latest of them he is found challenging what he terms Lord Campbell's "dogma of the House of Lords' judicial infallibility," which he declares has been confirmed in our time without any pretence of serious considera tion," and there is this much truth in the as sertion, that Lords Cramvorth, Wensleydale, and Chelmsford seem, in Beamish v. Beam ish, to have accepted the dogma on Lord Campbell's authority, and Lord Halsbury, again, on their authority. But it has not passed without protest. Lord St. Leonards was strongly of opinion that though the House could not reverse its decision in a particular case, it was not bound by a rule ol law which it might lay down if it should subsequently find reason to differ from that rule; it possessed, he contended, like every court of justice, an inherent power to correct an error into which it may have fallen, and Lord Loughborough held a similar view. Lord Brougham treated it as a vexata qucvstio, and so did Lord Kingsclown. The doc trine does not apply to the privy council, as Lord Cairns emphatically stated; and it is contrary, so Sir Frederick Pollock declares, to the practice of every other court of last resort in the world. Certainly it is a startling proposition that the highest tribunal in the land, because it has once made a mistake, is to persevere in its error for all time. Lord Halsbury finds a justification of the "dogma" in the maxim, Interest reipublica ut sit finis litiion; but may there not be an even higher obligation—an interest more vital to the State—that justice should be adminis tered?—The Law Journal. THE first statute on the subject of tobaccogrowing was passed in 1660 (12 Car. 2, c. 34), and prohibited the planting of tobacco in England and Ireland under the penalty of forfeiture of the crop and a fine of 405. for every rood so planted. The leading motive of this legislation is stated to be the encour agement of our American colonies, which then enjoyed a practical monopoly in the supply of tobacco to this country. The Act does not seem to have effected its purpose, and in 1663 a further statute was passed (15
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Car. 2, c. 7) increasing the penalty from 403 to £10 for every rood planted with tobacco in England and Ireland. Next came a stat ute, passed in 1779 (19 Geo. 3, c. 35), with drawing the prohibition of tobacco-growing as regards Ireland, provided the crop should be exported only to Great Britain, on the preamble that "it is of the greatest import ance to the strength and security of these kingdoms that every attention and encour agement should be given to such of the prod uce and manufacture of the kingdom of Ire land as do not materially interfere with the commercial interests of Great Britain." Just about this time the Scottish farmers, in view of the high price of tobacco due to the Amer ican War, conceived the idea of endeavoring to raise tobacco crops, and we learn from a volume of contemporary Memoirs" that many thousand acres were planted with to bacco. The speculation failed, however, on account of a combination of legal and clima tic obstacles. A very bad season ruined the plants, and the Crown lawyers of the day in tervened in the interests of the revenue. No doubt the prohibitive statutes of Charles II. applied only to England and Ireland, but the authorities took the view that laws relating to colonial matters were, by force of the Union, rendered of equal application in Scot land. To set the matter at rest, another Act was passed in the session 1781-82 (22 Geo. 3, c. 73), entitled an "Act to explain 12 Car. 2, c. 34, and! to permit the use and removal of tobacco, the growth of Scotland, into Eng land for a limited time under certain restric tions." In 1831 the last Act on the subject was passed—viz., I & 2 Will. 4, c. 13, which repealed the exemption conferred on Ireland by 19 Geo. 3, c. 35, and revived in that coun try the original prohibiting statutes of Charles II. At the present moment, accord ingly, it is illegal in England, Scotland and Ireland alike to grow tobacco, except for scientific or medical purposes, which the seventeenth-century legislators favored to the extent of allowing ground not exceeding half a pole to' be planted with tobacco for these purposes exclusively— The Laio Times.
