OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 247 



says, " The possession of such an amount as is specified in the act 

 affords no criterion in the colony, where property is notoriously 

 accumulated by every variety of dishonest means. It may be a test 

 of respectability and trustworthiness in a community differently 

 constituted, but wholly fails in a community like this, lacking 

 honesty, but abounding in property. In consequence of this quali- 

 fication being requisite, many honest and respectable persons in the 

 community, very proper to serve on juries, are excluded. 



" Within this range are included a class of persons in the colony 

 who have been transported hither for offences committed out of the 

 colony. They are qualified to act as jurymen under the Local Act. 

 without any proof being required that they had regained that good 

 repute which they once lost, and the mere circumstance of their 

 having served the period of their several sentences, does not establish 

 that fact. 



"There are others who, possessing the qualifications in property, 

 have arrived in the colony as free emigrants, the near relatives of 

 transported persons, under such circumstances as justly to lead to the 

 suspicion of an undue bias existing in any case affecting them, and 

 who have connexions in England, not unlikely to follow them to the 

 colonies, possessing ready means of importing into this country pro- 

 perty dishonestly acquired, and who speedily accumulate wealth by 

 that and other dishonest means. There is no provision for guarding 

 the administration of justice against the predominance of such persons 

 upon the jury list. The effect of the colonial law in practice has been 

 that juries actually empanelled under it, have been frequently formed 

 of very improper persons." 



From the data submitted with Judge Burton's report, he says, "It 

 appears that a party accused, inclined to exercise his right of peremp- 

 tory challenge, might insure a large predominance of convicted per- 

 sons on the jury, inasmuch as the law allows in cases of felony the 

 peremptory challenge of twenty in number, and if a prisoner has 

 professional assistance in his defence, this right of challenge is fully 

 exercised. In one instance I knew gentlemen of high character and 

 respectability thus peremptorily rejected on the part of the prisoner. 

 I took the liberty of asking some of them afterwards if the prisoner 

 was known to them, and was answered that he was not. The 

 conclusion in my own mind was, that they were challenged on 

 account of their respectability. In another case before me, every 

 person of apparent respectability who was called, was peremptorily 

 challenged on the part of the prisoner, which the crown officer 



