Curia Militaris

See Court of Chivalry; Court-Martial; Harcourt, His Grace the Steward, etc. CURIA REGIS (Lat). The king's court. In English Law. A court established in England by William the Conqueror in his own hall. It was the "great universal" court of the kingdom; from the dismemberment of which are derived the present four superior courts in England, viz.: the High Court of Chancery, and the three superior courts of common law, to-wit, The Queen's Bench, Common Pleas, and Exchequer. It was composed of the king's great officers of state resident in his palace and usually attendant on his person; such as the lord high constable and lord marescal (who chiefly presided in matters of honor and of arms), the lord high steward and lord great chamberlain, the steward of the household, the lord chancellor (whose peculiar duty it was to keep the king's seal, and examine all such writs, grants, and letters as were to pass under that authority), and the lord high treasurer, who was the principal adviser in all matters relating to the revenue. These high officers were assisted by certain persons learned in the laws, who were called the king's justiciars or justices, and by the greater barons of parliament, all of whom had a seat in the aula regia, and formed a kind of court of appeal, or rather of advice In matters of great moment and difficulty. These, in their several departments, transacted all secular business, both civil and criminal, and all matters of the revenue; and over all presided one special magistrate, called the chief justiciar, or capital ciarius totius Anglice, who was also the principal minister of state, the second man in the kingdom, and, by virtue of his office, guardian of the realm in the king's absence. This court was bound to follow the king's household in all his expeditions; on that "communia placita non sequantur curiam regis, sed teneantur in aliquo certo loco," which certain place was established in Westminster Hall (where the aula regis originally sat, when the king resided in that city), and there it has ever since continued, under the name of Court of Common Pleas, or Common Bench. It was under the reign of Edward I. that the other several officers of the chief justiciar were subdivided and broken into distinct courts of judicature. A court of chivalry, to regulate the king's domestic servants, and an august tribunal for the trial of delinquent i erected; while the barons reserved to themsi: parliament the right of reviewing the sentences of the other courts in the last resort; but the distribution of common Justice between man and mai arranged by giving to the court of chancery jurisdiction to issue all original writs under the great seal to other courts; the exchequer to manage the king's revenue, the common pleas to determine all causes between private subjects, and the court of king's bench retaining all the jurisdiction not cantoned out to the other courts, and particularly the sole cognizance of pleas of the crown, or criminal causes. 3 Steph. Com. 397; 3 Bla. Com. 38; Bract. 1. 3. tr. 1, c. 7; Fleta, Abr. 2, cc. 2, 3; Gilbert, Hist. C. Pleas, Introd. 18; 1 Reeve, Hist. E. L. 48. The Council of the King. Its early nature is not well understood. Probably its working body consisted of the king's great officers of state and the judges; perhaps others were added to it on particular occasion. It transacted business of state, sometimes taxation and legislation. It was a court of appeal and exercised original jurisdiction. It answered petitions, which was its chief duty. It might send the petition to one of the ordinary courts or lay it before the king. It came to provide new remedies for new wrongs and distribute justice for each man's des Later it was tending to become an executive body. Formerly the Chancellor was the leading legal member of the Council. By the end of the Middle Age's the Chancery has b< a court, but its connection with the Council is so close that in most cases the Council gives the judgment of the court In the Tudor period the Council was re-organized and the Chancery became separate from it. At the end of the 13th and the beginning of the 14th century, Parliament gradually became separate from the Council: a hundred years later a division began to take place within the Council — into the Privy <>r Ordinary Council, tie great officers of state and certain other trusted advisers of t lie king, and the Great Council, which coi of the rrivy Council and the great body of the nobility, spiritual and temporal. The early records speak of the Council; about the time of Henry VI the term Privy Co is met with. The royal authority was exercised through the Council. Towards the end of the 10th century, a committee of practically the whole Council Bitting in the star Chamber gradually absorbed the judicial work of the Council, but the process was gradual and there are few Chamber." Every member of the Privy Council bad tbe right to sit there. At the beginning of the Tudor period tbe court of Star Chamber bad begun to present the appearance of a court more or less separate from the Council acting as an executive body. The Long Parliament abolished the greater part of the judicial business of the Council but only as to English bills or petitions. Its appellate jurisdiction as to places outside the ordinary English law was retained. The act of 1833 provided "for the better administration of justice in His Majesty's Privy Council." * The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council is a committee of an Executive Council. Though spoken of as a court, it has not a self-contained and independent judicial function; its legal operation receives its final consummation and sole efficacy from tbe direct official action of the sovereign in council. Historically it is the oldest of the royal courts. The act of the crown in allowing or dismissing an appeal, according to tbe advice contained in the report of the Judicial Committee, is the, direct lineal descendant of the judgment given by the king in person in the Curia Regis. See 1 Holdsw. Hist E. L. 23. See Judicial Committee of the Privy Council; Court of Star Chamber; Dicey, Privy Council. A collection of cases (1616- 1626) called Abbrematio Placitorum contains the earliest information of the working of the Curia Regis. See Reports; 2 Sel. Essays, Anglo-Amer. L. H. 209. See Procedure in the Curia Regis, by G. B. Adams (13 Columb. L. Rev. 277).