APPEAL

The provocation of a cause from an inferior to a superior judge. (1 Kings xviii.; Acts xxv.) Appeals are divided into judicial and extra-judicial. Judicial appeals are those made from the actual sentence of a court of judicature. In this case the force of such sentence is suspended until the cause is determined by the superior judge. Extra-judicial appeals are those made from extra-judicial acts, by which a person either is, or is likely to be, wronged. He therefore resorts to the legal protection of a superior judge. By the civil law, appeals ought to be made gradatim ; but by the canon law, as it existed before the Reformation, they might be made omi o medio , and immediately to the pope; who was reputed to be the ordinary judge of all Christians in all causes, having a concurrent power with all ordinaries. Appeals to the pope were first sent from England to Rome in the reign of King Stephen, by the pope’s legate, Henry of Blois, bishop of Winchester ( A. D. 1135–1154). Prior to that period, the pope was not permitted to enjoy any appellate jurisdiction in England. William the Conqueror refused to do him homage. Anglo-Saxon Dooms do not so much as mention the pope’s name: and the laws of Edward the Confe or a ert the royal supremacy in the following words:—“Rex autem, qui vicarius Summi Regis est, ad hoc const i tutus est, ut regnum et populum Domini, et super omnia sanctam ecclesiam, reg at et defend at ab injuriosis; male ficos autem destruat et evellat.” The Penitential of Archbishop Theodore ( A. D. 668–690) contains no mention of appeals to Rome; and in the reign of Henry II., at the Council of Clarendon, ( A. D. 1164,) it was enacted, “De appellation i bus si emerserint ab archidiacono debebit procedi ad episcopum, ab episcopo ad archiepiscopum, et si arc hie pisco pus defuerit in just it i a exhibenda, ad dominum regem perveniendum est postremo, ut præcep to ipsius in curia archiepiscopi con trovers i a terminetur; ita quod non debe at ultra procedi absque a ensu domini reg is.” Notwithstanding this law, and the statutes made against “provisors” in the reigns of Edward I., Edward III., Richard II., and Henry V., appeals used to be forwarded to Rome until the reign of Henry VIII., when, by the statutes of the 24 Henry VIII. c. 12, and the 25 Henry VIII. c. 19, all appeals to the pope from England were legally abolished. By these statutes, appeals were to be finally determined by the High Court of Delegates, to be appointed by the king in chancery under the great seal. This jurisdiction was, in 1832, by 2 & 3 William IV. c. 92, transferred from the High Court of Delegates to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council; whose “report or recommendation,” when sanctioned by the Crown, is a final judgment. The Crown, however, used to have the power to grant a commi ion of review after the decision of an appeal by the High Court of Delegates. (26 Henry VIII. c. 1; 1 Eliz. c. 1, Goodman’s case in Dyer’s Reports.) This prerogative Queen Mary exercised by granting a review after a review in Goodman’s case, regarding the deanery of Wells. (See Lord Campbell’s Judgment in the Court of Queen’s Bench in Gorham v. the Bishop of Exeter .) It is a remarkable fact that, although the statutes for restraint of appeals had been repealed on Queen Mary’s acce ion, no appeal in Goodman’s case was permitted to proceed out of England to the pope. The commi ions of review were not granted by Queen Mary under the authority of Protestant enactments, but by virtue of the common law, regarding the regalities of the Crown of England. It does not appear that by the 2 & 3 William IV. c. 92, 3 & 4 William IV. c. 41, 7 & 8 Vict., the prerogative is interfered with; and that the Crown is compelled to adopt the “report or recommendation” of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council: on the contrary, the sovereign is quite free to sanction or reject such report, which only becomes valid as a decision on the royal a ent being given. The ancient Appellant Court of Delegates still subsists in Ireland.