Wood — The Court of Castle Chamber or Star Chamber of Ireland. 153 



To trace the history of this Court in Ireland, it is necessary to go back to 

 the early forms of our Constitution. The King, with the assistance of his 

 Council, was the source of all justice, and any administrative, judicial, or 

 legislative powers exercised by others were derived from him. But whilst he 

 devolved upon Courts of law certain legal powers, and upon Great Councils or 

 Parliaments certain legislative functions, he did not exhaust thereby his 

 royal prerogative; but in certain cases he, with the advice of his Privy 

 Council, still continued to exercise legal and legislative functions. To us at 

 the present time the overlapping of the powers of these bodies in the infancy 

 of the administration seems difficult to understand ; and it is one of the most 

 intricate problems the historian has to solve to trace the gradual evolution of 

 the administration from its original indefinite composition to the fixed and 

 orderly conditions which exist at present. As Mason well points out : " The 

 authorities usurped or legally enjoyed by the Privy Council in Ireland were 

 very considerable, extending indeed to comprehend legislative, executive, and 

 judicial powers to an almost unlimited extent. . . . They granted exemptions 

 from the penalties of the Statute and Common Law in numberless instances : 

 but their encroachment on judicial authorities was most remarkable." 1 And 

 again, he says : " The Privy Council were at all times ready to encroach upon 

 the other authorities of the State, nor is it strange that in troublesome times, 

 and in a distant and disordered land, the limits of power should be indistinctly 

 traced and constantly trespassed on." 2 



But though the conditions in England were not so lawless as in Ireland, 

 we find the King through his Privy Council frequently exercising these 

 arbitrary powers, and thereby coming into conflict with Parliament. Indeed, 

 in England we find special sessions of the Council being held for judicial 

 purposes as early as the time of Henry V, for in the eighth year of his reign 

 (1429-30) it was laid down that, of thoae causes determinable at common 

 law, the only ones to be tried before the Council — that is, in the Star 

 Chamber — were those in which the complaint was against a man of great 

 influence or where the suitor was too poor to prosecute his cause in the 

 inferior courts, or in which the Council saw other reasonable causes. 

 However, the powers of the Council in the Star Chamber were not fixed 

 upon a statutory basis till by 8 Henry VII, e. 13, its functions were limited 

 to cases of maintenance, giving of liveries, having retainers, embracery, jurors 

 receiving money, untrue demeanours of sheriffs in false returns and panels, 



1 Mason, "Essay on the Antiquity and Constitution of Parliaments in Ireland. 1 

 Appendix 3. 

 i Ibid., p. 19. 



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