COUNTY COURT. In English and Ameri can law, a judicial tribunal of considerable dig nity and importance, whose jurisdiction is co extensive with the limits of a county (q.v.). The county courts are among the most ancient institutions in England, dating back to the popular tribunals of the Anglo-Saxon period. We find provisions regulating their procedure as far back as the laws of Edward the Elder (901-25) and of Canute (1014-35). Under the system of local self-government which was char acteristic of that period, the county courts (shire grmots) were the chief ordinary tribunals of the English people, their judicial authority being superseded by that of the Witenagrmot, or Great Council of the Kingdom, only for particular pur poses and on rare occasions.
It will be remembered that in England the county, or shire, is not merely a political sub division of the State for administrative pur poses, as it is in most cases in the United States, and as are the departments into which the terri tory of France is divided; hut it is a separate and distinct political division, in many eases an in organization and in its functions, the State itself. As the supreme judicial tribunal, therefore, of such an ancient political organiza tion, the county court was not only the fountain of justice for the people of England, high and low, but a court of great dignity and authority as well. Tt was presided over by the sheriff
(shire reeve), who was the high judicial officer of the county, and. like the court baron and other popular tribunals, was composed of the freeholders of the eounty who should be sum moned by the sheriff for that purpose. Its orig inal jurisdiction extended to all civil and crim inal matters, and it was the common court of appeal from all the minor courts of the county. Under the Saxon engine there was no regular tribunal of appeal from the judgments. of the county court, but after the Conquest the superior authority of the new national tribunal, the Curia _Regis, or King's Court, drew to it appeals from the county courts. The rapid growth in power and importance of the King's courts, espe cially of the so-•alled conmum-law •ourts—the King's Bench and C'ommon Pleas—tended to re duce the authority of the more ancient tribunals. and their jurisdiction was impaired by 5uc•es sive acts of Parliament. They still exist. how ever, with a limited but still considerable au thority, which has heen expressly defined by re cent statutes. See County Courts Act, 188S (51 and 52 Viet. c. 43).
For the modern organization of county courts in England and the United States, see the article