The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Book I.
• Preface.
• Introduction.
• Chapter I.: General Division of the Aggregate Body of the Law.
• Chapter II.: Constitutional Law.
• Chapter III.: Civil Or Distributive Law. *
• Chapter IV.: Penal Law.
• Chapter V.: Procedure Law. †
• Chapter VI.: Financial Law.
• Chapter VII.: Prescriptions Or Bearings of the Other Codes Or Branches of Law, to the Constitutional Code.
• Chapter VIII.: Public-opinion Tribunal.
• Chapter IX.: Good Rule and Bad Rule.
• Chapter X.: Corruption.
• Chapter XI.: Delusion.
• Chapter XII.: Fiction.
• Chapter XIII.: Factitious Honour.
• Chapter XIV.: Established Religion—none.
• Chapter XV.: Supreme Constitutive.
• Chapter XVI.: Supreme Legislative.
• Chapter XVII.: Supreme Operative.
• Book II.
• Preface to the Original Edition of Book II.
• Chapter I.: Territory of This State, Name, Situation, Boundaries, Divisions.
• Chapter II.: Ends and Means.
• Chapter III.: Sovereignty, In Whom. *
• Chapter IV.: Authorities.
• Chapter V.: Constitutive Authority. *
• Chapter VI.: Legislature.
• Chapter VII.: Legislator’s Inaugural Declaration. *
• Chapter VIII.: Prime Minister.
• Chapter IX.: Ministers Collectively.
• Chapter X.: Defensive Force.
• Chapter XI.: Ministers Severally.
• Chapter XII.
• Chapter XIII.
• Chapter XV.
• Chapter XVI.: Quasi-jury.
• Chapter XVII.
• Chapter XVIII.
• Chapter XIX.: Government Advocate General.
• Chapter XX.: Eleemosynary Advocates.
• Chapter XXI.
• Chapter XXII.
• Chapter XXIII.
• Chapter XXIV.
• Chapter XXV.
• Chapter XXVI. *
• Chapter XXVII.
• Chapter XXVIII.
• Chapter XXIX.
• Chapter XXX.
• Chapter XXXI.
• Appendix.
• No. I.
• No. II.
• No. III.
• No. IV.
• No. V.
• No. VI.
• No. VII.
• No. VIII.

CHAPTER XXVI.*

Local Registrars.

Section I.

Fields of Service.

Enactive.

Art. 1. Of the service of a Local Registrar, the local field is the same as that of his companion in office, the Local Headman.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 2. The logical field is marked out by the functions, delineated in the fourteen following Sections.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 3. Of the service of the Local Registrar, the ordinary field, is no other than that which is occupied by the recordation of preappointed evidence. Incidentally and momentarily, it may become applicable to the purpose of a suit, to which it gives commencement: and so far as this is the case, the evidence elicited by him takes the character of litiscontestational evidence, as per Ch. xxi. Immediate and Appellate Registrars, Section 1, Fields of Service.

Section II.

Self-suppletive Function.

Enactive.

Art. 1. To a Local Registrar, as to a Local Headman, belongs the self-suppletive function, together with the obligation of keeping it in exercise.

Enactive.

Art. 2. To the situation of Local Registrar, apply the several other articles, which, as per Ch. xxv. Local Headmen, Section 2, Self-suppletive function, apply to the situation of Local Headman.

Section III.

Functions in general.

Instructional. Enactive.

Art. 1. For the elementary and separately ineffective functions, of which the process of effective registration is composed, see Ch. xxi. Immediate and Appellate Judiciary Registrars, Section 4, Elementary Functions.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 2. For the mode of minutation, see that which is directed to be employed in the Judiciary Registry, as per Ch. xxi. Immediate and Appellate Judiciary Registrars, Section 5, Minutation how.

Enactive.

Art. 3. In Section 5, and those which follow, are detailed the several functions belonging to this office, such excepted, in the exercise of which a conjunct part is borne by the Local Registrar, and the Local Headman: as to which see Ch. xxv. Local Headmen, Section 29, Relation to Local Registrar.

Enactive.

Art. 4. On the occasion of the several functions, by the exercise of which such occurrences as call for minutation are recorded, a description will be given by this functionary of the persons by whom the relative information is delivered. Heads, the following:—

I. Person or persons from whom elicited. Subheads:

1. Sex.

2. Names, surnames and christian, or the equivalent, the whole at length.

3. Age, mentioning the year, month, and day as far as known.

4. Occupation.

II. Place at which the information is elicited: whether the Registrar’s official chamber, or any and what other place: if a house, making known the house or other place, as per Ch. vi. Legislature, Section 13, Vote-making habitations, how defined.

III. Time at which the information is elicited. Subheads: year, month, day of the month, day of the week, hour.

Instructional. Exemplificational.

Art. 5. Examples of the matter of various sorts of preappointed evidence.

I. Memorandums of events ablative and collative, as to title to property, power, and condition in life.

1. Deaths.

2. Births.

3. Marriages.

II. Legally operative species of statements. These are,

4. Conveyances at large, such as the Legislature shall have ordered, or permitted to be thus registered or recorded, namely, the originals, or transcripts, including, i. Conveyances of actual transfer; ii. Conveyances of encumbrances or eventual transfers; and iii. Discharges of such encumbrances.

