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Article THE APPEAL OF BRO. JOHN LEE STEVENS ← Page 4 of 6 →
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The Appeal Of Bro. John Lee Stevens
at the trial ; and this brought him again to the question of expediency . Ii might be inexpedient to examine all the witnesses in Grand Lodge , and therefore the evidence ~ taken ^ either by the Grand Secretary , or by the President , or some other member of the Board of General Purposes , ought to be laid before the Grand Lodge ; but to refuse'to hear the evidence in any shape would be most unjust to the appellants , and place the Grand Lodge in the dilemma of deciding without the facts . Brother POLLOCKPast Grand Registrarwould contend that this was
, , not like the case of an appeal in which the evidence was gone into at quarter sessions ; for that was under a particular statute . He agreed in opinion with Bros . Harrison and Henderson . Brother KENYON PARKER , S . G . D ., said , that allusion having been made to the Court of Chancery , and being connected with that court , he would observe that the present were entirely dissimilar proceedings ; for there the evidence was part of the record , and the whole record was of course examined .
Brother HENRY UDALL contended that the appeal was entirely nugatory , unless the evidence was considered on which the judgment had been given . That to decide and not to examine the evidence was making the authority o thc Board of General Purposes independent of Grand Lodge , which was quite contrary both to the letter and spirit of the BOOK OF CONSTITUTIONS . That book gave THE GRAND LODGE a supreme superintending power over all other Masonic bodies . He pointed out to the Grand Master how serious it would be to make such a precedent to guide future Grand Lodges . The decision of
the Board might be arrived at by a simple majority , and yet the question could not be investigated further ; and thus bythe decision of one individual a Masonic stain might be cast on a Brother for life . As to the construction put on the Constitutions by the legal authorities , he expressed his unfeigned surprise , and particularly at the speech of a gentleman of the legal acquirements of Brother John Henderson . One fallacv nervaded the whole of that
Brother's speech—the confounding an appeal against a judgment which had been given on an examination of testimony with an appeal against a judgment given on facts admitted and arrived at by arguments on the law . Brother Plenderson argued as though there was no mode of appeal except by writ of error , although he must be well aware of the distinction . An appeal , by the very force of the term , implied a power to examine the judgment appealed against , and how could a Court of appeal ascertain whether the judgment was correct or incorrect wdthout going through the same process as the Court
below had done before giving a decision ? Where the Courts below arrive at their judgments by an examination of the law , the Courts of appeal do the same ; where the Court below decides on evidence , so does the Court above ; such was the distinction in this country , and the universal rule from the lowest Court of Petty Sessions to the Plouse of Lords , and he challenged Brother John Plenderson to give one instance in any system of law , English or Foreign , in which ihe practice was to thc contrary . Besides , the present appeal was analogous to a criminal proceeding , and would depend mainly on ,
the credence given to thc testimony ofthe parties examined . He said he thought it would be clear , so far as analogy went to other laws , that the evidence must be examined . But there was that which more nearly resembled the present proceedings than anything that had been yet noticed—he alluded to the proceedings of both Houses of Parliament . Those bodies continuall y appointed select committees to investigate a particular subject , which committees made their report , the report was printed , and thc discussion came on by an examination of the evidence whether their report should be adopted .
THE DEPUTY GRAND MASTER , THE EARL OF ZETLAND , here said : " In such cases the committee report the evidence . " Brother STEVENS asked why had not the Board of General Purposes reported the evidence ? He had himself taken a close note of all that was
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
The Appeal Of Bro. John Lee Stevens
at the trial ; and this brought him again to the question of expediency . Ii might be inexpedient to examine all the witnesses in Grand Lodge , and therefore the evidence ~ taken ^ either by the Grand Secretary , or by the President , or some other member of the Board of General Purposes , ought to be laid before the Grand Lodge ; but to refuse'to hear the evidence in any shape would be most unjust to the appellants , and place the Grand Lodge in the dilemma of deciding without the facts . Brother POLLOCKPast Grand Registrarwould contend that this was
, , not like the case of an appeal in which the evidence was gone into at quarter sessions ; for that was under a particular statute . He agreed in opinion with Bros . Harrison and Henderson . Brother KENYON PARKER , S . G . D ., said , that allusion having been made to the Court of Chancery , and being connected with that court , he would observe that the present were entirely dissimilar proceedings ; for there the evidence was part of the record , and the whole record was of course examined .
Brother HENRY UDALL contended that the appeal was entirely nugatory , unless the evidence was considered on which the judgment had been given . That to decide and not to examine the evidence was making the authority o thc Board of General Purposes independent of Grand Lodge , which was quite contrary both to the letter and spirit of the BOOK OF CONSTITUTIONS . That book gave THE GRAND LODGE a supreme superintending power over all other Masonic bodies . He pointed out to the Grand Master how serious it would be to make such a precedent to guide future Grand Lodges . The decision of
the Board might be arrived at by a simple majority , and yet the question could not be investigated further ; and thus bythe decision of one individual a Masonic stain might be cast on a Brother for life . As to the construction put on the Constitutions by the legal authorities , he expressed his unfeigned surprise , and particularly at the speech of a gentleman of the legal acquirements of Brother John Henderson . One fallacv nervaded the whole of that
Brother's speech—the confounding an appeal against a judgment which had been given on an examination of testimony with an appeal against a judgment given on facts admitted and arrived at by arguments on the law . Brother Plenderson argued as though there was no mode of appeal except by writ of error , although he must be well aware of the distinction . An appeal , by the very force of the term , implied a power to examine the judgment appealed against , and how could a Court of appeal ascertain whether the judgment was correct or incorrect wdthout going through the same process as the Court
below had done before giving a decision ? Where the Courts below arrive at their judgments by an examination of the law , the Courts of appeal do the same ; where the Court below decides on evidence , so does the Court above ; such was the distinction in this country , and the universal rule from the lowest Court of Petty Sessions to the Plouse of Lords , and he challenged Brother John Plenderson to give one instance in any system of law , English or Foreign , in which ihe practice was to thc contrary . Besides , the present appeal was analogous to a criminal proceeding , and would depend mainly on ,
the credence given to thc testimony ofthe parties examined . He said he thought it would be clear , so far as analogy went to other laws , that the evidence must be examined . But there was that which more nearly resembled the present proceedings than anything that had been yet noticed—he alluded to the proceedings of both Houses of Parliament . Those bodies continuall y appointed select committees to investigate a particular subject , which committees made their report , the report was printed , and thc discussion came on by an examination of the evidence whether their report should be adopted .
THE DEPUTY GRAND MASTER , THE EARL OF ZETLAND , here said : " In such cases the committee report the evidence . " Brother STEVENS asked why had not the Board of General Purposes reported the evidence ? He had himself taken a close note of all that was