Thomas Denison Quotes

Sir Thomas Denison was a British judge.

Born in Leeds, Denison's father William was a clothier described as "an opulent merchant at Leeds". Denison, the younger of two sons, was educated at the Leeds Grammar School, and entered the Inner Temple in 1718 to receive his legal education; he was thereafter called to the bar.He was successful as a lawyer, and December 1741, he was appointed to succeed Sir Francis Page on the Court of the King's Bench, taking office on 16 February 1742. He served in that capacity for over twenty-three years, under chief justices, Sir William Lee, Sir Dudley Ryder, and Lord Mansfield, resigning on 14 February 1765 on account of poor health and failing eyesight.He died in September that year and was buried in Harewood in Yorkshire. Per his instruction, Denison was buried next to admired former Chief Justice Gascoigne; a memorial was erected in his honor with an inscription by his closest friend, Lord Mansfield.Denison had no children. His wife, Anne, daughter of Robert Smithson, Esq., died twenty years later, and his estate passed to his wife's grand-niece, who married Edmund the fifth son of Sir John Beckett, Bart. who then assumed the name of Denison. Denison's grand-nephew, John Evelyn Denison, would become speaker of the House of Commons in the 1800s. Wikipedia

✵ 1699 – 1765

Thomas Denison: 6 quotes 0 likes

Famous Thomas Denison Quotes

“In case of private jurisdictions, the Court has inclined not to intermeddle.”

Thomas Denison

The King v. Bishop of Ely (1750), 1 Black. Rep. 58. If it be a matter

“To the memory of Sir Thomas Denison, Knt., this monument was erected by his afflicted widow. He was an affectionate husband, a generous relation, a sincere friend, a good citizen, an honest man. Skilled in all the learning of the common law, he raised himself to great eminence in his profession; and showed by his practice, that a thorough knowledge of the legal art and form is not litigious, or an instrument of chicane, but the plainest, easiest, and shortest way to the end of strife. For the sake of the public he was pressed, and at the last prevailed upon, to accept the office of a judge in the Court of King's Bench. He discharged the important trust of that high office with unsuspected integrity, and uncommon ability. The clearness of his understanding, and the natural probity of his heart, led him immediately to truth, equity, and justice; the precision and extent of his legal knowledge enabled him always to find the right way of doing what was right. A zealous friend to the constitution of his country, he steadily adhered to the fundamental principle upon which it is built, and by which alone it can be maintained, a religious application of the inflexible rule of law to all questions concerning the power of the crown, and privileges of the subject. He resigned his office February 14, 1765, because from the decay of his health and the loss of his sight, he found himself unable any longer to execute it. He died September 8, 1765, without issue, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. He wished to be buried in his native country, and in this church. He lies here near the Lord Chief Justice Gascoigne, who by a resolute and judicious exertion of authority, supported law and government in a manner which has perpetuated his name, and made him an example famous to posterity.”

Thomas Denison

Memorial inscription, reported in Edward Foss, The Judges of England, With Sketches of Their Lives (1864), Volume 8, p. 266-268.
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“None shall be disseised of his freehold.”

Thomas Denison

Magna Charta, Quoted by Denison, J., Rex. v. Inhabitants of Aythrop Rooding (1756).

“A serjeant is a soldier with a halbert, and a drummer is a soldier with a drum.”

Thomas Denison

Lloyd v. Wooddall (1748), 1 Black. 30.

“The custom of the city of London is a matter of fact.”

Thomas Denison

Rex v. Davis (1758), 1 Burr. Part IV. 641.

“The point now before us is a settled case, and therefore there is no need to enter into arguments about it.”

Thomas Denison

Rex v. Jarvis (1756), 1 Burr. Part IV. 154.

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