5. Conveyances testamentary, or say, post obituary, in particular.

6. Contracts ordained or permitted, as above, in case of conveyances.

7. Declarations, delivered under or without interrogation, concerning facts, eventually collative or ablative, in relation to title, to property in things, or to services of persons, or power, or condition in life,—and capable accordingly of serving in the character of evidence.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 6. As to the Books into which the various minutes or entries are made, the Local Registrar exercises the custoditive and applicative functions, and also the communicational, as to the faculty of inspection. As to the Edifices or Apartments in which they are deposited, the custoditive.

Section IV.

Genealogical-recordation Functions.

Expositive.

Art. 1. By genealogical registration, understand registration of Deaths, Marriages, Divorces, Births, Arrivals at Full Age, Lapses into Insanity, and Restorations to Sanity.

Instructional.

Art. 2. Of the apt registration of these several occurrences, the several useful effects and purposes may be stated as follows:—

I. Property-settling Purposes.

1. Establishing title to property.

2. Establishing title to support or relief, at the charge of near relatives, in case of indigence.

3. Establishing at the charge of one relative liability as to debts contracted by another.

4. Establishing title to condition in life: to wit, in respect of parentage, consanguinity and affinity.

5. Establishing title to self-government.

Instructional.

Art. 3. II. Health-preserving Purposes.

6. Furnishing matter and grounds for inferences, contributory to the increase of general health—the diminution of mortality and disease: for investigating the causes of disease in its several shapes; and thence for devising of remedies, sanative and preventive.

7. Furnishing grounds for determining the comparative degrees of salubrity of places in different situations; with a view to individual settlements, and public establishments.

8. Furnishing grounds for determining the comparative degrees of salubrity, as between occupation and occupation, in places alike circumstanced: that persons who are willing to engage in insalubrious occupations, may be the more effectually enabled to obtain adequate compensation in other shapes, for their sufferings in respect of health.*

Instructional.

Art. 4. III. Private Economy-aiding Purposes.

9. Furnishing grounds for calculation, respecting the rate of mortality, with a view to the purchase of life annuities, and post-obit provision for relatives: thereby enabling each proprietor to employ his money to most advantage, whether for his own benefit, or for the benefit of any persons dear to him: and this, without sensation of loss to any one else.

Instructional.

Art. 5. IV. Political Economy-serving Purposes.

10. Furnishing, at all times, indications of the state of the population, at different periods, in respect of increase and decrease, in the several different parts, and thence of the whole, of the territory of the State: to wit, with a view to the causes of any such excess or deficiency, and thence to the appropriate remedies.

Instructional.

Art. 6. V. Calamity and Casualty-minimizing Purposes.

11. By affording continual indication of the several disasters that have been known to have place, whether on the more extended scale of calamity, or the more contracted scale of ordinary casualty,—directing the attention of the public, and of the Government, to the minimization of the like in future.

Instructional.

Art. 7. VI. Crime-minimizing Purposes.

12. The case, in which this purpose is capable of being served by registration in this shape, is almost exclusively that of death. The way in which this purpose is served is—by bringing to light the instances in which that result has had criminal or culpable conduct among its concurrent causes: thus, whether it had for its cause, design, or negligence, giving publicity to the fact, with its several material circumstances, with a view to legal pursuit; and, by maximizing the probability of detection, minimizing the frequency of the offence.

Instructional.

Art. 8. VII. Indeterminate Purposes.

In a period of the same length, and among the same number of deaths from all causes taken together, the condition of the portion of territory in question in respect of the points following should be attended to:—

1. Natural salubrity or insalubrity.

2. Sufficiency or insufficiency of employment for labouring hands.

3. Salubrity or insalubrity of the occupation in which the greatest number are employed.

4. Temptations offered to prodigality.

5. Degree of prevalence of habitual drunkenness.

6. Form of the Local Government: to wit, of one Headman’s Territory, as compared with another: or of one District, or say, Sublegislature’s Territory, compared with another.

7. Form of the General Government, as compared with the form of Government in this and that other political State.

8. Notions most extensively prevalent on the subject of religion: in particular as applied to the case of deaths by suicide.

Section V.

Death-recordation Function.

Enactive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, on the occasion of every death that happens within his territory, the Registrar receives and extracts information concerning it: that is to say, concerning the mode, the known or supposed causes, and the material consequences of it.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 2. Heads and Sub-heads under which the information furnished will be entered, are the following: added under each Sub-head, will be one or other of the three words following—to wit, Known, Supposed, or Unconjecturable.

I. Person of the deceased, Sub-heads as per Section 3, Functions in general, Art. 4.

II. Place of the death; as per Section 3.

III. Time of the death; as per Section 3.

IV. Cause of the death. Sub-heads are, mere old age, disease, or casualty.

1. If disease, name of the disease.

2. If casualty.

• 1. What.
• 2. Persons contributing to it, any, and who.
• 3. As to each, whether with or without design to hurt.
• 4. If with design to hurt, whether with or without design to kill.

V. Persons, if any, present at the death. Sub-heads, as to each, are:

1. Sex.

2. Names.

3. Age.

4. Occupation, or occupations.

5. Abode, or abodes.

Enactive.

Art. 3. From these elementary Tables, the Registrar will frame Digested Mortality Tables, annually, or if need be, oftener.

Enactive.

