INTRODUCTION.

THE recent Act, 32 & 33 Vict., c. 37, and the General Rules and Orders which have been made in pursuance of that Act, have added greatly to the efficiency, and, therefore, to the importance, of the Court of Common Pleas at Lancaster.

The main features in the reorganization, which has been effected by and under the Common Pleas at Lancaster Amendment Act, 1869, are the institution of district Prothonotaries, and the extension to them of the powers exercised by the Masters of the Courts at Westminster. All personal actions, perhaps, certainly all in which the defendant can be served with a writ of summons within the County of Lancaster, may now be brought in a superior court, whose judges are the judges of the three superior Courts of Common Law at Westminster, which sits for the transaction of business during the Assizes at Lancaster, Manchester, and Liverpool, and which has offices and officers, invested with the authority of the Common Law Masters in London, in the three principal towns in Lancashire.

The improvement in the constitution of the Court has been accompanied by a simplification of its practice and procedure. Many of the rules and orders of the court were of great antiquity, and there seems to have been considerable difficulty in ascertaining clearly what they were. The practice of the court was, consequently, in a somewhat uncertain and ambiguous state. To remedy this inconvenience, all rules and orders existing at the date of the new general rules and orders (with the exception of certain orders of the Spring Assizes, 1868), have been abolished; and it has been ordered that, where there is no provision to the contrary, the practice of this court shall be as nearly conformable as may be to that of the superior Courts of Common Law at Westminster.

The well-known treatises on the practice of the courts at Westminster will in future serve for the guidance of practitioners, upon almost every point of practice which may arise in the course of an action in the Common Pleas at Lancaster. It is obvious, however, that, in following the practice of the courts at Westminster, attention must be given to the provisions of the recent Act, to the new General Rules and Orders, and, occasionally, to some of the earlier Statutes relating to the practice of this court; and also that the practitioner should be acquainted with the constitution and jurisdiction of the court.

In the following pages, therefore, an attempt is made to supply the reader, who is presumed to be familiar with the practice at Westminster, or to have at hand the ordinary books of practice, with such additional and supplemental directions and information as may be necessary or useful to guide him in the management of business in this court.