TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION F. 479 



should be established, with the best guarantees obtainable for impartiality and 

 practical wisdom, to determine when each criminal is fit for freedom. 



The first result of this system would be to clear the country of habitual 

 criminals, and to fill the jails ; but in a few years crime would be much diminished, 

 and the moral tone of the people greatly elevated. 



5. On the Feasibility and Importance of Extending to Scotland the proposed 

 Criminal Code for England and Ireland. By W. Neilson Hancock, 

 LL.D., M.B.I.A. 



The criminal code first proposed for England only, after inquiry, was proposed to 

 be extended to Ireland also. A delay has occurred in passing it, which afforded 

 an opportunity of including Scotland also. The system of public prosecution so 

 long prevailing in Scotland, and partially adopted in Ireland, had been partially 

 adopted in England. The complete system in Scotland led to some great 

 economies and simplification of procedure, in dispensing with the double pre- 

 liminary inquiry before coroners and magistrates and the double attendance of 

 witnesses before grand juries and petit juries, the Scotch dispensing altogether 

 with inquests and with grand juries, except in cases of treason. If grand juries 

 were preserved for the two classes of cases of private prosecution and treason 

 and offences against public authority, the double attendance of witnesses might 

 be obviated in the vast majority of cases, and grand juries woidd not be necessary 

 in Scotland to a greater extent than at present. The English Metropolitan police 

 report shows numbers of cases abandoned from cost and trouble of prosecution. 

 The system of inquests might also be limited to a few cases to be conducted more 

 on the plan of Board of Trade inquiries as to ships, and railway inquiries as to 

 accidents, and a few other special cases, so the Scotch would not have to adopt 

 inquests. The Statistical European Congress held at St. Petersburg in 1870, 

 recommended uniform criminal tables for all Europe. A criminal code is the 

 first step towards uniform statistics for England, Scotland, and Ireland. The 

 value of statistical comparison is shown by some results of the first complete 

 comparison of Scotch, English, and Irish crime. In the same population the 

 English figure for crimes against property with violence was 1,014, the Scotch 

 3,175, and the Irish 458. The Scotch figure for assaults and breaches of the peace 

 98,145, the English 22,000, and the Irish 38,351. The first excess was accounted 

 for by the peculiarity of the Scotch Poor Law which prohibited guardians from 

 relieving the able-bodied, however great their distress might be. The second by 

 the weakness of the Scotch in police, only 5,034, as compared with 12,546 for 

 Ireland, and 6,670 for England in the same popidation. The paper also suggested 

 the importance of reducing the law as to offences disposed of summarily to a code. 



TUESDAY, AUGUST 26, 1879. 



The President delivered the following Address : — 



I cannot commence my address to the present meeting of this Section without 

 referring to the very brilliant essay delivered last year at Dublin by my predeces- 

 sor, Dr. Ingram, and which has justly attained an European fame and circulation. 

 It was at once a vindication of the claim of Sociology to a high place in the pro- 

 ceedings of this Association, and a protest against the somewhat narrow limits and 

 methods which political economists have for some time past imposed on themselves. 

 With most of his arguments and statements I cordially- concur. So far from 



