tory of the general law, as well as the common law of England, for which he cites numerous authorities. (a) Indeed the very definition of law-a rule of action-shows that it cannot be applicable to an act done before the rule existed, for how can an action violate a rule which does not exist? And this doctrine on the subject of retrospective laws naturally leads to the consideration of the promulgation of laws, and the great palpable defect, heretofore existing in the British legislation, is noticed, resulting from the singular maxim that a session of parliament is but one day, and that, the first day of the session; a maxim that has just as much sense as one which should pronounce the whole year to be one day, and that the first of January, upon which all notes should be paid that were to fall due in the year. The palpable absurdity of this maxim and its injustice in subjecting men to penalties for breaking laws that did not exist, finally induced the enactment of the statute of 33 Geo. III., ch. 13, which makes the operation of a statute commence from the day of its receiving the royal assent, if no other day is mentioned for this purpose; this in part remedies the evil, and puts the British legislation upon the same footing with ours in this respect. The consequence of this rule is to render laws in some cases practically ex post facto, as in the case of the brig Ann, 1 Gallison's R. 62; for a law of which a party cannot possibly have knowledge, is, as to the regulation of his conduct, to all practical purposes, the same as if it had not been enacted. A wrong may be thus occasionally wrought, and be the proper subject of redress by the executive or legislature, but we very much doubt whether the case admits of a general remedy.

In this part of the volume Mr. Hoffman touches upon the subject of codification and the works of Jeremy Bentham, whom he treats with some respect. It is certain that Mr.

(b) Bracton lib. 4, fol. 228. Digest 50, 17, 75. Code 1, 14, 7. Taylor's Civil Law, 168. Bacon's Abridgment, 6 vol. 370, Statute (C.) 2 Institute 292. 1 Black. Com. 46. Coke Litt. 360. Gilmor v. Shuter, 2 Modern Rep. 310. Bacon De Augm. Scient. lib. 8 cap. 3. Puff. N. & N. book 1, ch. 6, sec. 6. 4 Burrow's Rep. 2460. 2 Shower's Rep. 17. Calder v. Bull, 3 Dallas's Rep. 386. Ogden v. Blackledge, 2 Cranch's Rep. 272. Wilkinson v. Myer, 2 Lord Raymond's Rep. 1352. Ham v. McClaws, 1 Bay's South Car. Rep. 93. Osborne v. Hager, same, 179. Bowman v. Middleton, same, 252. Dash v. Van Kleeck, 7 Johnson's N. York Rep. 477. Society v. Wheeler, 2 Gallison's Rep. 103. Dartmouth College v. Woodward, 4 Wheaton's Rep. 518. 2 Coke's Institute, 526. 4 Inst. 25. 1 Plowden's Comm. 79. 1 Levinz's Rep. 91. 6 Brown's Parlia. Cases, 553. Latless v. Holmes, 4 Durnf. and East's Rep. 660. p. 276.

Bentham has survived the ridicule and contempt of which he was formerly the subject, and though no legislator can consider him as a safe guide, or good authority, there is no doubt that his writings have had a powerful and very salutary effect upon contemporary legislation, not merely by pointing out improvements, but more perhaps in consequence of the merciless satire and irresistible force of illustration, with which he has exposed some of the absurd maxims and senseless prejudices, which masked many hoary abuses and venerable follies. The plan proposed by Bentham, and which appears to be approved by Mr. Hoffman, is certainly worthy of attention. He proposes an analysis of all the subjects of legislation, which Mr. Hoffman adopts. Under these various heads it is imagined that an abstract universal code might be framed, which should contain all the essential enactments which ought to be embraced in the code of every nation, and from which each might improve its own laws. The difficulty is, however, that the moment you get beyond the veriest first principles, you are entangled in the peculiar national forms, prejudices, and institutions, which cannot be dealt with in a general abstract code. A plan for the reformation of the laws of any community, must be framed upon a knowledge of its existing laws and institutions. From the times of Solon to the present, it has been quite as difficult to know what laws a community will bear, or are fit for, as what would be best for them, provided their character and circumstances admitted of their adoption.

