Royal Commission for Consolidating the Statute Law

The Royal Commission for Consolidating the Statute Law (also known as the Statute Law Commission of 1854) was a

In the

The Royal Commission on Revising and Consolidating the Criminal Law was established in 1854 and issued its final report in 1849.^[2] In autumn of 1852, the Lord Chancellor, Edward Sugden, 1st Baron St Leonards, directed James John Lonsdale and Charles Greaves to prepare Bills for the codification of criminal law based on the reports of the Criminal Law Commissioners.^[2] Two major Bills based on the work of the Commission covering offences against the person and larceny were introduced in 1853 and continued under Lord Cranworth. The bills made no progress, principally because of the unanimously unfavourable judicial reaction to the prospect of the common law being embodied in statutory form.^[4]

At the start of the parliamentary session in 1853, Lord Cranworth announced his intention to the improvement of the statute law and in March 1853, appointed the Board for the Revision of the Statute Law to repeal expired statutes and continue consolidation, with a wider remit that included civil law.^[2] The Board issued three reports, recommending the creation of a permanent body for statute law reform.

The Commission was appointed by

The Commission consisted of:[2]

The barrister Matthew Brickdale was appointed Secretary to the Commission.^[2] Ker was the only paid member of the commission, receiving a salary of £1,000.^[8]

The Commission first met on 13 November 1854, with apologies from the Lord Chancellor, Robert Rolfe, 1st Baron Cranworth.^[6] Following the Commission's next meeting on 15 November 1854, the Commissioner's agreed to divide into sub-committees to superintend paid draftsmen in the consolidation of a particular branch of the statute law.

The Commission issued four reports dated 10 July 1855, 5 March 1856, 11 June 1857 and February 1859.

The Commission issued its first report on 10 July 1855.^[9][6] Work undertaken focused on the production of several independent consolidation bills, rather than proposing a large overall scheme of change.

The Commission observed difficulties in relation to the consolidation of the statutes, including:

1. Arrangement of materials. Statutes were a collection of amendments and additions to the general body of the unwritten common law, making systematic classification difficult.
2. Scientific vs. Practical Classification. A purely analytical classification, as proposed by jurists, would require disassembling and reorganising the entire statute book, which would not align with the practical needs of those who use the law, such as legal professionals and judges.
3. Need for Simultaneous Reform. Reorganising statute law into a new classification system would require all affected laws to be passed at once, which was seen as impractical given the legislative process.
4. Defining “Consolidation”. While clear in simple cases, larger-scale consolidation presented challenges, particularly in deciding whether the process should merely restate existing laws or also introduce amendments.
5. Extent of Simplification and Amendment. Whether and to what extent simplifications and corrections of defects should be introduced.
6. Retention of Existing Wording. Retaining exact original language maintained consistency with judicial interpretations, but rewriting in a clearer form could help incorporate judicial decisions directly into the statutes.

The Commission concluded by observing that, which respect to current legislation:^[2]

"Perhaps nothing satisfactory towards the improvement of future legislation can be effected until either a board or some other persons are appointed, whose duty it shall be either to prepare or revise and report upon all Bills before they are brought into Parliament, and to watch them during their progress through the two Houses, either as officers of the Lord Chancellor or of some other Minister, or as officers of the two Houses of Parliament"

The report was laid on the table in the House of Commons on 13 July 1855.^[10] On 2 August 1855, the House of Commons ordered that copies of any replies received by the Commission in relation to No. 6 of the Appendix II of the report be laid on the table,^[10] which were presented on 7 August 1855 and printed on 8 August 1855.^[10]

Following the publication of the first report dated 10 July 1855, the Commission turned its attention "to devise and suggest such rules, if any, as might in our judgement tend to ensure simplicity or uniformity, or any other improvement, in the form and style of future Statues".^[7]

The Commission issued its second report on 5 March 1856.^[11][9][7] It recommended the adoption of two plans:^[2]

1. The appointment of an officer or board to revise and improve current legislation "to advise on the legal effect of every Bill which either House of Parliament should think fit to refer to them, and, in particular, on the existing state of the law affected by the proposed Bill, its language and structure, and its operation on the existing law; and also to point out what Statutes it repeals, alters, or modifies, and whether any Statutes or clauses of Statutes on the same subject-matter are left unrepealed or conflicting; so that the House may have at its command the materials which will enable it to deal properly with the Bill."
2. The adoption of a system of classification to the public general statutes across 11 illustrative classes: Army, Navy and Militia; Revenue and other Financial Acts; The United Kingdom; Great Britain; England and Ireland; England; Scotland; Ireland; Special and Local; Colonies; East India.

