§ SIR ROUNDELL PALMERsaid, he would beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether the Government is prepared to advise Her Majesty to issue a Commission of Inquiry into the operation and effect of the present constitution of the Superior Courts of Law and Equity in England (including the Courts of Exchequer Chamber and of Appeal in Chancery), and the Courts of Admiralty and of Probate and Divorce respectively, and into the operation and effect of the present 475 separation and division of jurisdictions between the said several Courts, and also into the operation and effect of the present arrangements for holding and transacting the business of the Assizes throughout England and Wales, and of the present divisions of the Legal Year into terms and othewise; and generally into the operation and effect of the existing Laws and arrangements for distributing and transacting the judicial business of the said Courts respectively, as well in open Court as at Chambers; with a view to ascertain whether any and what changes and improvements either by uniting and consolidating the said Courts, or any of them, or by eztending or altering their several jurisdictions, or assigning any matters or causes now within their respective cognizance to any other jurisdiction, or by increasing or reducing the number of Judges in the said Courts, or any of them, or empowering one or more Judges in any of the said Courts to transact any kind of business now transacted by a greater number, or by any new arrangement of the divisions of the Legal Year, or by altering the mode in which the business of the said Courts, or any of them, or of the Assizes, or any part thereof, is now distributed or conducted; or, otherwise, might be advantagiously made, so as to provide for the more speedy, economical, and satisfactory despatch of the judicial business now transacted by the same Courts, and at the Assizes respectively?
§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, that the Government had considered the subject to which the Question referred, and it was their opinion that it would be expedient to issue a Commission for the purpose indicated.