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in favor of Defendants and others: and I conceive that Legislators
ought not, in consequence of a particular Enormity, to neglect the
uniform Dispensation of Justice
4.thly Because the County Courts are, in general, already so crowded
with common Pleas, Criminal Suits, Summary Complaints, Petitions
and a variety of Matters respecting the Government and Common
Justice of the respective Counties, that their Business is not done
'till after many Adjournments and Sittings, to the grievous Incon-
venience of Plaintiffs, as well as of Defendants and Witnesses and
Jurymen, and to the great expence and vexation of the Parties and
of the Witnesses and Jurymen; and not always to the Satisfaction
of the Justices of the County Courts themselves; who are often
perplexed with a Multiplicity and variety of Business.
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U. H. J.
Liber No. 36
June 18
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5.thly Because the Business of Courts can no where be executed
but with some Inconvenience: and where this falls heavier on one
Suitor than the other, no principle will justify the Defendant profit-
ing of his own Wrong, and throwing the Inconvenience on the
person he has injured, sheltering himself under this Bill from the
Hand of impartial Justice, as often as his dishonesty or Idleness
force plaintiffs to sue. But I presume that generally the Incon-
venience of attending the Provincial Court, in the Center of all the
Business of the Province, is equal Between Plaintiffs and Defendants;
and if it was not quite so yet I conceive it cannot be a grievous
Inconvenience, but through a want of vigor and attention in the
Members of the Court to forward the Business of it. Witnesses
arc necessary. Dealers from all parts of the Province negotiate
much Mercantile Business in the City, and at Baltimore and other
Towns. If the Merchants of these Towns are obliged to sue in the
distant Counties, it would be a more Grievous Inconvenience for
their Clerks or other Witnesses to go, it may be to the Extremities
of the Country, to attend the County Courts than to meet half way
at Annapolis; where Merchants and others from all parts meet, and
settle other concerns, as well as their Law Suits. Jurymen are also
necessary in all Common Law Courts. To the Provincial Court come,
from each County, two Grand jurymen, and three Petty jurymen.
I cannot think that the attendance on such necessary Business by
only five Men from each County twice a Year, altho somewhat
Inconvenient to them, can be grievously Inconvenient when they
are paid for their Attendance and Itinerant Charges. At the County
Courts, as it appears to me, the Attendance and loss of time is greater:
for instead of only Seventy Jurymen in the whole Province attend-
ing the Provincial Court, as Jurymen twice a Year, there Attend
four hundred Jurymen in the County Courts three Times a Year,
and moreover at their many Adjournments, then the vast addition of
Jurisdiction to these County Courts Proposed by this Bill will, I
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p. 652
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