Benefit or Friendly Societies. 149 



llie decision of a judge of a supreme court before them, they could not do 

 otherwise than take his opinion as their guide. 



The result of this case having also been made public through the medium 

 of the newspapers, prosecutions immediately became general throughout the 

 whole of Scotland, but more especially in the capital and its vicinity. In the 

 Justice of Peace Court of Edinburgh, there were sometimes thirty and forty 

 such cases in a day ; and the extent of oppression and injustice to which these 

 measures led^an hardly be imagined. Numbers of poor people, after having 

 contributed to these societies for a long series of years, became unable, in the 

 late distressing times, to continue their payments, and were consequently not 

 only forced to surrender the whole that they had provided for sickness and 

 old age, but also subjected to imprisonment for non-payment of what was called 

 arrears. Others, again, who had contributed for as long a time from mere 

 feelings of benevolence, who had never received, nor intended to receive, any 

 benefit, and who had left the societies from inadvertence or otherwise, were 

 now draggetl before these courts, and decerned against for whatever sums were 

 demanded as arrears. By the statute 6th Geo. IV. cap. 48, under which the 

 Justices act as a small debt court, it is ordered, that " a copy of the account, 

 document of debt, or state of the demand, shall be delivered by a constable or 

 peace-officer, to the defender personally, or left at his dwelling place ;" and 

 in the very summonses issued from the Justice of Peace Court, there is the 

 following " N. B. The Justices strictly enforce the provision of the act which 

 requires a copy of the account, document of debt, or state of the demand to 

 be delivered to. the defender, at the time he is summoned." When such ac- 

 counts were called for, however, the act of Parliament produced, and the note 

 in the summons referred to, the court decided, in no fewer than six different 

 cases, that such objections were frivolous, and intimated that they were deter- 

 mined to enforce payment of these arrears, and to support Friendly Societies 

 by every means in their power, as they considered them most valuable insti- 

 tutions. But the defenders having threatened actions before the Supreme 

 Court, if these decisions were enforced, a farther hearing took place, and 

 several of the Justices at length began to express doubts of the equity of 

 such decisions. With regard to this particular society, it was found that 

 the question ought to have been tried in another court ; and the cases were 

 accordingly remitted to that of the city Magistrates ; but with regard to nu- 

 merous other cases, it was deemed prudent, in the mean time, to delay decide, 

 ing them, until their merits should be farther considered, and proper advice 

 obtained. The city Magistrates having followed the same course, the matter 

 remains for the present unsettled *. 



Such, then, being the nature and supposed difficulties of these questions, it 

 is trusted that the following additional detail will not be considered as alto- 

 gether superfluous for their farther elucidation. 



At the commencement of every Friendly Society, a number of individuals 

 agree to contribute each a sum as entry-money, and afterwards a quarterly 

 contribution for one, two, three, or more years, before any of them shall claim, 

 or be entitled to benefit ; and should any one die or withdraw before the ex- 



* Friendly Societies in England are now pursuing the same measures. One society in London - 

 very lately summoned twenty-seven of its late members for arrears ; but the Magistrates, from the 

 importance of the question, also delayed giving any decision. See the London Trades Free Press 

 newspaper, 24th May 1828. ^ 



