CHANCELLOR

(Lat. can cellar i us.) A high officer in many European states. The can cellar i us under the Roman emperors is supposed to have been a notary or scribe, and his title to have been derived from the cancelli or railing behind which he sate. In ecclesiastical matters, every bishop had (and continues to have) his chancellor, the principal judge of his consistory. The chancellor of France began to be an officer of importance under the Frankish kings, especially after the office of referendary had become merged in his, about the ninth century. In 1223 he was made the first minister of the crown, and rank next after the princes of the blood was a igned to him. The offices of chancellor and keeper of the seals were frequently united. Chancellor, Arch, of the Empire. This office, under the elective empire of Germany, belonged to the archbishop elector of Mentz. The archbishop of Cologne was titular arch-chancellor of Italy, the archbishop of Treves of Gaul and Aries. Chancellor of a Diocese. The keeper of the seals of an archbishop or bishop. This office now includes those of official principal, whose duty is to hear and decide matters of temporal cognizance determinable in the bishop's court; and vicar-general, who exercises the jurisdiction properly spiritual. Chancellor of the Exchequer. The highest finance minister of the British government. This office is from its nature nece arily entrusted to a commoner, and is commonly united to that of first lord of the treasury when the premier happens to be below the peerage. The chancellor, as an officer of the Court of Exchequer, has precedence above the barons of that court. Chancellor of a University. The head of the corporate bodies by whom he is elected. He exercises exclusive jurisdiction in all civil actions and suits where a member of the university or privileged person is one of the parties, except in cases where the right to freehold is concerned. The duties of the respective chancellors of Oxford and Cambridge are in nearly all cases discharged by a vice-chancellor. Chancellor, Chancery. The office of chancellor is the most ancient as well as the highest of all judicial offices in the kingdom; for though the superior antiquity of his jurisdiction has been questioned, the establishment of the office itself was certainly prior to the institution of any existing court of justice, the name as well as some of the functions, which were borrowed from the " can cellar i i " of the later Roman emperors, having been introduced into this country within the first three centuries that followed the di olution of the Western Empire. In addition to his judicial functions, which are various and extensive, the chancellor is now by virtue of his office privy councillor, and when a peer speaker of the House of Lords; over all the members of which, with the exception of the archbishop of Canterbury, he then has precedence in rank. As chief conservator of the peace, he has the nomination of all magistrates throughout the kingdom; and he is the patron of all livings of the crown under the value of twenty marks in the king's books. He has also the right of appointment to almost all the offices in the Court of Chancery, particularly to the office of master; and has very great mfluence over the appointment of any of the other judges both of common law and equity. He still retains also the title of keeper of the king's conscience, a duty originally incident to his situation in the king's chapel, over the service of which he presided; and this office may perhaps have afforded a ground for that part of his jurisdiction which profe es to remedy what is contrary to equity and good conscience. It is further his duty to i ue the writs for the convocation of parliament; and all acts there pa ed, as well as many records and documepts affecting the rights of individuals, —as to the latter in ordei to their validity, — are enrolled and kept in chancery, under the immediate care and custody of the master of the rolls, himself an officer of that court. The custody of the great seal is the peculiar and e ential mark qf the chancellor's dignity; and by delivery of that and the proper oaths taken the office is created, with all suqJi of its rights as can be exercised by a chancellor not beiog a peer. The jurisdiction of the chancellor is of various sorts. And, first, as to his common law jurisdiction. By this is meant that part of the chancellor's jurisdiction which is regulated by the same principles, and exercised according to similar forms, as the jurisdiction of the other courts of common law. This is by far the most ancient branch of the chancery judicature, and seems to have been originally incident to the nature of the chancellor's office, whose chief busine it was to advise the sovereign on the subject of grants, charters, and letters patent, and to [s. 225]