Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 August 1883 — The English National Debt. [ARTICLE]

The English National Debt.

The national debt of England first appears as a regular expenditure in 1694, though no doubt it had practically existed long before. With some fluctuations it grew and grew until, at the close of the great war in 1815, it amounted to nearly £900,000,000 —more than all the other national debts of the world put together. It seems a singular commentary on our great triumph over Napoleon that, while France came defeated out of the war with a debt of only about £70,000,000, we, who were victorious, had incurred one of £900,000,000. This enormous sum has been slowly reduced; but at the present moment, and even after deducting the amount of loans made to local authorities and the purchase money of the Suez Canal shares, it still amounts to £731,000,000. The Americans are setting us a noble example, atid paying their debt off toth .much greater — English paper. Boston’s exports are largely on the increase, while her imports have decreased.

A Jirrj. The last thing in a trial is the verdict of the jury, whifh must be a unanimous one. Originally the jurors were witnesses, and the rule was in the earliest times that twelve witnesses must swear to the prisoner’s guilt before he could be convicted* just as at the present time twelve grand jurors must swear to their belief in his guilt before he can be put on his trial. Later on ceased to be witnesses and became Judges. The rule that the jury must be unanimous before the prisoner can be convicted is a direct consequence of the principle that no one is to be convicted unless his guilt is proved beyond all reasonable doubt, and so long as the institution is preserved the principle of unanimity should be retained. It is one of the curiosities of legal history, the uncertainty which prevailed down to within the last quarter of a century or less, wbat the presiding Judge should do in case the jury could not agree. One theory was, as Sir James Stephens cays, that the Judge ought to confine them, without food or fire, till they did agree. We We remember, in 1859, Lord Campbell angrily telling a jury, when discharging • them without giving a verdict, that the old law was that the Judge could have them all put into a covered cart, carried to the eonfines of the county, and there shot into a ditch. Lord Lyndhurst made fun of this in the House of Lords, and declared that Lord Campbell had been mistaken in his law, and that all that the Judge could do originally was to carry the jury with him on his circuit till did agree, or until he reached the borders of the county. Whatever the old rule may have been, it was solemnly determined in 1866 that in case of necessity the Judge might discharge the jury and the prisoner be committed and tried a second time. Snch a rule obviates the objections which had been entertained to the principle of unanimity, and possibly has given the institution of trial by jury a fresh lease of life. It was always regarded as an abuse of power to subject jurors to any penal consequenoes in respect of their verdict, and since the revolution no attempt of the kind has been made.— Blackwood’s Magazine.