Art. 4. Disposed of by him will exemplars thereof be as follows:—

1. Kept in the Office, one.

2. Transmitted to the Health Minister, one.

3. Transmitted to the Immediate Judicatory, one.

4. Transmitted to the Appellate Judicatory, one.

5. Transmitted to the Prime Minister, one.

6. Transmitted to the Legislation Minister, one.

7. Transmitted to the Sublegislature of the Territory, one.

Enactive.

Art. 5. In relation to the evidence thus to be obtained, he possesses power, receptive and extractive, in the same manner as does a Judge Immodiate.

Enactive.

Art. 6. In a case where, as per Article 2, No. IV., any person has been stated, or is by him suspected to have been, contributory to the death, in a criminal or culpable manner, as therein mentioned, he will forthwith transmit to the Immediate Judicatory, an exemplar of the record of the inquiry as above, of which such statement or suspicion is the result.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 7. Follow certain other functions subjudiciary, exercisable by the Registrar on the occasion of deaths. Reason. Impossibility of their being exercised by the Judge, in time for the eventually requisite ulterior judicial operations.

He will, if in his judgment it be necessary, issue and cause execute, a prehension and transduction mandate, for taking into custody every such suspected person, and conveying him forthwith to the Immediate Judicatory, together with every such thing, as it may appear necessary, or preponderantly useful, in the character of sources of written or real evidence. Name of the function, the Prehensive.

Enactive.

Art. 8. So, where the deceased was found dead, or in a dying state, in a street, road, or any other open and public place,—he will, in like manner, transmit information to the Immediate Judicatory, although no such cause of suspicion at the charge of any person in particular shall have as yet appeared.

Enactive.

Art. 9. The body he will, in this case, keep in his custody, until there has been time for his receiving the directions of the Judge in relation to it.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 10. The fact of the death being established and recorded, and the time for receiving directions from the Judge, as per Art. 9, having expired, he will deliver the body to the known Post-obit trustee, testamentary, or vice-testamentary of the deceased, or any person properly authorized by such trustee, by a warrant, authorizing him to dispose of the body by interment, or in any such other mode as he may choose.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 11. If the body be that of a person unknown, or of a person for whom no such trustee has appeared, nor, to the belief of the Registrar or the Headman, is likely to be found, antecedently to the time at which, by putrescence, it will have been rendered a source of annoyance,—he may place it at the disposal of a medical practitioner for the advancement of medical art and science. In such case, he will give the preference to any practitioner who shall have attended the deceased at his last moments, or who, after the decease, shall have been called in for the purpose of the inquiry into the cause and manner thereof as above.

Enactive.

Art. 12. If no such practitioner be to be found, the Headman will dispose of the body in any such other manner as he shall think best, and will make entry of such disposal upon the record.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 13. If, for the purpose of examination, in the course of the inquiry as to the cause of death, the Registrar has deemed it necessary to prehend any person, although not at the time suspected of having been contributory to the death, and has accordingly caused him to be prehended, he will take his examination accordingly.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 14. In case of obstinate silence or evasive responsion, or responsion believed or suspected to be wilfully false,—he will cause convey him to the judicatory, in like manner as a suspected person, together with an exemplar of the record of the examination.*

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 15. If, in any case in this section mentioned, the delay necessary to the transmission of an exemplar of the record, would be attended with preponderant inconvenience,—the Registrar may, for the present, transmit a brief abstract, or notice, together with an intimation of the time at which the exemplar may be expected. Appropriate formularies will be found provided in the Procedure Code.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 16. In the prehension mandate, as per Art. 7, or 13, may be contained an authority, in case of necessity, to prehend the person in question in any adjacent Local Headman’s territory, or even in any other in the State. But, in this case it must be accompanied by a transcript of the record up to that time, and contain a clause requiring the persons and things prehended, to be forthwith delivered into the custody of the nearest Immediate Judge.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 17. When, in case of casualty, as per Art. 2, the person, though not actually dead, appears to be in imminent danger of death, the same powers may be exercised, as are herein appointed to be exercised, in case of actual death.

Instructional.

Art. 18. By these two local functionaries—the Headman and the Registrar—are performed in conjunction the several kinds of service performed under English bred-law, by the Keeper of the Parish Register, and the Coroner with his Jury.

Of the English system, the extreme inadequacy is among the results of the inexperienced and barbarous ages in which it took its origin. The Coroner’s inquest, though better than nothing, would be palpably inadequate, were it only for the distance to which this functionary has to go, especially in the largest counties, and the expense necessitated by two journeys. The direction of this important function being left to the nonentity called Common Law, the conduct of the Coroner is altogether arbitrary, and is determined on every occasion by whatever sinister interest happens to have place. The notification, too, in this case, is confined to deaths, known or suspected to be violent.

Section VI.

Marriage-recordation Function.

Enactive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, the Local Registrar causes recordation to be made, as they occur, of all marriages celebrated within his territory.

Enactive.

Art. 2. So likewise of all divorces.

Enactive.

Art. 3. With relation to the Register Book, in which these occurrences are recorded, he exercises the custoditive function.

Instructional.

Art. 4. The business of marriage is subjected to difficulties and causes of complication which have not place in regard to deaths or births. 1. Parties two; 2. Families two; 3. Anterior residences frequently in different bis-subdistricts; 4. Places of celebration different from the places of anterior abode of both, or either. Care and regulation will also be requisite to obviate error by the registration of the same contract in different places, and thus giving it the appearance of so many different contracts.

Instructional.