The Commission issued its third report on 11 June 1857.^[12][13][14] The Commissioners stated that they had given instructions for the preparation of a classification of statutes and a .^[2]

The Commissioners recommended the classification of the whole existing general statute law into four classes:[2]^[12]

1. Historical statutes
2. Enactments which require to be re-written
3. Statutes standing alone, and not requiring consolidation
4. Statutes requiring consolidation

The Commissioners also gave instructions for a sessional register of statutes and produced a specimen for the session ending in 1837 (

The Commission argued that the public general statutes since the year 1800, consisting of 6,887 statutes across 23 and a half quarto volumes averaging 1,000 pages each, could be reduced to 1,836 statutes across Class IV to IX. inclusive across 6 quarto volumes.[15]

The Commission recommended completing the register to a much earlier date and found that it was probable, from the data furnished by the register, that the whole of the existing statute law might be usefully consolidated into 300 or 400 statutes across 173 heads.^[2][15] The Commissioners had prepared 90 consolidating Bills and the work may require ten or twelve permanent draftsmen two years to complete.^[2]

The work of the Commission faced wide criticism from politicians, legal academics and commentators, who focused on the high expenditure of the committee, especially on the salary and motivations of the Commissioners and draftsmen, including Charles Henry Bellenden Ker, the proposed approach taken by the Commission to proceed with consolidation before expurgation, and the lack of results to show for it.^[17]

The first report accidentally included in the appendix criticism by Charles Henry Bellenden Ker of the resolution of the House of Commons decision to print an expurgatory list of statutes and a later resolution to bring forward a Bill to expurgate the statute book of those acts, as well as criticism of the Personal Estates of Intestates Bill after it had been passed by the House.^[18] This was acknowledged in Parliament on 2 August 1855 which did not object to the production of copies of replies to the appendix by Thomas Chisholm Anstey and George Coode.^[19] The matter was raised again by Peter Locke King MP on 11 April 1856, eliciting an apology from one of the Commissioners, Spencer Horatio Walpole.^[18]

On 8 May 1856, following criticism by Peter Locke King MP, the House of Commons ordered for returns showing a breakdown of expenditure of the Commission and a list of names and fees paid to each draftsmen of the proposed Consolidation Bills.^[20] In returns dated 9 May 1856, showed that the commission had incurred expenses of £2,919 7s. 5.s, leaving a balance of £3,029 11s. and 7d as of 30 April 1856.^[21] A motion to authorise the commissions expenditure closely passed on 2 June 1856, but was objected to by Peter Locke King MP who criticised the annual salary of £1,000 to Charles Henry Bellenden Ker (£600 for other Commissioners) and the £1,051 5s. spent on draftsmen, as well as the lack of results obtained by the Commission and its predecessors.^[22]

By 1869, the Commission incurred expenses of £40,052 23s. and 8d,^[5] which was subject to criticism by legal academics and commentators,^[23] and by politicians, including Peter Locke King MP and George Hadfield MP as part of a resolution criticising the expensive process of legal revision that had taken place over 36 years, costing the country over £80,000 without yielding substantial results.^[24]

The draft Bills proposed by the Committee were criticised for their quality of drafting.

Furthermore, Bellenden Ker was criticised for not reviewing the draft Bills, instead focusing in the first report of reviewing all Bills introduced in either House of Parliament.^[17]

The Commission faced significant criticism in Parliament for its slow progress and perceived ineffectiveness. During a May 1855 debate, several MPs, including

Following the Commission's second report, which recommended the appointment of an officer or board to revise and improve current legislation, the House of Commons resolved on 25 April 1856, requesting a "Copy of the Memorandum of the Attorney-general as to the plan of proceeding in Consolidation of the Statutes".^[20] The memorandum, dated 2 April 1856, was published on 9 May 1856.^[20] Attorney General, Alexander Cockburn, proposed a plan of proceeding for the consolidation of the statutes, remarking that:^[21]

"In order to form a correct judgment as to the course of proceeding which it is expedient to adopt in the Consolidation of the Statutes, it is, in the first place, necessary to have a clear view of what is the true nature and extent of the work which the Commission is called upon to execute. It will then be seen how far what has hitherto been proposed is adequate to the magnitude and importance of the work to be accomplished. To me, I must acknowledge, it appears that the view which has been taken of the object has been too limited and narrow, and that the mode of proceeding has, in consequence, been far from commensurate to the magnitude of the undertaking.

