Mr. Fysche Palmer, pursuant to notice, rose, to move for a Committee to inquire into the nature of the Duties of High Sheriff, and entered into a detail of the various complicated subjects on which a High Sheriff was expected to be conversant, and of the number of Courts in which he was supposed to preside, if he fulfilled in person the duties of his office. Among these he enumerated the presiding in the County Courts, the protection of the public as conservator of the peace, his duties as Collector of the Crown Rents, and as the officer called on to execute all writs issued within the county. All these, and many other judicial and ministerial functions, were performed by a man who was compelled to discharge a large portion of the expenses out of his own pocket, and who was liable to be prosecuted for the failure or misconduct of his officers. Every expense of the Judges of Assize was paid by the Sheriff—the table of their attendants, the coals, the beer, the wine consumed at their place of residence—all was defrayed by the property of the High Sheriff, while he was, at the same time, compelled to bring a vast number of retainers to the court town, at his own entire cost, to be employed as javelin-men, and for other purposes. To so great an extent had this gone, that a law was passed in the 13th and 14th of Charles the Second by which it was enacted, that no Sheriff should be compelled to keep a table at the Assize town for any save the members of his own family, or the judges' servants; that he 26 was not at any time to bring forth more than forty retainers; but for the sake of decency and a proper regard to the dignity of his station, he was not to appear with less than twenty in England or twelve in Wales, to be employed as javelin-men. He had procured a return of the amount of expenses incurred in one county, and he found that they amounted to about 1,300l. while the whole of the receipts were only 600l. so that the remaining 700l. remained to be made good out of the pocket of the Sheriff. Looking at the extent of duty required from the High Sheriff, and the expenses to which he was subjected in the performance of these duties, he thought they were by much too numerous and too great to be demanded from any gentleman of ordinary fortune; and he, therefore, proposed to bring the subject under the consideration of a Select Committee, for the purpose of ascertaining to what extent the duties might be lightened and the expenses removed. He should, therefore, without troubling the House by going into any further details, move at once for a Select Committee to take into their consideration the Duties and Expenses attending the execution of the office of High Sheriff in England and Wales, with a view to devise some means to reduce or amend the same.
§ Mr. Hudson Gurneybegged the House to recollect that the office of High Sheriff was an ancient one, of very great importance, and always filled by gentlemen of rank, character, and fortune. In his opinion, if the House were to make those alterations and reformations which the hon. Member seemed to aim at in his speech, the result would be, that the office must fall into the hands of men in a lower and humbler rank of society than those who had hitherto filled it with so much advantage to the country. The Motion of the hon. Member seemed to go to the reformation of points so extremely frivolous, that it would be worse than idle to give it the support of the House.
§ Motion agreed to. Committee appointed.