John Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge: Case

John Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge was British lawyer, judge and Liberal politician. Explore interesting quotes on case.
John Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge: 48 quotes0 likes

“It is no longer true in the sense in which it was true when these dicta were uttered, that " Christianity is part of the law of the land." Nonconformists and Jews were then under penal laws, and were hardly allowed civil rights. But now, so far as I know the law, a Jew might be Lord Chancellor. Certainly he might be Master of the Rolls, and the great Judge whose loss we have all had to deplore2 might have had to try such a case, and if the view of the law supposed be correct, he would have had to tell the jury, perhaps partly composed of Jews, that it was blasphemy to deny that Jesus Christ was the Messiah, which he himself did deny, and which Parliament has allowed him to deny, and which it was part of " the law of the land " that he might, deny.”

John Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge

Reg. v. Ramsay and Foote (1883), 15 Cox, C. C. 235.

“It is far more important the law should be administered with absolute integrity, than that in this case or in that the law should be a good law or a bad one.”

John Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge

1 Cababe & Ellis' Q. B. D. Rep. 134.
Reg. v. Ramsey (1883)

“To me the entire uselessness of such rules^as practical guides lies in the inherent vagueness of the word "reasonable," the absolute impossibility of finding a definite standard, to be expressed in language, for the fairness and the reason of mankind, even of Judges. The reason and fairness of one man is manifestly no rule for the reason and fairness of another, and it is an awkward, but as far as I see, an inevitable consequence of the rule, that in every case where the decision of a Judge is overruled, who does or does not stop a case on the ground that there is, or is not, reasonable evidence for reasonable |men, those who overrule him say, by implication, that in the case before them, the Judge who is overruled is out of the pale of reasonable men.”

John Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge

Dublin, &c. Rail. Co. v. Slattery (1878), L. R. 3 App. Ca. 1197.

“I am sure from my experience of juries that, in a criminal case especially, they will obey the law as declared by the Judge; they will take the law from the Judge, whether they like it or do not like it, and apply it honestly to the facts before them.”

John Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge

1 Cababe & Ellis' Q. B. D. Rep. 133.
Reg. v. Ramsey (1883)

“The moment juries or judges go beyond their functions, and take upon themselves to lay down the law or find the facts, not according to the law as it is, but according to the law as they think it ought to be, then the certainty of the law is at an end; there is nothing to rely upon; we are left to the infinite variety and uncertainty of human opinion; to caprice which may at any moment influence the best of us, to feelings and prejudices, perhaps excellent in themselves, but which may distort or disturb our judgment, and distract our minds from the single simple operation of ascertaining whether the facts proved bring the case within the law as we are bound to take it.”

John Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge

1 Cababe & Ellis' Q. B. D. Rep. 134.
Reg. v. Ramsey (1883)