Art. 5. As to the conditions, the fulfilment of which shall be rendered necessary to the validity of this species of contract,—or say causes of invalidation,—they belong to the Civil Code.

Exemplificational.

Art. 6. In England, the entering into this contract has been mixed up with religion, and the performance of a religious ceremony by a Priest is necessary to the validity of the contract.* For the performance of the ceremony, too, fees are exacted from all alike.

Section VII.

Birth-recordation Function.

Enactive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, the Local Registrar causes recordation to be made of all births as they take place within his territory.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 2. Heads, under which, in the Birth-recording Register, entries will be made, are the following:—

1. Sex.

2. Father’s names, as reported, exceptions excepted.

3. Father’s age, as reported.

4. Father’s occupation, as reported.

5. Mother’s names as reported, exceptions excepted.

6. House where born—description as per Election Code, Section 10 (vol. iii. p. 583.)

7. Year, month, and day of the month: and, as near as can be guessed, the hour as reported.

8. Persons, if any, present at the birth.

9. Person or persons by whom the report was brought to the office: their names, under the handwriting or signature of each respectively.

10. Year, month, day, and hour at which the Report is received.

11. Names given, or if any proposed to be given, to the child, as reported.

Instructional.

Art. 3. As to exceptions, whether any and what shall have place, will depend upon the state of the laws respecting sexual intercourse, and its consequences.

Instructional.

Art. 4. In regard to the statements here required, the case of children born out of marriage, or from an adulterous intercourse, requires to be kept in view. On this occasion, two opposite evils present themselves. On the one hand, disgrace entailed upon the irreproachable offspring, in addition to that suffered on the same account by both parents, but in the vastly higher degree by the mother; on the other hand, for the hope of exemption, judicial falsehood, in intended effect, tantamount to what, under the existing swearing system, is styled perjury.

Instructional. Exemplificational.

Art. 5. In the exercise of this function also, has religion been mixed up in England, under the name of christening, and fees of course exacted for the performance of it. Without the payment of these fees, and declaration made of belief in certain religious opinions, no individual is admitted to the benefit of this substitute for registration.† Thus, with respect to the registration of deaths, marriages, and births, of the seven distinguishable purposes mentioned in Section 4, of none but the first, is any care pretended to be taken by Government. Much more apt is the footing on which this business stands in France. Neither into the registration of deaths, marriages, or births, is what is called religion, admitted to interfere. The apt registration of these facts, taken in the aggregate, is there regarded as a work of prime necessity, with reference to the purposes, public as well as private, mentioned in Section 4, and the exaction of any fees, for such registration, is prohibited by law. See the Code Civil, de Napoleon, Liv. i. Tit. ii. Ch. ii. iii. iv.

Section VIII.

Maturity-recordation Function.

Enactive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, the Local Registrar records the day on which each person has arrived at the age of complete self-government, for which purpose he will elicit sufficiently probative evidence of the fact.

Enactive.

Art. 2. So, arrival at the several other ages, if any, at and not before which, he or she is by law competent to the exercise of this or that particular right or power.

Instructional.

Art. 3. Examples are the following:—

1. Right of choosing a guardian.

2. Right of making a will, or say a post-obituary disposition.

3. Right of contracting marriage.

Section IX.

Insanity-recordation Function.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, the Local Registrar records, as soon as adequate evidence thereof has been elicited by him, the existence of insanity in the instance of any person, resident at the time within his territory.

Expositive. Ratiocinative.

Art. 2. By insanity, understand such infirmity of mind as either for the sake of persons in general, or for the sake of the person himself alone, otherwise than on the account of non-age or criminality, an effectual demand is produced for the subjecting of his body or his mind, or both, to restraint, under the care of some person or persons, by authority of law.

Expositive. Ratiocinative.

Art. 3. In some cases, only as a channel for conveying the information to the Judge, is the ministry of the Registrar needed: name of the function in this case the Insanity-informative. Use and reason, saving in respect of delay, vexation, and expense, in the journeys of information. In other cases, the nature of them may require that, by this functionary himself, means of security should immediately be employed: use and reason, prevention of immediately impending mischief. Name of the function in this case the Insanity-obviative.

Instructional.

Art. 4. For the marking the requisite distinction in practice, between these two classes of cases, as per Art. 2, the several modifications, which in these respects the infirmity admits of, require to be distinguished and brought to view.

Expositive. Instructional.

Art. 5. Insanity is either 1. primæval, or 2. adventitious. Name, when primæval, (in English,) idiotcy: adventitious, it is either 1. Incidental, or 2. Superannuational.

Incidental, considered as to its effects, may be distinguished into universally-dangerous, and purely self-dangerous: self-dangerous insanity may, as delinquency, be so in respect of person, property, reputation, or condition in life: in respect of person, by self-destruction for example, or irreparable self-disfigurement, self-disablement, or self-mutilation: in respect of property, by prodigality, or improvident management: in respect of reputation, by indecorous self-exposure, or self-disgracing discourse: in respect of condition in life, by ill-assorted marriage.

By superannuational adventitious insanity, understand that which is sometimes produced by old age.

Expositive. Ratiocinative.

