COPY.
Enclosure 6.
157
His Excellency
The Governor.
I must apologise for not replying sconer
to Your Excellency's letter of January 8th., on the subject
dealt with in the accompanying papers.
In spite of the apparently retrograde
nature of the proposal to substitute bi-monthly for monthly
Criminal Sessions, I am in favour of the change: so much so
that I had intended to make the proposal to Your excellency
myself, as the present arrangement unduly hampers me in the
conduct of the civil and other business of the Court.
The principle involved in the proposal is,
I think, very fairly raised and stated in the last paragraph of
the Colonial Secretary's minute. is it fair to postpone a man's
trial on a criminal charge in order to facilitate the civil
work of the Court: to postpone the vindication of public justice
to the settlement of private wrongs ? I think the answer is
that the settlement of private wrongs is as much part of the
judicial duties for the due performance of which Government has
to provide, as the administration of the criminal law: and the
judicial time must be so divided as to deal with both branches
of judicial administration in the most effective manner possible.
I have no hesitation in saying that under
the present system too much of the Chief Justice's time is
taken up by the monthly assize, and that he is prevented by it
from making satisfactory arrangements for the due despatch of
civil and other business. This is true even when the Court is
not very busy. This month, for example, I was compelled to ask
the Puisne Judge to take the Sessions as i was in the middle of
an Admiralty case, the postponement of which would have been
attended
.
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