COURT LEET (from court + lect, AS. !Code, 011G. lint, Ger. Lento, people; connected with OCh. Slay. Gudfi, Lett. laudis, people, and ulti mately with Skt. rub, to grow). In English law, a local customary court of great antiquity and of a popular character, having a limited erhnina jurisdiction. It has been declared to he "the most ancient court in the land for crimMal mat ters, the court baron being of no less antiquity in civil," and it is supposed to have been de rived from the Anglo-Saxon folk-mote, in contra distinction, perhaps, to the 'hall-mote,' or court baron, which consisted of the freeholders, sitting in the hall of the manor.
Though usually found in connection with manors, the leet was not, properly speaking, a manorial court. There were town leets, borough leets, and hundred leets. But it was in con nection with the manor, to whose internal or ganization it was peculiarly adapted, that the court leet reached its highest development. Though held by the steward, with the aid of the freemen of the manor (they were not required to be freeholders, as in the court baron), it was still regarded as belonging to the King. It was,
in effect, a royal magistrate's or police court, having, complete jurisdiction only of minor of fenses (misdemeanors) and the jurisdiction of a committing magistrate in cases of felony and treason. These latter it referred to the su perior tribunals of the country for trial and punishment. The court has now completely lost its importance, having been superseded by the police and county courts, though it still has a nominal existence in sonic manors. See Coturr BARON; MANOR; and consult the authorities referred to under MANOR; also Jacob, Law Dic tionary (title, "Court Leer) (London, 1800) ; Pollock and Maitland, History of English Law (2d ed., London and Boston. 1S99) ; Gurdon, History . . . of Court Baron and Court Leet (London, 1731).