After an examination of the foundation of the laws of nature in the ninth lecture, the various forms of government are treated of in the tenth, and the works of the most distinguished writers, both ancient and modern, from Confucius to the authors of the Federalist, are cursorily reviewed.

The last lecture, and one of the most satisfactory in the volume, is on the subject of the feudal law. It may be advantageously read by the student, after the first volume of Robertson's Charles V. As treated by Mr. Hoffinan it is by no means a dry, forbidding subject, but may be read with facility and interest by a novice in legal learning. In the course of this lecture the author touches upon the subject of conflicting laws and jurisdictions; he says in a note,

"The great number of territorial jurisdictions which obtained, not only in France, but in the Netherlands, Germany, &c. necessarily originated a great diversity of legislation, customs, and ju

dicial procedure. Frequent collisions arose from this diversity, and caused the occurrence of questions of extreme interest respecting jurisdiction. A marriage, for example, valid in one place, might be void in another; a divorce granted by one tribunal, might not be respected in a second; a will executed in conformity to one system of laws, might not correspond with the requisitions of another; a contract might be affected by the law either of the place where it was made, or that in which it was litigated, or that in which it was designed to be executed, or that in which the subject of the contract was situate, or, finally, that of the domicil of one or both of the contracting parties and so as to the remedy, and various pleas, which might be resorted to in one tribunal, and not in another. These are questions of intrinsic difficulty, on which the Continental jurists have displayed surprising ingenuity and learning, unhappily little known to English and American lawyers. The vast variety of baronial and provincial customs, laws and tribunals in France, rendered these conflicts especially frequent in that country. It gave rise to a body of learning, and of refined distinctions as to the extra-territorial operation of statutes, which the lawyers of this country are particularly called on to examine, since American jurisprudence, arising, as it does, from the laws and customs of twenty-five independent sovereignties, is not likely ever to become a very homogeneous system, and must necessarily give rise to a series of questions very similar to those occasioned by the various systems of laws existing in continental Europe. I am happy to say that this subject has been recently taken up by an eminent American civilian, Mr. Livermore.'

'The student may hereafter consult, at his leisure, Toullier's Droit Civil, tom. 10, 117; Voet De Statutis; Hertius De collisione legum; Emerigon des Ass. tom. 1. c. 4, sec. 4; Huberus, 2 vol. lib. 1, tit. 3; Rodenberg De jure quod oritur ex statutorum diversitate, tit. 1, cap. 1; and the following English and American authorities: Sill v. Warwick, 1 Henry Blackstone's Reports, 690; Robinson v. Bland, 2 Burrow's Reports, 1077; Solomons v. Rice, 1 Henry Blackstone's Reports, 131; Hunter v. Potts, 4 Term Reports, 182; Phillips v. Hunter, 2 Hen. Black. 402; Melan v. Fitzjames, 1 Bosanquet & Puller's Reports, 138; Selkrig v. Davis, 2 Dow's Reports, 230; Dalrymple v. Dalrymple, 2 Haggard's Reports, 54; Pippon v. Pippon, Ambler's Reports, 25; Bruce v. Bruce, 2 Bos. & Pull. 229, in notis; Norris v. Munford, 4 Martin's Louisiana Reports, 20; Ranway v. Stevenson, 5 Martin, 23; Saul v. His Creditors, 5 Martin, 569; Fisk v. Chandler, 7 Martin, 24; Thuret v. Jenkins, 7 Martin, 318; Bird and others v. Caritat, 2 Johnson's N. York Reports, 344; Holmes v. Remsen, 4 Johnson's Chancery Cases, 460; 20 John. Rep. 229; Milne v. Moreton, 6 Binney's Pennsylvania Rep. 353; Harrison

v. Sterry, 5 Cranch's Rep. Sup. Court U. S. 289; Harvey v. Richards, 403; Slacum v. Pomery, 6 Cranch, 221; Scofield v. Day, 20 Johnson, 102; Goodwin v. Jones, 3 Massachusetts Rep. 577; Grimshaw v. Bender, 6 Mass. Rep. 157; Van Reimsdyk v. Kane, 1 Gallison's Rep. 371; McCandlish v. Cruger, 2 Bay's S. Car. Rep. 377; Taylor v. Gear, Kirby's Conn. Rep. 313; Lodge v. Phelps, 1 John. Cases, 139; McNeil v. Colquhoun, 2 Hayward's N. Car. Rep. 24.' pp. 529, 530, 531.

