The Poet here recognizes that the validity of a rule of municipal law depends upon its being enforced within the limits of the municipality where it is invoked. The rule of law invoked against Lysander and Hermia, was a rule of municipal law, as distinguished from international law. The former laws apply only to particular municipalities or districts, while the latter obtain, even among different states or nations.1 1 Bl. Comm 44. Sec. 59. Term-Subscribing to oath. "King. You three, Biron, Dumain and Longaville, Your oaths are past and now subscribe your names; If you are arm'd to do, as sworn to do, Subscribe to your deep oath and keep it too."1 As an oath can only be administered by some one authorized to administer oaths,2 and the form of taking the oath is not here presented, the Poet purposely accounts for this absence by saying that the oaths have already been 'Love's Labour's Lost, Act I, Scene I. 12 McLean, Cr. Cases, 135. taken and the names are now but to be subscribed thereto. This verse abounds in proper legal phrases. One "subscribes" to an instrument of writing, when he places his signature at the bottom of the engagement or writing.1 "Term," in the law of contracts, is the space of time given for the discharge of an obligation.2 Statutes, until recorded are not usually enforceable, hence the rules of conduct here are announced as duly recorded. Indeed, the statute law, was understand as the written or recorded laws, to distinguish it from the unwritten or unrecorded laws, at common law.* Sec. 60. Decrees. "Biron. same; 3 Give me the paper, let me read the And to the strict'st decrees, I'll write my name." "King. We must, of force, dispense with this decree, She must lie here, on mere necessity.” Decrees, as generally understood, are sentences or judgments of a court of equity, as distinguished from a court of law, but this is not the sense in which the term is used in this verse, for here the word is used as applying to a legislative act, not to a judgment of a court. In some countries, acts of the legislative branch of Government, or of the sovereign, which have the force and effect of laws, are spoken of as decrees, such as the Berlin and Milan decrees and this is the meaning in which the word is used here. 1 From Latin, sub. under and scribo, to write. 'Bouvier's Law Dictionary. 1 Bl. Comm. 85, 86; 4 Coke, 76. 'Bouvier's Law Dictionary. Love's Labour's Lost, Act I, Scene I. 7 Comyns Dig. 445. "Bouvier's Law Dictionary. Sec. 61. Penalty of the law. "Biron. (Reads) That no woman shall come within a mile of my court-And hath this been proclaimed? Long. Four days ago. Biron. Let's see the penalty. (Reads) On pain of losing her tongue. Who devis'd this? Long. Marry, that did I. Biron. Sweet lord, and why? Long. To fright them hence, with that dread penalty. Biron. A dangerous law against gentility." The idea is expressed in this colloquy that the law would not be effective until it was properly proclaimed as a law and this, of course, is true. The penalty is then adverted to and the avowed purpose is stated to be to deter the violation of the rule prescribed by the edict. This The following occurs, in Love's Labour's Lost (Act IV, Scene III): "Biron. As true, we are, as flesh and blood can be, The sea will ebb and flow, heaven show his face; Young blood will not obey an old decree: We cannot cross the cause why we were born; In Merchant of Venice (Act I, Scene II) the effect of a decree, contrary to the inclinations of youth, is spoken of as follows: "Por. The brain may devise laws for the blood; but a hot temper leaps over a cold decree; such a hare, is madness, the youth, to skip o'er the meshes of good counsel, the cripple." Complaining of his past treatment, the King said to his son, in 2 Henry IV (Act IV, Scene IV): "K. Hen. . . Give that which gave thee life unto the worms; pluck down my officers; break my decrees." In King Richard, in exiling Bolingbroke and Norfolk, the King said: "K. Rich. Let them lay by their helmets and their spears, And both return back to their chairs again; 'Love's Labour's Lost, Act I, Scene I. (Act I, Scene III.) '1 Stephen, Comm. 25; 10 Pet. 18. A law not properly promulgated or proclaimed, would be no law. Bouvier's Law Dictionary. is the object of all penal provisions, to deter those upon whom the law is to operate from a violation of its provisions. But if the penalty is too harsh for the offense. prescribed, it is not generally, a good law, for it will be apt to be violated and the penalty dispensed with, hence Biron concludes that this harsh provision is "a dangerous law." Sec. 62. Attainder. "Biron. . I am foresworn on mere necessity.- "Attainder" was that extinction of civil rights and capacities which took place, at common law, whenever a person who had committed treason or other felony, received the sentence for his crime. Attainder was either by confession, in court; by verdict, or by process of outlawry, in case of his flight. The effect of an attainder was that the felon's estate, real and personal, was forfeited; his blood was corrupted, so that nothing passed by inheritance, to, from or through him, and he was unable to sue to enforce any right in a court of justice. Of course the player spoke extravagantly in the use of this term as a penalty for the offense considered. The King, in Hamlet, mentions "How dangerous is it, that this man goes loose;" but he concludes, "Yet must not we put the strong law on him." (Act IV, Scene III.) 11Kent's Comm. 467; 1 Bl. Comm. 88; 1 Comyns Dig. 444. 2 Love's Labour's Lost, Act I, Scene I. 1 Bishop, Criminal Law, 641; 1 Stephen, Comm. 408. 4 Coke, Litt. 391. 6 Coke, 63a, 63b; Coke, Litt. 130a; 1 Bishop, Criminal Law, 641; 2 Gabbett, Criminal Law, 538. Attainder is not known in the United States. 4 Kent's Comm. 413, 420. |