Art. 6. Considered as to its effects, insanity may be distinguished into 1. capricious; 2. malicious; 3. rabid; and 4. melancholy. Where capricious, malicious, or rabid, a necessary supplement to the recordation function may be that which is exercised by the operations, having for their object the prevention of the impending mischief: name of the function, as above, the insanity-obviative. Reason for the institution of it, length of the distance of the Judiciary Registrar’s office from the sources of the information: thence, danger of mischief before any preventive arrangements can be taken by the Judge. In the case of melancholy insanity, the mischief is continual, but special danger has no place.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 7. In respect of time, immediate and more or less urgent, but short, will be the demand for the exercise of the insanity obviating function by the Local Registrar, in the cases of primæval, superannuational, and melancholy insanity. After appropriate recordation made by him of the malady, the charge of permanent guardianship will devolve upon some other persons, non-functionary or functionary, the Indigence-Relief Minister, for example, according to directions given by the Judge.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 8. If, from the information received, it appears to the Local Registrar that the supposed insane person cannot, without danger either to others, or to him or herself, be left in a state of personal liberty, he will pronounce an appropriate provisional opinative decree and imperative order, declaring under the charge of what persons he or she shall be placed in a state of temporary confinement, and under what mode of confinement. Name of such person so appointed Temporary Insanity Guardian. Name of the instrument, Insanity Temporary Guardianship Order.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 9. If, in this case, it appears to the Registrar that the insane person has in possession, or effectually at command, pecuniary means adequate for the present to his maintenance, the Registrar will, by appropriate decree and order, authorize the guardian to receive and apply to that purpose such pecuniary means. Name of the instrument, Insanity Temporary Alimentative Authorizing Order.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 10. If it appear to him that the supposed insane person has not, in adequate quantity, in possession or effectually at command, such pecuniary means, he will, by appropriate decree and order, give direction to some person or persons, to advance from time to time to the Temporary Insanity Guardian, such requisite pecuniary means. Name of the person so charged, the Temporary Insanity Alimentator.

Instructional.

Art. 11. Permanent Insanity Guardian, who? Permanent Insanity Alimentator, who? for answer to these questions, see in the Particular Codes the Insanity Sub-code.

Instructional.

Art. 12. A question for the consideration of the Legislature will be, whether in any and in what cases, and in what mode, to put prodigality upon a footing analogous to that of insanity for preservation of property from waste, for individuals and families.

Exemplificational.

Art. 13. Under the English system, where to a person possessed of adequate property, insanity is imputed, around him flock the lawyers like vultures round a carcase. Many are the years, many the thousands of pounds, frequently thus consumed. Thus is prodigality, compulsory prodigality, organized at the expense, frequently to the ruin, of the afflicted family: organized by the power and for the profit of these pretended and self-constituted guardians.

Enactive.

Art. 14. Disposed of by the Local Registrar, are exemplars of the record as follows:—

1. Kept in the office, one.

2. Transmitted to the Immediate Judicatory, one.

3. Delivered to the Temporary Guardian, one.

4. Delivered to the Temporary Alimentator, one.

5. Transmitted to the Prime Minister, one:

Enactive.

Art. 15. Of every case of restoration to sanity, (evidence thereof, as expressed in an appropriate instrument, being elicited and delivered to the Local Registrar of the territory, in the Register of which recordation had been made of the insanity,) recordation will be made. Name of the instrument, Restored-sanity Certificate. For the persons by whom such certificate will be granted, and the conditions requisite to the grant of it, see in the Right-conferring, or say Non-penal particular Codes, the Insanity Sub-code, as above.

Section X.

Post-obit-administration-granting Function.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, on the decease of a person leaving effects in his territory, the Local Registrar receives application from any person stating himself or herself to be entitled to the administration of those same effects in the quality of Post-obit Successionist, or Post-obit Trustee: and if trustee, whether as testamentary or as vice-testamentary trustee, or say administrator: to wit, for the purpose of making disposal of them, for the common benefit of all interessees, whether as creditors, legatees, or kinsfolk.

The term Post-obit Trustee includes the idea of trust, and is therefore more expressive than the term Executor: the term Post-obit is already in use in English practice, as in the instance of a Post-obit Bond.

Enactive. Instructional.

Art. 2. He thereupon, according to the direction given in the Right-conferring and Procedure Codes, proceeds to inquire whether there be any person entitled and disposed to contest with such applicant the right to the possession and exercise of this trust. If it be clear to him that there is not, he accordingly, by an appropriate instrument, grants to the applicant the appropriate powers: if it be clear to him that some such proposed contestator exists, or if it be matter of doubt whether there does or not, he refers all parties to the Judge: on the Register he in every case makes entry of everything that has passed.

Enactive.

Art. 3. Exemplars of the Record will on this occasion be disposed of as follows:—

1. Kept in the office, one.

2. Of parties between whom the right is contested, delivered to each, one.

3. To the Registrar of the Immediate Judicatory, one.

Enactive. Instructional. Ratiocinative.

Art. 4. In case of need, for preservation of the effects from depredation, destruction, and deterioration, the Registrar has power to take them under his care, and so to keep them, until time sufficient having elapsed, the Judge, or under his direction the Eleemosynary Advocate, in the exercise of his supertutelary function, as per Ch. xx. Section 5, has taken them into his disposal. Use and reason, the same as in the case of the Local Registrar’s Insanity-recordation function, as per Section 9: and in the case of the Local Headman, in virtue of his Hospitable Post-obituary function, as per Ch. xxv. Section 21.

Ratiocinative. Instructional.