As a specimen of the lecture we quote a passage on the subject of the gradual abolishment of the territorial jurisdiction of the barons in France, and the substitution of that of the royal courts.

'We have seen that the barons, among their other rights, possessed exclusive judicial jurisdiction in their own domains. This, like the others, was gradually abolished by the policy and increasing power of the kings; the first step in which was the enactment of that code which is known by the name of the "Establishments of St. Louis." By the wisdom which distinguished the rules of civil and criminal procedure in that code, and the principles of legal decision, (which discouraged, for example, the judicial combat;) by the adoption of a wiser jurisprudence in the royal domains; and, finally, by making it discretionary with the litigants in all civil suits, to adopt the law of the "Establishments;" St. Louis gradually wrought a change which the gentler manners, and diminished superstition of the times promoted and corroborated.

'By an ordinance in 1190, nearly a century before the Establishments of St. Louis, Philip Augustus established bailiffs or seneschals, who acted as judges for the king; and every barony, as it became reunited to the crown, was subjected to one of these officers. The vassals, therefore, whose lands depended on such reunited fief, became subject to the appellate jurisdiction of the royal court. In many cases, also, which were termed royal, a term the true extent of whose meaning was kept in studied ambiguity, the territorial court was held to be incompetent; and these encroachments were attended by two other very important ones, viz. that vassals might complain in the first instance to the king's court; and that in all cases, the royal court might take cognizance of a suit unless the defendant excepted to the jurisdiction.

'The Parliament of Paris, as we have before mentioned, was another great organ of the kingly jurisdiction. This supreme council of peers was the great judicial tribunal of the French crown, from the accession of Hugh Capet. It was originally composed of the king's great vassals, peers of those who were to be tried by it, and also of the household officers. But when the business of this court became vastly increased by the multi

plicity of appeals, which might originally be made from any court on denial of justice, and which afterwards were much augmented by those which came from the bailiffs' courts just spoken of, the barons found neither leisure nor capacity to sit there; and St. Louis, anxious for regularity and wisdom in its decisions, introduced into it some counsellors, chiefly ecclesiastics, to act as advisers. It now became known by the name of the Parliament; and though for some time ambulatory, it sat principally at Paris during the thirteenth century.

:

'The character of a feudal court was soon lost in this stationary parliament it was a regular tribunal, and not a loose aristocratic assembly. It was to hold two sittings in the year, and was composed of two prelates, two counts, thirteen clerks, and as many laymen. The nobility, however, grew weary of attendance; the bishops were dismissed to their sees; and lawyers gradually engrossed the whole direction of the tribunal. With them, however, sat the lay and spiritual peers of France, a title no longer applicable to all persons coequal in tenure under the king, but to twelve great feudatories, six of them ecclesiastical: this number, however, was augmented by successive creations. A judicial body thus constituted, was necessarily important and respectable; and it was deemed essential, at least as early as the close of the fourteenth century, that the king's edicts should be registered on its records, before they had validity as laws. This privilege was often used by that body for the public benefit; it frequently set itself in opposition to royal usurpation; and its struggles just before the commencement of the French revolution, are well known to modern history.

Thus, then, the kings regained for the sovereignty that right of dispensing justice which, though essential to the constitution of every well regulated state, had been wrested from it by the territorial privileges of the feudal barons; privileges which, we have seen, were the growth of anarchy and barbarism. The steps of their policy were slow but certain; and received force from their augmenting resources and consequence. We have already remarked that the kings first assumed jurisdiction where the lords' courts, from some particular circumstance, could not render complete justice to the suitors. This was a plausible ground for the assumption of jurisdiction, and proved a principal source of its amplification. An appeal, too, was provided on the ground of an unjust sentence; whenever the royal prerogative was supposed to be concerned; and lastly, where the suitors had election to decline the trial by combat. But perhaps as powerful an instrument as any, in the augmentation of the king's general jurisdiction, was the dignity and superior regularity of the royal courts. Yet as the king could not decide every cause in person, the next natural step was to appoint bailiffs or seneschals, with right of