THE STIRRING OF POLITICAL ASPIRATIONS. 277 



had himself recommended to the Colonial Office the greater 

 part of the measures which it argued. The most difficult and 

 important of these was trial by jury. 



Field dealt thus with its legal aspects. " Except in certain 

 classes of misdemeanours, which do not induce legal incompe- 

 tencies, and except in case of pardon under the Great Seal, 

 which removes them, men convicted of felony or misdemein- 

 our, after the expiration of their terms of transportation or 

 (after being) pardoned by the Governor, are liable to challenge 

 as jurors. The pardon of the King under Sign-Manual is 

 sufficient in the case of transportation." 1 



There was, of course, the property qualification, and in 

 accordance with the returns sent by the magistrates to Sir John 

 Jamison there were 614 persons free and emancipated owning 

 freehold property and so entitled to act as jurors. But amongst 

 these there were fifty-one officers of Government and many 

 others who, as Bigge pointed out, were " raised too high above 

 the condition of the ordinary description of offenders that come 

 before the Criminal Court to be selected as jurors ". 2 Those 

 born in the Colony and resident on their own property num- 

 bered no more than eighty-seven, and though equal, if not 

 superior in intelligence and moral conduct, to the class from 

 which petty jurors were taken in England, would find it burden- 

 some and expensive to leave their farms to attend the sittings 

 of the Criminal Court. 3 Apart altogether from the legal aspect, 

 it was necessary to consider what would be the actual effect of 

 jury trial, and whether it would secure a more efficient admin- 

 istration of justice. It was in the Criminal Court that it was 

 felt to be most needed, and the petitioners gave little con- 

 sideration to its use in the Court of Civil Judicature. 



Since the time when Ellis Bent and Macquarie had urged it 

 upon the Government, feeling on the subject had undergone 

 some changes. Jeffery Bent doubted whether petty juries would 

 be an advantage and Riley was quite against it. " It is certainly 

 most natural," he said, "that Englishmen should wish for so 

 great a blessing, but according to my opinion the present state 



1 Field to Bigge, 23rd October, 1820. Appendix to Reports. R.O., MS. 

 The last sentence refers to misdemeanours not entailing legal incompetencies. 



2 Bigge's Report, II. 3 Ibid. 



