Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A89344
|
The lawes of Virginia now in force collected out of the assembly records and digested into one volume : revised and confirmed by the Grand Assembly held at James-City by prorogation the 23d of March 1661 in the 13th year of the reign of our soveraign lord King Charles the II.; Laws, etc.
|
Virginia.; Moryson, Francis.; Randolph, Henry.; Virginia. General Assembly.
|
1662
(1662)
|
Wing M2849; ESTC R7787
|
65,296
|
97
|
THE LAWES OF VIRGINIA Now in Force Collected out of the Assembly Records and Digested into one Volume Revised and Confirmed by the Grand Assembly held at james-James-City by Prorogation the 23d of March 1661. in the 13 th Year of the Reign of our Soveraign Lord King Charles the II. LONDON Printed by E. Cotes for A. Seile over against St. Dunstans Church in Fleet-street M.DC.LXII For the Honourable Sr William Berkeley Most Honoured Sir SInce you care impos'd on me and the Clerk of the Assembly the charge to peruse our Laws and to reduce them into as good a Form as our weak abilities could perform I thought my self obliged to render you an accompt of our performance which might perhaps have been better done had not the Troubles of the Indians and Quakers and other emergent Occasions of the Publique depriv'd me of much of that time I had devoted to that most serious Imployment However Sir as they are since the Assembly hath approv'd them and Ordered them to be put in Print I thought it my duty to Dedicate them to your Patronage who of the most and best of them was the only Author Little addition there is to what your self had done in the time of your Government only what vitious Excrescencies had grown in the body of them by the corrupt humor of the times we have throughly purg'd them of that we might not any where leave unrazed the memory of our enforc'd Defection from his Sacred Majesty for whom your prudent care so long preserved the Countrey both from the ruine we were almost brought to by that desperate Warr with Opechankevogh whose Conquest had not the Cloudiness of those times obscured the glory of it could not have lost the esteem of being one of the most important Services that perhaps had been rendred in many years before to the Crown But Sir you have not only done this but also retein'd us in an inviolated obedience to his Majesty that we were the last of his Subjects that necessity enforc'd from our duty which was an Act of approved Loyalty as the other was of gallant Bravery Sir though the remoteness of this place hath veild the glory of these and other your Honourable Actions yet I and all that here with me were witnesses of them must and ever will acknowledg that to you next to his Majesties goodness we owe both the Laws we Govern by and the Countrey it self now Govern'd by those Laws which truth as a Publique Person I must ever justifie and as a Particular one confess my self by it oblig'd to be Most Honoured Sir Your most humble And Faithful Servant Francis Moryson THE LAWES OF VIRGINIA At a Grand Assembly held at James-City the 23 d. of March 1662. PREAMBLE WHEREAS the late unhappy Distractions caused frequent Change in the Government of this Countrey and those produced so many Alterations in the Laws that the People knew not well what to obey nor the Judges what to punish by which means Injustice was hardly to be avoided and the just freedom of the people by the uncertainty and licentiousness of the Laws hardly to be preserved This Assembly taking the same into their serious Considerations and gravely weighing the Obligations they are to discharge to God the King and the Countrey have by setling the Laws diligently endeavoured to prevent the like inconveniences by causing the whole body of the Laws to be Reviewed all unnecessary Acts and chiefly such as might keep in memory our forced Deviation from his Majesties Obedience to be Repealed and Expunged and those that are in force to be brought into one Volume and lest any prejudice might arise by the ignorance of the times from whence those Acts were in force they have added the Dates of every Act to the end that Courts might rightly administer Justice and give sentence according to Law for any thing hapning at any time since any Law was in force and have also endeavoured in all things as near as the capacity and constitution of this Countrey would admit to adhere to those Excellent and often refined Laws of England to which we profess and acknowledge all Reverence and Obedience and that the Laws made by us are intended by us but as brief Memorials of that which the capacity of our Courts is utterly unable to Collect out of its vast Volumns though sometimes perhaps for the difference of our and their Condition varying in small things but far from the presumption of contradicting any thing therein contained And because it is impossible to honour the King as we should unless we serve and fear God as we ought and that they might shew their equal care they have set down certain Rules to be observed in the Government of the Church untill God shall please to turn his Majesties pious thoughts towards us and provide a better supply of Ministers among us Be it therefore Enacted by the Governour Council and Burgesses of this Grand Assembly That all the following Laws continued or made by this Assembly shall be hereafter reputed the Laws of this Countrey by which all Courts of Judicature are to proceed in giving of Sentence and to which all persons are strictly required to yield all due Obedience and that all other Acts not in this Collection mentioned be to all intents and purposes utterly Abrogated and Repealed unless Suit be Commenced for any thing done in the time when a Law now repealed was in force in which case the producing that Law shall excuse any person for doing any thing according to the Tenor thereof I. Church to be built or Chappel of Ease BE it Enacted for the advancement of Gods Glory and the more decent Celebration of his Divine Ordinances Tnere be a Church decently built in each Parish of the Countrey unless any Parish as now setled by reason of the fewness or poverty of the Inhabitants be incapable of susteining so great a Charge In which case It is Enacted That such Parishes shall be joyned to the next great Parish of the same County and that a Chappel of Ease be built in such places at the particular Charge of that place II. Vestries appointed THat for the making and proportioning the Levies and Assessements for building and repairing the Churches and Chappels provision for the Poor maintenance of the Minister and such other necessary uses and for the more orderly managing all Parochial affairs Be it Enacted That Twelve of the most able men of each Parish be by the major part of the said Parish chosen to be a Vestry out of which number the Minister and Vestry to make choyce of two Church-wardens yearly as at so in case of the death of any Vestry-man or his departure out of the Parish that the said Minister and Vestry make choyce of another to supply his room And be it further Enacted That none shall be admitted to be of the Vestry that doth not take the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy to his Majesty and subscribe to be
