§ SIR COLMAN O'LOGHLENasked Mr. Attorney General, If his attention has been called to the decision of the Court of Appeal on Saturday last in the case of "The Attorney General v. Charlton and others," as to Succession 819 Duty, in which the Court stated, that, but for certain decisions of the House of Lords on the Succession Duty Act, they would have held that the lower and not the higher duties, as claimed by the Crown, were payable by the defendants, and, consequently, would have given judgment against the Attorney General in the case before the Court; if it be the fact, that the Lord Chief Justice of England, in giving judgment in that case, stated that the decisions of the House of Lords relied upon by the Crown, were "clearly wrong, and proceeded on technical grounds contrary to the real meaning of and the spirit of the Act;" and that the House of Lords in these decisions had fallen into "a great and fatal error," and "had misconstrued the Act;" and, whether, having regard to the judgment of the Lord Chief Justice, and the judgments of Lord Justice James, Lord Justice Bramwell, and Lord Justice Brett, concurring with him, it is his intention to introduce at once a Bill to declare the Law, so as to overrule the decisions of the House of Lords, referred to by the Court of Appeal, which compelled that Court to decide in favour of the Crown, against their own unanimous opinion, in a matter of taxation affecting Her Majesty's subjects?
THE ATTORNEY GENERALThis case of "the Attorney General v. Charlton" was one of a very complicated and perplexing character. It was, by desire of the Courts, argued five times—three times before the Exchequer Division and twice before the Court of Appeal. I was one of the counsel for the Crown, and my attention was therefore called to the judgment pronounced by the Court of Appeal on Saturday last. The Lord Chief Justice, in the course of his judgment, did make some such observations as those alluded to in my right hon. and learned Friend's Question with reference to the decisions of the House of Lords, and all the learned Judges stated, I believe, that they felt themselves constrained to pronounce the judgment which they gave by the authority of those decisions; but I do not think it at all clear that if the Court of Appeal had not felt obliged to follow the judgment of the House of Lords, they would have decided that the Crown was entitled to a lower duty than the duty claimed. It is quite possible that the Court might have come to the conclusion that the case fell within 820 Section 4 of the Successions Duty Act, and that double duties were payable as under the Legacy Acts. It will be open to the appellant to carry this case to the House of Lords; and until I know whether this course is to be adopted, I cannot decide whether it will be desirable to introduce any Bill on the subject.