Art. 5. Possible indeed it is, that in the instance of this, as in the instance of any other functionary, or any other individual trustee, it may happen to the trust to be abused. But in this possibility no adequate reason for withholding it from him can be deduced. In regard to appropriate aptitude, in the case of this functionary, security, the highest that the nature of the case admits of, will have been provided. Moreover, in his hands the duration of the trust, and thence of the faculty of abuse, is minimized. If from a functionary, for whose trustworthiness this security is given, the exercise of it being also under the constant inspection of the Headman, the power is withholden, it will remain in the hands of persons of all descriptions, the most untrustworthy not excepted.

The security thus afforded by the care of a functionary, who, by reason of the smallness of his territory, is nearer to the spot in question than any other can be, is added, not substituted, to the greatest security afforded by the current practice.

Instructional. Exemplificational.

Art. 6. In the whole of England, Wales included, there are but two offices at and from which the judiciary power in question can be obtained: that belonging to the Archiepiscopal Province of Canterbury, and that belonging to the Archiepiscopal Province of York. For the obtainment of the power in question, £5 is the minimum of the expense. Such is the expense if the place of the effects were next door to the office. Judge from hence what it may be at three hundred miles distance.

Instructional. Exemplificational.

Art. 7. This being the case, all persons interested in a mass of effects, which, after defraying the expense, will not afford a surplus, are without the benefit, whatever it may be, of the law, which has, or is supposed to have place, in relation to the subject. But in this case are the vast majority of the people. To what extent injustice on this ground may have place, no one can on any sufficient ground take upon him to say: and in so far as justice has place, the law of course gets the credit of it, but the real cause is in the probity and good conduct of the people, in spite of what, by the license and encouragement thus held out, the law does to render them dishonest.

Instructional. Exemplificational.

Art. 8. The person to whom the disposal of the property is intrusted, (a person of whom, casual exceptions excepted, too few to be taken into account, the functionary by whom it is granted has not any the smallest knowledge,) on the granting of the power, makes a promise on oath to deliver in, within a limited time, say a year, an inventory of these same effects. When the time comes, it has been delivered in—this same inventory—or not, as it may happen. But suppose it delivered in, what claim has it to confidence: to confidence on the part of persons interested? What check is there upon it, what security against falsehood and insufficiency? Preventive check, not any: reparative check, yes; to wit, by litigation: and at an expense such as, in the case of the vast majority, is sufficient to absorb, not only the whole subject matter of the litigation, but the whole property of all litigants on all sides.

Instructional. Ratiocinative.

Art. 9. Contrast this established with the here proposed state of things.

1. The abode of the Headman and his Registrar not being so far distant from the most distant abode in his territory, but that a person of adult age may, with ease, walk thither and back again in the course of a day, every habitation with every inhabitant is known to him. The arrangements made for the purpose of Elections, in the Election Code, as per Section 10, suffice to render it so.

2. The time at which the inventory is given in, may be fixed with joint regard to the quantity of the mass, the quality of the ingredients, and the facilities, natural and acquired, of the persons interested.

3. The power of disposal being given to some one, or some two in conjunction, the power of inspection (subject to such conditions as shall prevent obstruction to the disposal) may be given to all persons interested.

4. The comparison of the effects themselves, with the account of them as given in the inventory, will be as easy as possible.

5. Of the sale of such, as to prevent deterioration or deperition, it may be necessary should be forthwith sold, the fairness will have as many guardians and guarantees as there are persons interested, with the addition of their respective friends and neighbours.

6. Every arrangement, whether of substantive or adjective law, by which the disposal would be directed, being determined by the ordinances of real law, not as in England by imaginary and sham law, every one would know what he has to expect, every one would have in his hand an efficient check upon any act of such sinister design or carelessness, in which, without such check, the functionary on whom it depended might otherwise be apt to indulge himself.

Instructional.

Art. 10. True it is, that supposing, with the management of this functionary, the Headman of his territory, or any party interested, were dissatisfied, recourse to the Immediate Judicatory of the Subdistrict would be the only remedy. Here, then, would be litigation. But in respect of vexation and expense, what a contrast such litigation would make, with that litigation which has place in the established English practice, may be seen in the Procedure Code.

Section XI.

Property-transfer-recordation Function.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, the Local Registrar, in manner ordained by the Legislature, exercises the recordative function, in relation to all instruments of conveyance, or say property-affecting instruments, to which, by the Legislature, or, subject to the authority of the Legislature, by the Sublegislature of the territory, exercise shall have been ordained to be given to it in the Local Registry.

Instructional.

Art. 2. For the list of property-affecting instruments, see the Non-penal Code, tit. Instruments.

Expositive. Instructional.

Art. 3. Purposes in this case, over and above the advantage attached to the giving to the transaction a determinate form, by means of perpetually existing signs, are—

1. Securing the instrument against deperition.

2. Securing it against injurious alteration.

3. Securing individuals against loss, by fabrication of a false instrument.

4. To persons contemplating the giving credit to another, on the supposition of his having at his disposal the mass of property in question, affording security against its having been by antecedent obligations placed at the disposal of anterior creditors. Say, security against prior encumbrance.

5. To persons who might otherwise be disposed to contest the title of the proprietor to the interest in question, in the mass of property in question, rendering manifest the hopelessness of any such endeavour. Say, security against disturbance.

