The Courts and Lawyers of New Jersey 1661-1912 (Volume 1) (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1912. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER XXIV. Chancellors, 1703-1776. There are vague references to the Court of Chancery in the Colonial period prior to the arrival of Lord Cornbury in 1703. It is doubtful whether Governor Philip Carteret exercised the powers of a Chancellor by virtue of his authority as Governor representing the King, or whether this power was ever exercised by the Proprietary Governors, although William Griffith in his Law Register, says the court was held by the Governor and his Council from 1698 to 1705.1 A statute in East New Jersey in 1694 declared that any action or suit might be removed after judgment or execution by writ of error before the Court of Common Right, or, in cases of equity, before the High Court of Chancery,2 and an act of 1698 in the same Province provided that the judges of the Court of Common Right for the time being should not be judges of the High Court of Chancery, any law or custom to the contrary notwithstanding,8 but of any such custom we have no account. An ordinance for the Court of Chancery was issued by Lord Cornbury in November, 1705. This recited that it was very necessary that such a court should be established, and declared that the Governor and the Council, or such of them as should take the oath prescribed, were empowered to be the High Court of Chancery, and that the Governor and two of the Council should sit every Thursday at Burlington to hear motions and make orders therein. (See chapter containing the ordinances). (1). Griffith's Law Register, 1183. (2). Grants and Concessions, 348 (3). Ibid., 370 There has been preserved an affidavit of John Pinhorne, Esq., one of the clerks of the Court of Chancery of the Province of New Jersey, dated June 10, 1709, in which he says "That sometime in the month of May, in the sixth year of the Re...