6 court of appeals of maryland

in the Upper House of Assembly of a judgment
of the Provincial Court.⁹ That it was a resort to
the old parliamentary jurisdiction in error is evi-
dent from the nature of the tribunal, and also from
the fact that in 1681 some writs then pending were
found by the house to be (in the words of the rec-
ord of proceedings) "not legally brought before
this house according to the manner of bringing
writs of error in Parliament." ¹⁰ After the first
writ, in 1664, the practice became usual, although
the number of cases was small. In the House of
Lords, too, the number of such cases was small
during that period. It appears from the record
of Assembly proceedings of the period in Mary-
land that in the twelve years from 1666 to 1678
there were only eight cases considered by the Up-
per House. This practice of appeals from the Pro-
vincial Court presided over by the Governor and
Council, to the Upper House of the Assembly
made up of the same Governor and Council, seems
anomalous, and the wonder is increased by the fact
that on such appeals reversals of the judgments
rendered in the Provincial Court were propor-
tionately numerous.¹¹ There must have been some
advantage to be expected in the hearing by the

9. Archives, Proc. Assembly, 1637 to 1664, 521.

10. Archives, Proc. Assembly, 1678 to 1683, 224. The Scotch historian
and antiquarian, George Chalmers, who practiced law in Balti-
more, Maryland, during the ten years preceding the Revolution,
says in his Political Annals of the United Colonies, written in
1780, page 684, that, "The Councillors were extremely analogous
to the peers, though their office was not descendible, since it was
defeasible. * * * As the court of local appeals, they were gov-
erned in their decisions by the principles of the common law, by
territorial regulations, and by their own customs; but an appeal
lay from their judgments, because they were not supreme."

11. For instance, see Archives, Proc. Assembly, 1666 to 1678, 33,
59, 380.