6. To persons disposed to purchase the mass of property in question, or an interest therein, affording security, and the persuasion of security against all claims on the part of others, on the ground of antecedent title on their part, or on that of the proprietor’s want of legal power to make the disposition, whatever it be, which he may take upon him to make. Say, security for titles.

Section XII.

Contract-recordation Function.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, the Local Registrar, in manner ordained by the Legislature, exercises the recordative function, in relation to all instruments of contract, to which, by the Legislature, or, subject to the authority of the Legislature, by the Sublegislature of the territory, exercise shall have been ordained to be given to it in the Bis-subdistrict Registry.

Expositive. Instructional.

Art. 2. In addition to the first three securities mentioned in Section 11, Art. 3, the grand use of committing this function in particular (although it applies to a great extent to all the functions in general) to so numerous a class of functionaries, is the consequent diminution of the delay, vexation, and expense resulting from the shortness of the distance between the seat of the evidence and the abodes of the individuals having need to deposit it, and thenceforward of those having need to inspect it.

Instructional.

Art. 3. Of contracts, as of conveyances, the exposition and relation belong to the Non-penal Code. For clearness, correctness, and comprehensiveness of conception, not inconsiderable, would be the use of a common appellative, by which the import of both might be comprehended,—say obligatory transactions. A contract is a species of conveyance; for by it are conveyed rights to the services, whatever they are, which by the contract a person stands bound to render. What distinguishes a contract from a conveyance which is not a contract, is that by the conveyance the sole services the right to which is necessarily conveyed, are the negative services of persons at large, as well as the conveyors: to wit, the service consisting in abstaining from all occupation of the article conveyed. Of these services, which, on the occasion of the conveyance, the conveyor undertakes for the performance of, the word covenant is the denomination: so of those for which the conveyee binds himself for the performance: these covenants are so many subsidiary contracts.

Section XIII.

Extra-judicial-evidence-recordation Function.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, the Local Registrar elicits, and records, all such evidence as, in contemplation of eventually existing suits, the Legislature, or subject to the authority of the Legislature, the Sublegislature of the territory shall have ordained or authorized him to receive: to wit, on the responsibility, satisfactional, and punitional, in case of falsehood of him by whom it is delivered: with or without power of receipt and extraction from persons other than him by whom the evidence is offered, and the recordation thereof requested, according as the Legislature shall have ordained.

Instructional. Ratiocinative.

Art. 2. In Ch. xii. Judiciary collectively, Section 24, Non-contestational-evidence-elicitation Function, this is among the purposes for which power to elicit, that is to say, to receive, and upon occasion extract, such evidence, is given to the Judge. By giving the same power to the Registrar of every Bis-subdistrict, the delay, vexation, and expense to individuals will be minimized, and the time of the Judiciary Registrar so far disburthened.

Instructional.

Art. 3. This seems moreover to belong, in a more particular manner, to the number of those cases in which,—to prevent unprofitable consumption of functionary’s time, by frivolous, wanton, or ill-designing applications,—it may be advisable that a small pecuniary compensation, remissible in case of declared and credited indigence, should be required to be exacted, as a condition preliminary to the exercise of the function.

Section XIV.

Subjudiciary-topographic-evidence-recordation Function.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 1. In the exercise of this function, the Local Registrar exercises the custoditive function, in regard to all such maps, and other imitative documents, as, by order of the Judge, in explanation of a judicial decree, shall from time to time have been consigned to his charge.

Enactive.

Art. 2. So, likewise all such maps, bearing reference to land, or works upon or under land, as, on that occasion, may, by any interessee, have been consigned to his charge.

Enactive.

Art. 3. At a view taken of any object for a Judicial purpose, at an Out-door sitting, as per Ch. xiii. Judges Immediate, Section 2, Out-door attendance, he attends at any time, and officiates, in manner as ordered by the Judge.

Section XV.

Digestive Function.

Enactive.

Art. 1. From the original Population Tables, as per Ch. xxv. Local Headmen, Section 28, Reports—publicity, will be copied in the manifold way, by the Local Registrar, exemplars in such number as shall have been deemed needful. Of these will be disposed of, five, in manner following:—

1. Kept in the office, one.

2. Transmitted to the Immediate Judicatory, one.

3. Transmitted to the Health Minister, one.

4. Transmitted to the Finance Minister, one.

5. Transmitted to the Prime Minister, one.

Enactive.

Art. 2. From the Tables of the several Bis-subdistricts, or his Subdistrict, the Registrar of the Immediate Judicatory, under the direction of the Judge, will, within one [week or month] after the conclusion of each solar year have framed a set of Digested Tables, adapted to the purposes of the Judicial department.

Enactive.

Art. 3. So, likewise, from the Tables of all the several Bis-subdistricts in the State, the Health Minister will frame another set, adapted to the business of the Health department.

Enactive.

Art. 4. So, likewise, the Finance Minister, a set adapted to the business of the Finance Department.

Enactive.

Art. 5. So, likewise, the Appropriate Minister attached to the Sublegislature, from the Tables of all the several Bis-subdistricts, within the District.

Enactive.

Art. 6. Of these respective Digests, when completed, the Registrar of the Immediate Judicatory, the Health Minister, and the Finance Minister, will each of them cause copies in the manifold way to be made, and exemplars disposed of in the manner following:—

• 1. Kept in the office, one.
• 2. Transmitted to the Prime Minister, one.
• 3. Transmitted to the Legislature, one.
• 4. Transmitted to the Sublegislature, one.

Section XVI.

