z 2

[(so necessary for the good order of the kingdom,) is entirely lost among the people.

The process of attachments for these and the like contempts, must necessarily be as antient as the laws themselves. For laws without a competent authority to secure their administration from disobedience and contempt, would be vain and nugatory. A power, therefore, in the supreme courts of justice to suppress such contempts, by an immediate attachment of the offender, results from the first principles of judicial establishments, and must be an inseparable attendant upon every superior tribunal ( p). Accordingly we find it actually exercised, as early as the annals of our law extend. And though a learned author seems inclinable to derive this process from the Statute of Westminster the second, 13 Edward I. c. 39,-which ordains that in case the process of the king's courts be resisted by the power of any great man, the sheriff shall chastise the resisters by imprisonment," a quâ non deliverentur sine speciali præcepto domini regis;" and that if the sheriff himself be resisted, he shall certify to the courts the names of the principal offenders, their aiders, consentors, commanders and favourers, and that by a special writ judicial they shall be attached by their bodies. to appear before the court; and that if they be convicted thereof they shall be punished at the king's pleasure, without any interfering by any other person whatsoever:yet he afterwards more justly concludes, that it is a part of the law of the land, and as such is confirmed by the statute of Magna Charta (q).

If the contempt be committed in the face of the court, the offender may be instantly apprehended, and impri

(p) It may be here remarked that the jurisdiction with regard to contempts, which belongs to inferior courts, and in particular to the county courts, is confined to contempts committed in the court itself; and in the case of the last

mentioned courts is limited to the power given by the statutes under which they are created. See The Queen. Lefroy, Law Rep., 8 Q. B. 134.

(9) Gilb. Hist. C. P. ch. 3.