Note 30 — Chapter LXXI · THE HISTORY OF TIM THE SNAMMER.

Taken as a body, there is not a more infamous and tyrannical set of authorities on the face of the earth than the unpaid magistracy of England. How the high spirited people of this country can endure such an atrocious system, is to us surprising. Almost entirely irresponsible—chosen on account of their wealth and influence in their respective counties, but without the least reference to their abilities—and, by the very circumstances of their position, opposed to the interests of the masses, the justices of the peace are so many diabolical tyrants vested with a power which completely coerces the industrious and labouring classes. If it be necessary to have paid barristers as magistrates in the cities and great towns, why should not the same rule apply to smaller towns and to rural districts? To invest an irresponsible, narrow-minded, and prejudiced body of men with such immense powers as those wielded by magistrates, is a foul blot upon our civilisation. Prison-chains, fines, and treadmills are at the disposal of these justices; and the use they make of their power proves that the entire system on which their attributes and jurisdiction are based, deserve universal execration. Thousands and thousands of honest, well-meaning, hard-working families have been ruined by this hierarchy of terrestrial fiends. Talk of the freedom of the British subject, and boast of the trial by jury! Why, any magistrate, by his own single decision, can award heavy fines or months of imprisonment! The unpaid magistracy exists as a protection and also as an agency for the infernal Game Laws. Their local powers and influence give them immense weight in general elections, for poor people are afraid to offend them. But the worst kind of unpaid magistrates are the clergymen who are in the commission of the peace. These men usually act more like off-shoots of the Czar of Russia than as magistrates in a civilised country and as ministers of the charitable and generous doctrines of the Christian faith.