Document Chamber.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 1. In every Local Registrar’s Office, a chamber will be allotted to the purpose of maximizing publicity in regard to the matter of the above-mentioned Population Tables. Name of the Chamber,—The Report Chamber, or say, The Document Chamber.

Enactive.

Art. 2. Tables, to wit the originals, exhibiting the matter under the several heads, as per Section 4, will therein be kept hung up, for public inspection. Of this matter will be composed the furniture of the walls: one wall or portion of a wall being allotted to Deaths; another to Marriages and Divorces; a third to Births and arrivals at Maturity; a fourth to entries made of Insanity and restoration to Sanity. For other matters, see Ch. xxv. Local Headmen, Section 28, Reports—publicity.

Section XVII.

Term of Service.

Enactive.

Art. 1. Of a Local Registrar, the term of service is the same as that of a Judiciary Registrar, as per Ch. xii. Judiciary collectively, Section 26, Term of Service.

Section XVIII.

Attendance.

Enactive.

Art. 1. Of a Local Registrar, the attendance is governed by the same rules as that of the Judge, as per Ch. xii. Judiciary collectively, Section 25, Judges’ Attendance.

Section XIX.

Remuneration.

Enactive.

Art. 1. The pay of a Local Registrar is [NA] per day.

Received from unwilling hands, ulterior emolument is extortion; from willing ones, corruption.

Section XX.

Attendance and Remuneration, how connected.

Enactive. Expositive.

Art. 1. Vacation days excepted, the Local Registrar attends in his office every day in the year.

Vacation days are,—every seventh day, urgency excepted, as in the case of a Member of the Legislature, as per Ch. vi. Legislature, Section 20, Attendance and Remuneration, &c.

Enactive.

Art. 2. Vacation days excepted, sick or well, for no day, on which he does not attend at office, during office hours, does any Local Registrar, any more than any Legislator, Judge, or Judicial Registrar, receive his pay.

Enactive.

Art. 3. By the Local Registrar’s Depute permanent, as per Section 2, Self-suppletive function, is kept an Attendance Book, in which the several days and hours, on which the Local Registrar principal attended, are set down by him: as to the mode, see Ch. xii. Judiciary collectively, Section 28, Locable who. Of the result, the Local Registrar, or in his default the Local Headman, transmits, on the last day of each month, an exemplar to the Judiciary Registrar of the Judicatory; another, for publication, to the editor of the nearest government newspaper.

Section XXI.

Locable who.

Enactive.

Art. 1. In the case of a Local Registrar, the qualification, constituted by service performed in the situation of a Depute, is the same as in the case of a Judge Immediate, as per Ch. xii. Judiciary collectively, Section 28, Locable who.

Section XXII.

Located how.

Enactive.

Art. 1. Located is a Local Registrar, by the same hands by which the Judges and Judiciary Registrars, are located: namely, the Justice Minister’s.

Section XXIII.

Dislocable how.

Enactive.

Art. 1. Dislocable is a Local Registrar in the same manner as the Judge, as per Ch. xii. Judiciary collectively, Section 30, Dislocable how.

Enactive.

Art. 2. So, likewise, by a majority of the Electors of the Local Registrar’s territory, convened or assembled for that purpose, in pursuance of a requisition signed by [one-fifth] of the whole number entitled to vote at elections, as per Ch. vi. Legislature, Section 5, Electors, who.

Section XXIV.

Securities for appropriate aptitude.

Enactive.

Art. 1. The same securities for appropriate aptitude, which, as per Ch. xxv. Section 30, are applicable to the situation of a Local Headman, also apply to the situation of a Local Registrar.

Expositive.

Art. 2. For a detailed exposition of these securities, see Ch. ix. Ministers collectively, Section 25.

Section XXV.

Inaugural Declaration.

Enactive.

Art. 1. Every Local Registrar, on his entrance into office, will pronounce an appropriate Inaugural Declaration, in the official apartment of the Local Headman.

Expositive.

Art. 2. For the form of an appropriate Inaugural Declaration, see Ch. xii. Judiciary collectively, Section 31, Judges’, &c., Inaugural Declaration.

[* ]Since this chapter was written, a general system of Registration for births, deaths, and marriages, has been established in England by the 6 and 7 W. IV. c. 86, as amended by the 7, W. IV. and 1 Vict. c. 22. The reader who is acquainted with the provisions of these acts will find them in their broader and more essential features anticipated in the following pages: and to the author’s discoveries and opinions on the subject of Registration, set forth in his other works, (and especially in book iv. of the Rationale of Evidence,) we may safely, as in so many other instances, trace the source of this step in civilisation. Those who are familiar with the working of the present system, will be no less struck with the accuracy with which the author has anticipated its advantages. When the Registration Bill for England was brought forward, a like measure was proposed for Scotland. It was opposed by the Church, and has now (1841) been for some years past forgotten.—Ed.

[* ]Since the establishment of the Registration System in England, the Reports of the Registrar General have from time to time supplied extensive information, and been the source of various comments in relation to these heads.—Ed.

[* ]It is here assumed as matter of necessity, that in the official residence of every Local Headman, there is a strong-room, in which persons, who have been examined, or who are in waiting to be examined, may be kept, until they can be conveyed to the Judicatory of the Sub-district.

[* ]This has been altered by the Registration Act.—Ed.

[† ]This is not now required by the Registration Act.—Ed.