Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- PART I LAYING DOWN THE LAW: 600–1500
- PART II CONFLICT OF LAWS: 1500–1766
- PART III THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE LAW
- 18 The Purity of England's Air
- 19 The Menace of the Mob
- 20 The Fear of the Felon
- 21 Garrow's Law?
- 22 The Tongue of Cicero: Thomas Erskine
- 23 The Drum Major of Liberty: Henry Brougham
- 24 The Bonfire of the Inanities: Peel, Public Protection and the Police
- 25 Lunacy and the Law
- 26 Necessity Knows No Law
- 27 The Apollo of the Bar: Edward Marshall Hall
- PART IV THE RULE OF LAW: 1907–2014
- Bibliography
- Index
23 - The Drum Major of Liberty: Henry Brougham
from PART III - THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE LAW
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 May 2015
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- PART I LAYING DOWN THE LAW: 600–1500
- PART II CONFLICT OF LAWS: 1500–1766
- PART III THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE LAW
- 18 The Purity of England's Air
- 19 The Menace of the Mob
- 20 The Fear of the Felon
- 21 Garrow's Law?
- 22 The Tongue of Cicero: Thomas Erskine
- 23 The Drum Major of Liberty: Henry Brougham
- 24 The Bonfire of the Inanities: Peel, Public Protection and the Police
- 25 Lunacy and the Law
- 26 Necessity Knows No Law
- 27 The Apollo of the Bar: Edward Marshall Hall
- PART IV THE RULE OF LAW: 1907–2014
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
I stand engaged to bring before you the whole state of the common law … with the view of pointing out those defects which may have existed in its original construction, or which time may have engendered, as well as considering those remedies appropriate to correct them.
Henry Brougham in the House of Commons, 7 February 1828 (EHD, XI)Born the year Garrow entered, and Erskine left, Lincoln's Inn, the third member of the Scottish trinity of great common law lawyers is Henry Brougham. Although his father was English, his mother was Scottish, and Henry was born and brought up in the intellectual centre of the Enlightenment world, Edinburgh. He was educated at both the Royal High School there and at its university, studying natural sciences and mathematics as well as law. Admitted to the Faculty of Advocates in 1800, he practised little in Scotland before he too, in 1803, enrolled in Lincoln's Inn. Five years later he was called to the English Bar.
A founder of, and leading contributor to, the radical publication The Edinburgh Review, and an ardent opponent of slavery, he was guaranteed a warm reception by the leading London Whigs, Lord Grey and Fox in particular. He enthusiastically engaged with Wilberforce in his anti-slave trade campaign and wrote several tracts in support.
He also successfully represented John and Leigh Hunt in their trial for seditious libel, the supposed libel being an exposure of the extent and severity of flogging in the British Army. In February 1811 the trial took place in the King's Bench before Chief Justice Ellenborough, and was prosecuted by a future Chief Justice, Vicary Gibbs. Addressing the jury, Brougham told them that they were trying a more general question than whether the article was written for a wicked purpose: ‘You are now to determine whether an Englishman still enjoys the privilege of freely discussing public measures.’
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- Law, Liberty and the ConstitutionA Brief History of the Common Law, pp. 218 - 223Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2015