It can scarcely be denied that the state of the law of this country is discreditable to us as a great and enlightened people. Partly written, partly unwritten, that part of our law which is unwritten, is to be gathered from the decision sand dicta of judges, dispersed over many hundreds of volumes of reports, or from the opinions of text writers, of various degrees of authority, contained in innumerable works; while the written law is scattered over thousands of statutes, strung together without any attempt at order or arrangement, and forming no less than forty ponderous volumes; the whole body of the law thus consisting a chaotic mass, to which the 'many camel-loads' of jurisprudence, of which the Roman jurists complained, hardly afford a parallel. A life of labour scarcely suffices to the professional lawyer to master, even imperfectly, this vast amount of legal learning; while to the body of the people, whose rights and duties are to be determined, and whose conduct is to be regulated by the law, that law is practically a sealed book.

The time is at length come for remedying, at least in part, this mighty grievance. Although it is still deemed too difficult a task to attempt to embody, in the more tangible form of writing, the floating rules of the unwritten law, we are called upon by the high authority of the Crown to devise means for reducing into shape and order the heterogeneous mass of written laws which now swell and encumber our Statute Book."

The Attorney General criticised the course of action proposed by the Commission, which recommended selecting particular sets or bundles of the statutes for consolidation, for not wholly digesting the statute book and for not expurgating the statute book of obsolete, spent, unnecessary or superseded enactments.^[21] The Attorney General proposed alternative aims to the Commission:^[21]

1. To collect all statutes in force under appropriate heads, i.e., to consolidate.
2. To arrange these heads under the different branches into which the whole body of law divides itself, i.e., to digest.
3. To do this as a great, entire and comprehensive whole into a consolidated and digested body of statute law to be published at once.

To do so, the Attorney General proposed a plan of proceeding, which he suggested would be able to be done in 12-months:^[21]

1. To survey the whole body of the law under branches, divisions and subdivisions.
2. To set aside and omit statutes repealed expressly or by implication, or which have expired.
3. To present consolidating statutes to Parliament with a provision that all statutes not included be expressly repealed (with the exception of Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights, seen as a "profanation" to repeal).

An alternative approach, focusing on expunging obsolete laws from the statute book, followed by consolidation, was proposed by

On 18 July 1859, Robert Rolfe, 1st Baron Cranworth, drew attention Fourth Report of the Commissioners, arguing that they had successfully catalogued and classified 6,887 statutes passed since the Union with Ireland, identifying 1,836 related to permanent rules of civil conduct. Cranworth proposed that the entire consolidation project could be completed within two years under the leadership of a dedicated senior barrister, effectively reducing the statute law to 300-400 consolidated acts contained in three to four volumes. To demonstrate the feasibility of consolidation, Cranworth introduced five sample Bills:^[29]

1. A Bill to Consolidate the Statute Law of England relating to Marriages (Marriages Bill)
2. A Bill to Consolidate the Laws relating to the Registration of Births, Deaths, and Marriages in England (Registration Acts Consolidation Bill)
3. A Bill to Consolidate the Statute Law of England relating to Bills of Exchange and Promissory Notes (Bills of Exchange and Promissory Notes Bill)
4. A Bill to Consolidate the Statute Law of England relating to Executors and Administrators, and the Distribution of the Personal Property of deceased Persons (Executors and Administrators, &c., Bill)
5. A Bill to Consolidate the Statute Law relating to Aliens (Aliens Bill).

On 17 February 1860, the

The Chronological Table of the Statutes, first published in 1870, resembled the sessional register of statutes published as a specimen in the Commission's third report dated 11 June 1857 and the complete register in the Commission's fourth report dated 21 June 1859.