On the 4th of December, 1882, Our Gracious Queen, on the occasion of the opening of the Royal Courts of Justice, said:—

“I trust that the uniting together in one place of the various branches of Judicature in this my Supreme Court, will conduce to the more efficient and speedy administration of justice to my subjects.”

On April 20th, 1883, in the House of Commons, Mr. H. H. Fowler asked the Attorney-General whether he was aware of the large number of causes waiting for trial in the Chancery Division of the High Court, and in the Court of Appeal; and whether the Government proposed to take any steps to remedy the delay and increased cost occasioned to the suitors by the present administration of the Judicature Acts.

The Attorney-General said the number of cases of all descriptions then waiting for trial in the Chancery Division was 848, and in the Court of Appeal 270. The House would be aware that a committee of Judges had been engaged for some time in framing rules in the hope of getting rid of some of the delay that now existed in the hearing of cases; and until those rules were prepared, which would be shortly, the Government were not desirous of interfering with a matter over which the Judges had jurisdiction. The Government were now considering the introduction of a short Judicature Act for the purpose of lessening the delay.—Morning Post.

[No rules or short Judicature Act at present!] [0a]

On the 13th April, 1883, Mr. Glasse, Q.C., thus referred to a statement made by Mr. Justice Pearson of the Chancery Division: “The citizens of this great country, of which your Lordship is one of the representatives, will look at the statement you have made with respectful amazement.” The statement appears to have been, that his Lordship had intended to continue the business of the Court in exactly the same way in which it had been conducted by Mr. Justice Fry; but he had been informed that he would have to take the interlocutory business of Mr. Justice Kay’s Court whilst his Lordship was on Circuit; and, as it was requisite that he should take his own interlocutory business before the causes set down for hearing, “all the Causes in the two Courts must go to the wall”!!! His Lordship added, that it would be necessary for him to rise at 3 o’clock every day (not at 3 o’clock in the morning, gentle reader), because he understood he should have to conduct the business of Mr. Justice Kay’s Chambers as well as his own.—Morning Post.

On the 16th April, 1883, Mr. Justice Day, in charging the Grand Jury at the Manchester Spring Assizes, expressed his disagreement with the opinion of the other Judges in favour of the Commission being so altered that the Judge would have to “deliver all the prisoners detained in gaol,” and regarded it as “a waste of the Judge’s time that he should have to try a case in which a woman was indicted for stealing a shawl worth 3s. 9d.; or a prisoner charged with stealing two mutton pies and two ounces of bacon.”—Evening Standard.