HABEAS CORPUS 



HACHETTE 



by affidavits showing that the person on whose 

 behalf the motion or application is made is illegally 

 detained. The chief rules of the act are as follows. 

 When a person is committed to prison the judge to 

 whom application is made must, unless there has 

 been great delay in making the application, grant 

 the writ of habeas corpus. The writ must be 

 obeyed, more or less promptly according to the 

 distance ; but in no case must the delay exceed 

 twenty days. Any officer who refuses the prisoner 

 a copy of the warrant of commitment, or who shifts 

 the prisoner to another custody without authority, 

 forfeits 100, and for the second offence 200, and 

 is disabled to hold office. No person once delivered 

 by habeas corpus may be recommitted for the same 

 offence under a penalty of 500. A person com- 

 mitted for treason or felony may insist on being 

 tried in the next term or session, or admitted to 

 bail, unless the crown witnesses cannot be ready : 

 if not tried in the second term or session he must 

 be discharged. Any judge who denies the writ 

 forfeits 500. This is now the only case in which 

 a private person may take proceedings against a 

 judge in respect of an act done in his judicial 

 capacity. 



The Habeas Corpus Act extends only to the 

 cases of persons imprisoned on criminal charges ; 

 but in 1816 its provisions were extended to other 

 cases by the 56 Geo. III. chap. 100. The result of 

 these enactments is that in all cases where any 

 person, whether man, woman, or child, is deprived 

 of liberty, some friend may apply for a habeas 

 corpus directed to the officer or private person 

 having custody of the prisoner. Refusal to make 

 any return to the writ will of course be dealt with 

 as contempt of court. If the party is detained by 

 lawful authority (e.g. in the case of a child in 

 the care of its parents, or a dangerous lunatic 

 privately kept under restraint by his friends) the 

 facts must be stated in the return. If the alleged 

 authority is of a formal character (e.g. a warrant 

 of commitment, or a certificate of lunacy ) it must 

 be produced, and the court will judge of its legal 

 sufficiency. A writ of habeas corpus runs in any 

 county palatine or privileged place, in the Channel 

 Islands, and the Isle of Man. In the case of 

 Anderson, a slave who in 1853 had escaped to 

 Canada after killing a Missouri planter, it was held 

 that the writ might be applied for by a person 

 confined in a colony ; but an act passed in 1862 

 provides that the writ shall not run in any colony 

 where there is a court having authority to grant a 

 habeas corpus. 



The law of habeas corpus does not extend to 

 Scotland ; but the subject is protected by the 

 Wrongous Imprisonment Act, 1701, chap. 6, which 

 is often called the Scotch Habeas Corpus Act. In 

 Ireland there was no Habeas Corpus Act until 

 1783 ; and the provisions of the law then passed 

 have frequently been suspended by acts arming 

 the government with exceptional powers. The 

 protection of habeas corpus is secured to American 

 citizens by the constitution of the United States, 

 and by the constitution of most of the states. The 

 state courts do not discharge persons imprisoned 

 by order of federal courts ; nor will the federal 

 courts interfere with persons imprisoned under 

 state process. 



In times of rebellion or disturbance the govern- 

 ment may find it necessary to arrest dangerous 

 persons, and to detain them in custody without 

 bringing them to trial. In such cases the govern- 

 ment may either break the law and apply to par- 

 liament for an Act of Indemnity, or it may invite 

 parliament to suspend the Habeas Corpus Act for 

 a time. In 1881, for example, the Irish govern- 

 ment was empowered to detain without trial all 

 persons reasonably suspected of complicity in 



treason and crime. In the United States, Merry- 

 man's case, in 1867, gave rise to a keen discussion, 

 some eminent lawyers maintaining that the presi- 

 dent, of his own authority, could suspend the law 

 of habeas corpus, others contending that the power 

 of suspension could only be exercised by congress. 

 For the history and law of Habeas Corpus, see 

 Blackstone's Commentaries, Hallam's Constitutional 

 History, Story's Commentaries on the Constitution, 

 of the United States, &c. 

 Habergeon. See HAUBERK, ABMOUR. 



Habington, WILLIAM, poet, was born at 

 Hindlip in Worcestershire, November 4, 1605. 

 His family was Catholic ; his uncle was executed, 

 and his father lay six years in the Tower, for com- 

 plicity in Babington's plot. He was educated at 

 St Omer, but declined to become a Jesuit, and was 

 next sent to Paris. He married Lucy Herbert, 

 daughter of the first Lord Powis, and has immor- 

 talised her in his Castara, a collection of lyrical 

 poems, some of rare beauty and sweetness, and 

 stamped throughout with a purity then unusual. 

 It was first published in quarto in 1634. His 

 father died in 1647, and he himself, says Wood, 

 ' who did then run with the times and was not 

 unknown to Oliver the usurper, died on the 30th of 

 November 1654.' Other works of Habington were 

 The Historic of Edward the Fourth (1640); The 

 Queene of Aragon, a Tragi-comedie (1640); and 

 Observations upon Historic ( 1641 ). 



Habit. See HEREDITY, INSTINCT, REFLEX 

 ACTION, VARIATION, ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS, 

 CAUSALITY, ETHICS. 



Habit and Repute, a phrase used in Scotch 

 law to denote something so notorious that it affords 

 strong and generally conclusive evidence of the 

 facts to which it refers. The best-known example 

 of this is where a man and woman cohabit as hus- 

 band and wife, and are reputed by the neighbours 

 to be married, in which case the law of Scotland 

 accepts the cohabitation and the proof by public 

 opinion as evidence that a marriage has been con- 

 tracted by the parties by the interchange of con- 

 sent. In England no such doctrine prevails, and 

 the marriage would have to be proved in the usual 

 way, if called in question, by a suit which directly 

 raises such question, though the parties had all 

 their lives lived together as man and wife. There 

 is also in Scotland an application of the doctrine 

 of habit and repute to persons when convicted of 

 stealing ; for if the individual is a habit and repute 

 thief i.e. a notorious thief the repute that the 

 accused gets his livelihood or supplements it by 

 thieving is technically an aggravation of the 

 offence, and may be charged and proved as such ; 

 nor is it necessary to the establishment of such a 

 charge that the accused should have been previ- 

 ously convicted. In England and Scotland a some- 

 what similar effect is produced more circuitously, 

 by proving that the thief has been several times 

 previously convicted (is an 'habitual criminal'), in 

 which case he is generally more severely punished. 



Habitual Drunkards Act. See INE- 

 BRIATES (RETREATS FOR). 



Habsburg. See HAPSBURG. 



Hachettc, Louis, French publisher, was born 

 at Rethel in the Ardennes, on 5th May 1800. In 

 1826 he established in Paris a publishing business, 

 principally with the intention of issuing books 

 calculated to improve school teaching and elevate 

 the general intelligence. In pursuance of his plan 

 he has published several series of books, as the 

 Bibliotheque populaire, Bibliotheque variee, &c., 

 which have done most useful service in disseminat- 

 ing information and amusement among the people. 

 He also deserves to be mentioned as a friend of the 



