Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet: In-Laws

“I readily admit that the law which requires presumption or custom to be carried back for a period of nearly 700 years, is a bad and mischievous law, and one which is discreditable to us as a civilised and enlightened people, but such is the law; and while it so continues, I consider myself, in administering it, as bound to administer it as I find it; nor do I feel myself warranted in undermining or frittering it away by subtle fictions or artificial presumptions inconsistent with truth and fact.”

Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet

Bryant v. Foot (1867), 15 W. R. 425; S. C. L. R. 2 Q. B. Ca. 179.

People , Truth , Law , Feeling

“Although the decisions of the American Courts are of course not binding on us, yet the sound and enlightened views of American lawyers in the administration and development of the law—a law, except so far as altered by statutory enactment, derived from a common source with our own—entitle their decisions to the utmost respect and confidence on our part.”

Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet

Scaramanga v. Stamp (1880), L. R. 5 Com. PI. Div. 303.

Law , Confidence , Decision , Parting

“I think the old, sound, and honest maxim that "you shall not do evil that good may come," is applicable in law as well as in morals.”

Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet

Reg. v. Hicklin and another (1868), 11 Cox, C. C. 27; S. C. 3 L. R. Q. B. 372; reported in Dictionary of Legal Quotations (1904) by James William Norton-Kyshe, p. 92.

Law , Thinking , Evil

“A Judge cannot set himself above the law which he has to administer, or make or mould it to suit the exigencies of a particular occasion.”

Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet

Martin v. Mackonochie (1878), L. R. 3 Q. B. 775.

Law

“Writers on international law... cannot make the law … it must have received the assent of the nations who are to be bound by it. This assent may be express … or may be implied from established usage.”

Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet

The Queen v. Keyn; "The Franconia" (1876), 2 L. R. Ex. D. 202.

Law

“In a criminal proceeding the question is not alone whether substantial justice has been done, but whether justice has been done according to law. All proceedings in poenam are, it need scarcely be observed, strictissimi juris; nor should it be forgotten that the formalities of law, though here and there they may lead to the escape of an offender, are intended on the whole to insure the safe administration of justice and the protection of innocence, and must be observed. A party accused has the right to insist on them as matter of right, of which he cannot be deprived against his will; and the Judge must see that they are followed.”

Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet

Martin v. Mackonochie (1878), L. R. 3 Q. B. 775.

Justice , Law , Question

“Whatever disadvantages attach to a system of unwritten law, and of these we are fully sensible, it has at least this advantage, that its elasticity enables those who administer it to adapt it to the varying conditions of society, and to the requirements and habits of the age in which we live, so as to avoid the inconsistencies and injustice which arise when the law is no longer in harmony with the wants and usages and interests of the generation to which it is immediately applied.”

Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet

Wason v. Walter (1868), L. R. 4 Q. B. 93.

Age , Law