DEODANDS ABOLITION (No. 2) BILL. (Hansard, 11 August 1846)

§ LORD GRANVILLE SOMERSET
objected to the manner in which this matter had been introduced. Neither the private rights of the Sovereign nor individuals had been consulted. He believed that 700l. or 800l. a year, arising from deodands, was paid into the privy purse; and it was only common decency that the Crown should have been consulted on the subject, and that some communication should have been made to Parliament on the part of Her Majesty. Private individuals would also be injured by this measure, as he believed that the corporation of Liverpool, for instance, received a considerable sum of money from deodands.

§ SIR G. GREY
said, that he was quite prepared to take the same course as was taken last year by the noble Lord the Member for Falkirk, who announced Her Majesty's assent to a similar measure; and he was now ready to signify Her Majesty's assent to the present Bill. The right which would be relinquished by the Crown was of trifling pecuniary value, because 625 lately deodands had been much litigated; and when they had been imposed by the verdict of a jury, they had in almost every case been taken into the Court of Queen's Bench, and quashed there.

§ MR. S. WORTLEY
said, that although this Bill had passed the House of Lords, after an able introduction, yet it had so passed without any discussion whatever. It would be recollected that deodands were a gift to the Crown in a very early stage of our history; and he did not think that any alteration whatever was made in the case by their having been in some instances made over to corporations. The only discussion which the Bill had undergone was in a Committee up-stairs, consisting chiefly of lawyers, the responsibility of whose acts he would share, although he was only present for half an hour. It should further be recollected that it was by means of deodands only that a cheap and ready compensation was made to the poor for the injury which they suffered. Now, in the instance of an injury inflicted by a railway company, was it at all reasonable that they should not be obliged to pay for the consequences of the conduct of their servants? What was the use of bringing an action for damages against the servant, who was in most cases a man of straw, and could pay nothing? He was no advocate for the absurdity of the law of deodands; but he did say that a simple compensation to the Crown was a very ready means of getting at the compensation which was due to the injured party. He would appeal to the learned Lord Advocate for a confirmation of the working of the law of deodands in Scotland. He believed it worked very well. The Bill was brought down from the House of Lords on the 8th of May; and it was read a second time in the House of Commons, and committed on the following Monday; and when he returned to town on that day at one o'clock, he found that the two clauses which gave the principal feature to the Bill had not only been refrained, but totally altered in character. In Scotland, there was this difference in the law: the nearest relation of the person killed or injured might bring an action for damages; and any relation who might be abroad at the time of the occurrence, was not debarred from bringing an action on his return; in fact, each relation might come in turn. The question was involved in difficulties: he considered, therefore, that the two Bills 626 before the House ought to be postponed until next Session; and that, in the meantime, a Select Committee should be appointed to consider the laws relative to deodands, and to report to the House on the subject. He concluded by moving as an Amendment the appointment of a Committee to consider the present state of the law of deodands, and of actions for injuries to the person by accident or otherwise.

The ATTORNEY GENERAL
could not accede to the Motion of his right hon. and learned Friend. The subject had been already carefully considered; and the result had been the Bill before the House. Were the deodands to be continued, to take them from the lord of the manor and give them to the sufferers, would cause a demand for compensation on the part of the former — a demand which, however, would not be raised were deodands to be abolished altogether, as converted from their original purposes, and vicious in their present operation. By the present law of deodand, compensation was made, not according to the extent of the injury inflicted, but according to the value of the instrument of injury. How did the right hon. and learned Gentleman mean to apportion the fine which he wished to keep up? Would he entrust the task of valuing it to the defective machinery of a coroner's court? If there was anything more difficult to fix than another, it was the amount of a deodand, and the cases in which it ought to be levied. The only way he could see of putting the system upon a more satisfactory footing was that of making the deodand recoverable by an action at civil law; and that was the course which the Government intended to adopt. He had great reliance upon the judgment of an English jury in fixing the amount of deodand. If they did sometimes run riot, they were always promptly checked, and the evil righted itself.

§ MR. WAKLEY
said, he had hoped that some other legal Gentleman would have been present to expound the law. His two hon. Friends who had just spoken were educated under circumstances entirely similar, but their opinions entirely differed. If either of those Gentlemen were elevated to the Bench, the law of coroner would entirely depend on the opinion of which of them happened to be judge. That was a most unsatisfactory state of things. The law of deodand, he admitted, was in a most unsatisfactory state. He would take the case of a liverystable keeper who lent 627 to a wild drunken apprentice an unmanageable horse. The horse might cause the death of some person; and yet the livery-stable keeper, who was as much, if not more, to blame than the rider of the horse, entirely escaped all the consequences—the law could not touch him. If the horse belonged to a gentleman, and were ridden by his servant, the gentleman, in that case, would be liable. If, in the case of a railway company, the wheel of a carriage came off, and caused death to some one, the company might prove that the wheels had been examined before the starting of the train, and yet the jury had the power to inflict a deodand. He admitted that the law required alteration; but yet he hoped the hon. and learned Member would not divide the House on his Motion, provided the Government would give an assurance that if the Bill did not work well they would bring in another of a more efficient character.

§ MR. HENLEY
said, that the question was, whether the Amendment proposed was one likely to be beneficial. The hon. and learned Members who had been discussing the Bill differed in opinion; and a similar difference of opinion was observable in the noble and learned Lords who had discussed the question in the other House. He thought that the Bill ought certainly to receive a more full and careful investigation before it passed that House.

List of the AYES.
Anson, hon. Col.	Greene, T.
Arundel and Surrey, Earl of	Grey, rt. hon. Sir G.
	Hawes, B.
Baldwin, B.	Hobhouse, rt. hn. Sir J.
Berkeley, hon. C.	Howard, P. H.
Berkeley, hon. Capt.	Jervis, Sir J.
Bernal, R.	Morpeth, Visct.
Bodkin, W. H.	Muntz, G. F.
Bouverie, hon. E. P.	O'Conor Don
Brocklehurst, J.	Parker, J.
Brown, W.	Rich, H.
Browne, hon. W.	Rumbold, C. E.
Byng, rt. hon. G. S.	Rutherford, A.
Crawford, W. S.	Sheil, rt. hon. R. L.
Duncan, G.	Somerville, Sir W. M.
Duncannon, Visct.	Strutt, E.
Dundas, Adm.	Thornely, T.
Dundas, D.	Troubridge, Sir E. T.
Ebrington, Visct.	Turner, E.
Escott, B.	Wakley, T.
Evans, Sir De L.	Walpole, S. H.
Ferguson, Sir R. A.	Warburton, H.
Gibson, rt. hon. T. M.	Ward, H. G.
Gore, hon. R.	Wawn, J. T.

Williams, W.	TELLERS.
Wood, Col. T.	Tufnell, H.
Wyse, T.	Craig, G.
Yorke, H. R.

List of the NOES.
Estcourt, T. G. B.	Somerset, Lord G.
Fuller, A. E.
Henley, J. W.	TELLERS.
Nicholl, rt. hon. J.	Wortley, J. S.
Palmer, G.	Cripps, T.