Where a justice of the peace acting in or out of sessions acts judicially in a mat ter over which he has jurisdiction, and does not exceed his jurisdiction, he is not liable to an action, however erroneous his decision may be; nor will even ex press malice or corruption entitle a party aggrieved by such decision to any remedy by action : the delinquent magistrate is answerable only to the crown as for an offence committed against the public. Where the justice has no jurisdiction, or exceeds his jurisdiction, or having juris diction deviates from the prescribed legal form to an extent which renders the proceedings void, or where a convic tion under which the justice has granted a warrant is set aside by a superior court, an action will lie against the justice to recover damages in respect of any dis tress, imprisonment, or other injury which may have resulted from his acts, though done without malice or other im proper motive. But even in these cases, if the justice has acted bond fide in his magisterial capacity, if he has intended to act within his jurisdiction, though by mistake he may have exceeded it, and not acted within the strict line of his duty, and also in cases where a justice has acted or intended to act in the execution of his ministerial duties, he is entitled to the protection of several important static tory regulations.
No action can be brought against a justice of the peace for anything done by him in the execution of his office without one calendar month's previous notice in writing, specifying the cause of the in tended action, within which period of one month the justice may tender amends to the party complaining, which will be a bar to the action, if refused and found to be sufficient by the jury. Nor can any such action be maintained unless it be commenced within six calendar months after the committing of the act complained • nor unless it be brought or laid in the county in which the act was committed. The defendant in such action may, under the general issue, e. a plea simply de nying the alleged trespass, &c., give in evidence any matter of justification or excuse without being bound, as other de fendants are, to select one particular line of defence, and set that defence with pre cision upon the record in the shape of a special plea. When the plaintiff in such action obtains a verdict. and the judge certifies that the injury for which the ac tion is brought was wilful and malicious, the plaintiff will be entitled to double costs of suit.
Where the action is brought on account of any conviction which may have been quashed, and cannot therefOre be pro duced as a justification of the consequent distress or imprisonment, the plaintiff is disabled, by 43 Geo. III. c. 141, from re covering more than 2d. damages, or any costs of snit, unless it be expressly al leged in the declaration that the acts complained of were done maliciously and without any reasonable or probable cause.
When a justice acts with partial, cor rupt, or malicious motives, he is guilty of a misdemeanor, for which he may be indicted, and in a clear case of miscon duct the Court of Queen's Bench, which exercises a general superintendence over the conduct of those to whom the admi nistration of the criminal law of the country is intrusted, will, if the applica tion be made without delay, give leave to file a criminal information. But the
court will consider, not whether the act complained of be strictly right or not, but whether it proceeded from unjust, op pressive, or corrupt motives, among which motives fear and Pavour are both included. If the affidavits filed in sup port of the application disclose nothing which may not be attributable to mere error or mistake, the court will not even call upon the justice to show cause why a criminal information should not be filed. The court will not entertain a motion for a criminal information against a justice of the peace, unless notice of the intended application have been given in sufficient time to enable him, if he thinb proper, to meet the charge in the first in stance by opposing the granting of the rule to show cause.
The proceedings after an information has been filed, or an indictment found against justices of the peace for criminal misconduct, are the same as in other cases of misdemeanor. If the defendant suffer judgment by default, or is found guilty by the verdict of a jury, the punish ment is by fine or imprisonment, or both ; after which an application may be made to the lord chancellor to exclude him from the commission ; and when affida vits are filed in the Queen's Bench im peaching the conduct of justices of the peace, such affidavits are frequently di rected by the court to be laid before the chancellor, to enable him to judge whe ther such persons ought to remain in the commission.
The institution of justices of the peace has been adopted in most of the British colonies, and has with some modifications been retained in the United States of America. A great deal of the vitality of the English social system is owing to the number of persons in nearly every rank of life who are called into activity and em ployed in the functions of provincial or local administration, instead of the various duties which they discharge being per formed by paid officers appointed by the central government, as in most European countries. [DEPARTMENT.] There are no doubt some disadvantages in the Eng lish system, but on the whole they are more than counterbalanced by the pecu liar benefits which are inherent in it. We have already stipendiary magistrates who have received a legal education, and a still more numerous body of unpaid justices of the peace many of whom have not had this advantage, but the unpaid and unprofessional justices of the peace, ge nerally speaking, decide upon most of the matters which come before them quite as satisfactorily as the stipendiary professional magistrates, and considering that the unpaid justices are by far the most numerous class, complaints of their administration are far less frequent than might be expected.
A parliamentary paper was issued in 1831 which showed the number of jus tices of the peace for counties who had qualified in England and Wales. The total number was 4842, namely, 4330 in England and 512 in Wales. The num ber of clergymen who had qualified as justices was 1090 in England and 143 in Wales. In Derbyshire and Sussex there was not one clerical magistrate. (CLERGY, p. 520.1