have purchased and hold their Lands by no other Titles then such sales which can be of no validity against the claim of the King whom no time can prescribe and to whom if an Heir appear not the Land must of necessity devolve And if the King should at any time give express Order to an Escheater to make inquiry into the Titles we hold by the said Escheater cannot by vertue of his Office but find all such Lands for the King which we Francis Morison and Thomas Ludwell who are at present intrusted by his Majesties Treasurer to make composition for all Lands so Escheated to his Majesty taking into our serious consideration and out of our tender care of many poor men who by the loss of Lands thus perhaps dearly purchased and honestly payd for and out of our sense of the many inconveniences and great damages would fall upon them by being ousted out of their Possessions by the severity of a too rigorous Escheator and that on the other side we might not seem to debarr his Majesty of his just Rights we have thought it convenient to propose a certain Rule for Compositions for all Lands held by any pretended Right two years by which while the power is in our hands we shall proceed and if the Assembly think it a favour we shall joyn with them making it our request to Major Norwood his Majesties Treasurer to get his Majesty to confine them that no succeeding Escheator may at his pleasure rigorously exceed these our moderate and reasonable Demands 1. We concede that any person having been two years in possession of any Land that ought to have been vested in his Majesty by Escheat shall pay for his Composition but one Hundred Pounds of Tobacco for every fifty acres besides the Fees for finding the Office and drawing the Conveyance 2. That every person having been so in possession two years as aforesaid shall have Eight Months time to petition for and make their Composition but if they defer it longer and another sue for it and obtain it they can impute the blame to nothing but their own neglect 3. That where there is a Widdow she shall enjoy the Land of her Husband during her life and be admitted in the first place to make her Composition for the Fee-simple in case she signifie her desire within the time aforesaid That all Lands escheated before the two years aforesaid the person concerned shall pay for his Composition as aforesaid but all Lands which shall hereafter lapse or which have lapsed within the two years last past the Composition to be made for with those by his Majesties Treasurer appointed and authorized thereunto and that the Widdow be admitted in the first place she making her claim within Eight Months according to the Proposition abovesaid XIX Courts WHereas the name of Quarter-Courts is altogether unsuitable to the nature of those Courts held by the Governour and Council both in respect there are but three of those Courts in the year as also because they are not equally distributed in the Quarters of the Year September and November being too neer and March too long from them to admit of that Title Be it therefore enacted That the said Courts be no longer stiled Quarter-Courts but that they be henceforth called General-Courts a name more suitable to the nature of them as being places where all persons and causes have generally audience and receive determination Whereas the Acts of Assembly already made are very defective in prescribing the Rules to be observed in the proceedings both in those General and the particular County-Courts for want whereof many errors are committed the respects due to the Courts so nearly representing His Majesties sacred Person by the clamorous unmannerliness of the people lost and the Order Gravity and Decorum which should manifest the authority of a Court in the Court it self neglected And in regard the long omission of those hugely material though in themselves little things of form hath caused all things still to continue in the first disorders It hath appeared necessary to this present Grand Assembly to set down the Rules and Forms themselves for the beginning continuance and proceedings in the said Courts as followeth And it is therefore enacted That the General-Courts begin and continue as followeth viz. General Courts to begin and continue That March-Court begin the Twentieth of March if it be not Saturday or Sunday and then the Munday following and hold eighteen dayes not accounting Sundays in the number That September-Court begin the Twentieth of September if it be not Saturday or Sunday and then to begin the Munday following and hold Twelve dayes not accompting Sundayes in the number That November-Court begin the Twentieth of November if it be not Saturday or Sunday and then to begin the Munday after and hold twelve dayes not accounting Sundayes in the number That Adjournments of the said Courts be alwayes avoided and that they begin precisely upon the day that all persons knowing the day of the return of the Writs may accordingly give their attendance Stile how entred That the Stile of the Court be entred thus At a General Court held at james-James-City the twentieth of _____ by His Majesties Governour and Council in the _____ year of the Raign of our Soveraign Lord Charles the Second by the Grace of God of Great Britain France and Ireland King Defender of the Faith c. and in the year of our Lord God _____ present Insert the name of the Governour and Council Silence commanded Then let the Cryer or under-Sheriff make Proclamation and say O Yes O Yes O Yes silence is commanded in the Court while His Majesties Governour and Council are sitting upon pain of Imprisonment Suitors to appear After Silence commanded let the Cryer make Proclamation saying All manner of persons that have any thing to do at this Court draw neer and give your attendance and if any one have any plaint to enter or suit to prosecute let them come forth and they shall be heard When silence is thus commanded and Proclamation made upon calling the Docket the Cryer shall call for the Plaintiff Calling the Plaintiff A. B. Come forth and prosecute thy Action against C. D. or else thou wilt be nonsuite and the Plaintiff putting in his Declaration the Cryer shall call for the Defendant Calling for the Defendant C. D. come forth and save thee and thy Bail or else thou wilt forfeit thy Recognizance For proceedings in the said Courts Warrants to be issued by the Clerks XX. Actions to be Proportioned BE it Enacted That Warrants be issued by the Clerks of the General Courts and the said Clerk so proportion the number of his Actions that there be for each day Twenty and that until there be Twenty Actions entred for the first day no Warrant issue for the second and then Twenty for the second before any issue for the third and so proportionably Twenty per day for so many days as there are